This article is probably a bit late since plenty of content exists on why you should use AI in your business and how to make the most of using a generative content tool. This article isn’t one of those. I will tell you why you should absolutely NOT use AI in your business to generate content.
My background is in operations management, so I’m looking at the technology from an ops perspective. I’ve seen countless examples of how new technologies set loose in a company can wreak havoc without the proper planning upfront—leading to disorganization, frustration, and poor quality.
If any of the points below sound like you, you should take a deep breath and hold off on allowing AI in your business. You should spend more time thinking about your implementation. And remember, if you aren’t the right person to think this through, delegate to someone who can do a good job.
1. You don’t have an individual in charge of standards and best practices
If you tell a group of 20 people to use a new tool without an individual responsible for maintaining best practices, you will get 20 different ways of doing the same thing. Each with a different level of quality, consistency, and efficiency. Having standards for creating content and having your team follow them provides a simple way to define what good looks like.
Your standards should include answers to these questions (and possibly others):
- Are you going to allow AI to generate complete pieces of content? Or just create outlines, blurbs, or sections of content?
- How should the brand be represented? Specifically, how should we reference ourselves?
- What length and style guidelines need to be followed?
- AI tends to repeat points and write unnaturally. What is an acceptable level of repetition and unnatural language?
- What should the tone and vibe of the content be? IE: What is the company’s voice?
- Does the team need to write their outlines and seed the AI before generation?
- What are efficient prompting strategies?
- What editing requirements need to be followed?
- How do you demonstrate authenticity in content not the team didn’t write?
2. You haven’t defined any constraints around AI usage
The person in charge of the AI implementation best practices should also set clear anti-patterns or situations in which you should not use AI. Having guardrails around using a new tool is vital to its success. Best practices include what good looks like. Defined constraints should guarantee that we teach our team what is not allowed.
3. You aren’t disciplined in your process
Is your business so flexible that the process isn’t followed (or it doesn’t exist)? Or do you have people who don’t feel the need to follow a process consistently? Using AI in your business will probably become a mess if this is you. AI will likely be used incorrectly, making your content inconsistent, mediocre, and off-brand.
4. You’re hoping that you can outsource your thought leadership
Under no circumstance should you outsource your thought leadership to AI. I mean, think about it. Most AI models are years old, and training them takes a long time. What kind of thought leadership are you offering if the tool provides information that is YEARS OLD? You can and should use AI for research, but thought leadership should be personal, and if you have something to say, say it. If you need to use AI for thought leadership, maybe you don’t have any.
5. You don’t have a process for training or quality control
When you work on a team, you can’t control everything that happens. But you can control what passes or fails the quality test. Quality control is a must if you use AI to generate content. Any article should be rejected if best practices are not followed, or the content isn’t good enough.
Only you can define what good looks like. Be consistent and ruthless in not letting garbage go live. Training your team on what good looks like will decrease the number of times you have to throw work in the trash. It will only take a few rejections before the team begins turning in quality work every time.
In conclusion
If any of the above points describe you, then you should not use AI yet. Take some time to establish ground rules and define what good looks like. Think through how you want to use the tool, set your boundaries, and teach your team how to use the tool effectively. Once you get these basics down, you can get fancy and more advanced with the technology. AI is a powerful asset to a team that has to generate content. It has the promise of making our lives easier and creating better content and more of it. It can also be a complete disaster if not implemented correctly, leading to lousy content, inconsistent content, and content that doesn’t represent the quality of our brand. As marketers, none of us want that.
