The Future of Content and SEO – Humans or Robots?

Can artificial intelligence replace human writers? Is it time for content writers to start looking for a new job? We don’t think so!

Artificial intelligence (AI) has come a long way. In fact, you probably use it every day. From asking Siri to take you to the nearest shop, or browsing Netflix until you finally give in to one of its recommendations – AI has pretty much taken over every aspect of our lives.

For many years, we have been discussing that AI is the future of content writing. Many people have even suggested that AI-generated content might become the norm in less than a decade. Artificial intelligence can gain valuable insights and curate content, but can it be used to actually create original, high-quality pieces? 

What is AI-Generated Content?

AI-generated content simply means content written by artificial intelligence and is defined as the ability to emulate human intelligence processes through learning and automation. AI can perform activities that will require intelligence, learning and decision making, which means it can eventually create written content through a natural language generator. 

Within the marketing industry, there’s already a whole range of AI-driven technologies, from chatbots that answer real-time questions to personalised content creation. It’s also good for predicting marketing trends and can help you decide on your marketing priorities, select relevant keywords and analyse a buyer’s journey through your site. AI can often see things and interpret things better and more efficiently than a human.

The Differences Between AI and Machine Learning

AI and Machine Learning are two trending topics, but both are very different. Machine Learning is a current application of AI based on the idea that we should be able to give machines data access and with the information machines should be able to learn more themselves. In short, AI is a bigger concept to create intelligent machines which stimulate human behaviour, emotions and thinking, on the other hand, Machine Learning learns from data without being programmed. 

The Challenges of AI Content Creation

As we explore the world of artificial intelligence content creation, we look into the challenges it could bring and why human writers are irreplaceable.

1. Robots Can’t Replicate the Human Touch

Robots don’t have emotions, memories or preferences – they can’t love or hate (yet). Their lack of emotions and experience is why many believe human content writers are irreplaceable. Human content writers can emotionally interact with their audience and move people in a more powerful way compared to statements of facts produced by artificial intelligence. 

Humans care about other humans’ stories, which are filled with meaningful experiences and memories – ones that robots can’t have. When it comes to robots they simply lack the human flair! AI can’t love content the way our writers do at Flaunt – we put our heart and soul t into our work, and that’s what makes us different.

2. Robots Lack the TOV Flair

AI machines supposedly don’t just have the ability to understand words, but can convey emotion and sentimental intent too. They are said to be able to adapt to clients’ tone of voices, but having the human intelligence and sensitivity to flex this voice, depending on the subject matter, is something artificial intelligence can’t do. 

Having a tone of voice ensures consistency and clear articulation of message across all communications – something we strive for! Human writers are flexible and able to ideate and create from scratch, whereas AI content generators need time to learn and collate ideas from a wealth of content before being able to pick up a brand’s subject matter and voice accurately. For original, fresh and fast ideas, turn to real life content writers.

3. Robot Generated Content is Expensive

AI content creators can be extremely accurate and slick but very pricey. What’s readily available to the public and small businesses is not nearly at the level of the tools large companies have access to. When it comes to robot created content you really get what you pay for. With free AI tools creating content to grammar levels similar to a dodgy Google translation, it’s technology that is still far from reliable enough to replace humans. 

4. Al Content is Not Relatable

People can’t relate to robots in the same way they can humans. Humans empathise with other humans on a real level and this simply cannot be generated by an emotion-lacking robot. Humans like and trust human writers as they are on the same level as them, allowing them to truly connect with the content.

Human writers can evoke readers’ emotions through common ground and relatable emotions – something robots completely lack! Here at Flaunt, everything we do has a clear purpose, allowing us to be creative and move with speed, relating to our clients and their audiences.

When knowing a piece of content is written by a machine, we also have far less emotional involvement versus when we know it’s been written by humans. You could always pretend it has been written by human hand but you risk getting caught out and undermining your brand and position.

Why It’s Important to Humanise AI-Generated Content

AI can power up your content process, but it still requires the human touch. To ensure your AI-generated content is correct and accurate, you should treat the content as a first draft. Keep your brand voice at the forefront of your mind, ensuring you have human flair and personality throughout the generated content. Will this take up as much time as simply creating the content from scratch? Potentially. At the moment, this is the price we all have to pay if using AI to develop content.

AI content follows basic grammatical structure – which may not always be outputted perfectly – making nonsense paragraphs and mimicking pages found on Wikipedia. The key is to proof thoroughly and, if it doesn’t resonate to you, it won’t appeal to your audience either. 

Could a Robot Co-Worker Appear in Your Future?

In short, maybe. There’s nothing set in stone and it could take hundreds of years of technology to reach that point – or maybe even just decades. But there is a greater possibility that human writers will rely on robots and AI content creators to complete more mundane tasks and cover a broader scope of information. In the near future, you should look out for smarter tools, systems and AI implementations within your industry. 

Continue to be more creative and emotional, more human and less robotic, and our lovely content writers will author-onwards for years to come.  

The Future of AI-Generated Content According to Flaunt

What are the consequences of these new technologies for content and SEO? The impact may be minor for now, but surely it pushes you to reconsider the core of your content creation strategy and how AI-generated content can help change the way you work within the marketing industry. Our Graduate SEO and Digital PR Executive, Laura Kirton starts by saying, 

“We have seen artificial intelligence get increasingly smarter and become worryingly more capable of replacing jobs. AI is without a doubt going to be seen more throughout the marketing profession, as we expect this technology to become just as advanced as senior content writers – with half of the time and cost. However, when it comes to creating emotionally driven marketing content, would a computer programme with zero life stories and relatability have such an impact?”

The future of AI-generated content is evolving and may even become the norm in the future. Thom Watson, Director of Natural Search says, 

“Just as robots and automation have replaced many factory jobs, AI is coming for the arguably more menial marketing jobs – in SEO that’s meta descriptions, page titles, category landing pages etc.. You can of course be petulant and fight it, focusing only on its current limitations and blinkering yourself to it, but then all of a sudden it might take your job. So keep an eye on it, understand what it can and can’t do and even if you’re not a coder/developer or data scientist, understand the commercial value and opportunities AI can bring. This will hopefully prevent you from being blindsided in the years to come – it’s a when not an if.”

The world of marketing is an exciting one, with technology developing everyday, but nothing will ever replace the human flair when it comes to delivering brand content that’s filled with personality. Senior Content Lead, Sophie Cartwright adds, 

“AI might eventually be able to replace marketers and writers who focus solely on keyword cramming and creating low-quality, easily-replicable content. But those who focus their efforts on creating captivating storytelling will hold on to their content crown. I really hope this empowers and encourages writers to hone their craft and produce genuinely fantastic content that impresses both readers and the search engines.”

Authenticity is still key, but you should never undervalue the advantage users will get from AI. On one hand, AI-generated content will accelerate within the marketing era, fuelling brands’ content – boosting productivity and saving time and money. But it cannot replace in depth, valuable content that human writers can produce. It’s up to you how you balance the benefits of saving time and generating content quickly with engaging, rich content produced by humans – one that is sure to be challenged in the next few years. 

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