OPINION: You Aren't Fooling Anyone with Your ChatGPT-Written Articles

Being totally honest, I'd be lying if I said I never used AI to write some articles for me. In fact, I just had ChatGPT write two articles for me this morning. Using AI to help you with your content needs is a great first step to get ideas, build foundations, and put ideas to action . . . but AI can't be the one doing all the work.

I wrote an article earlier this year investigating whether or not AI could recognize AI-written work or not (you can read it here, but the TL/DR is no . . . it can't even recognize it's own writing). However, perusing LinkedIn as I normally do, I came across an article written by a marketer at one of my old jobs. When I worked there, the employer didn't care about writing articles or use cases, so them publishing an article piqued my interest (because I'm unhinged, that article is located here). I didn't even make it past the first paragraph - the entire article reeked of AI.

I acknowledge that I'm being entirely hypocritical of judging my previous employer for using AI to write an article when I use it on almost a daily basis. But the difference between my using AI and them using AI is simple: I edit the article enough after it's written to remove the AI nuances so it's unrecognizeable after it's been written. Below are some key items I recognized that gave the AI-written stench a dead giveaway:

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   1. I don't care if it's a user story or a title about catching frogs, AI loves breaking headers up with colons. Is every article with colons AI-written? No, but they're becoming less popular by the industry, and AI uses it every. single. time.
      

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   1. They're in the title: thriving, enduring. In the first paragraph: evolving, celebrating. AI loves using exciteable action words, and it's a giveaway because it uses them throughout the entire article. It's like that friend that can't stop using exclamation marks - you're excited, we get it!

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   1. "In a remote desert on the planet of Janeth" (or in this case, in the rapidly evolving world of business) is how most ChatGPT articles start off. Don't believe me? I've got hundreds of prompts in my account that all start off the same way, using the same first two words: In & the.

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   1. ChatGPT doesn't know how to elaborate on sections, mainly because it doesn't have enough information to make those subsections longer. So it does things like give each section a generic header - like "Expanding Horizons" and writes three sentences using the information provided in the prompt. Each section is the same exact length, which is great to the untrained eye, but for me all I had to do is skim to the bottom to hit the back-button because I wasn't interested in reading AI-written content.

Ok, ok - I've complained enough about this horribly written article. So what should they have done in order to make this less ChatGPT-ey? I've laid it out below:

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   1. Want a unique title? Tell ChatGPT that! Enter into the prompt something like "I want a more unique title that uses X & Y keywords, and doesn't include colons." Be specific. You can still have AI do the work, but give it more help. Like your realtor tells you, don't accept the first offer that comes your way.

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   1. Want to catch my eye? Write your own stinking first line. Even better, write your own stinking first paragraph. ChatGPT just isn't human - which in some ways is great (e.g., I had the software fix the code that my web dev team said was unfixable). But read this sentence out loud: Marketing can't be entirely automated. And your content still needs some human writing to sound great.

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   1. AI uses code to recognize patterns and see what works - which is what we humans do, too, except we hate seeing the same thing over and over again, and AI doesn't. AI has recognized that good content includes a descriptive title, has plenty of action words to sound exciteable, and has a strong starter sentence . . . and uses the same three examples over and over again. Try this out: go to ChatGPT and ask it to write you a blog article. Then ask for a new introduction. Then ask a third time. You'll find that all three instances are going to be VERY similar, unless you give it specific instructions that say otherwise. While many SEO experts would argue that there's value in having the same keywords over and over again in your content, I highly doubt "in the ever-changing digital world" are the keywords they're talking about. Still use keywords like "mortgage" or "wedding," just be, you know, unique about it.

To my previous employer I just roasted, sorry I dragged you through the mud to prove a point. But in my opinion (which I stated in the title, you'll notice), that article stunk. If you're a company and you're promoting content, that content should be unique and attractive. If you're going to use AI, spend the time to make sure the content doesn't read like a computer. Otherwise, spend the darn $300 to have a professional write the content for you.