AI is the HOTTEST topic on social media right now and many preach that you can make your marketing much easier if you use ChatGPT and the likes. But is AI really as good as it sounds? And how do you best use it in your business?
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AI is a hot topic that many business owners are currently talking about. Whether you have already tested a few tools or are a complete newbie, this blog post will help you understand what AI is and how you could use it in your social media marketing. I'll also discuss the benefits and potential downfalls of using AI.
So, what is AI?
AI stands for Artificial Intelligence and it's a type of computer that can learn and think like a human. The computer is first trained with a lot of data (text, words, pictures etc) and is then able to use this data to answer your questions, solve problems and even create new things. And this component of "creating new things" is exactly why AI is so popular right now. Let me explain:
There are 2 branches of AI:
1) Predictive AI:
AI in itself is not something new. We have had AI for a while now, in the form of predictive AI. This type of AI helps us to predict future events or outcomes by analysing historical data.
Examples:
Netflix's watch recommendations (this is based on your past viewing behaviour as well as comparisons with people who are similar to you)
Siri
Spotify song recommendation
Amazon product recommendations
Self-driving cars
2) Generative AI:
This is the now so popular type of AI that lets us create new things that didn't exist before. The AI creates new things like text, images or even music based on data that it has been trained on.
Examples:
The pros and cons of using AI
+ Productivity boost & content ideas:
AI tools are great at increasing your productivity because they help you to automate certain tasks (e.g. scheduling posts, analysing your insights or transcribing videos). This helps you to spend less time on certain tasks that you don't really enjoy. AI can also be great to help you brainstorm initial content ideas when you aren't feeling very inspired.
- The best social media results come from businesses where the owner is involved in the process & the content creation:
When tasks become very easy and we automate them, we don't always spend enough time thinking about them and giving them the attention that they need. This is a problem that I see already enough in businesses even without the use of AI. I’ve managed over 25 business accounts in the last 4 years and the best results have always come from those accounts where the business owner was highly involved in the content creation process.
I know this is probably not what you wanted to hear from me but there is no shortcut when it comes to social media.
- You still need a proper strategy:
Yes, AI can generate content ideas and even whole posts for you but the biggest problem and MAIN reason why businesses don’t see great results with their SM marketing is that they don’t have a proper strategy set up. This means they put out whatever post comes to mind without connecting it to their business goals or considering their target audience. So, yes, AI might help you to post more consistently but you won’t see the desired results if you don’t have a strategy that you can base your posts on.
-/+ AI (like any other tool) is always just as good as the person who uses it:
For AI to spit out fantastic posts/content ideas/blog posts/(insert whatever you want it to create), you need to ask the right things = be able to use the right prompts.
Let me show you an example:
I used Google Bard to generate content ideas for a fictional photography business. I used a very basic prompt. Here are the results:
Pretty vague, right? And on top of that, you still have to take this prompt and turn it into a real post, something that my clients usually struggle the most with. For most entrepreneurs it’s not about not having the ideas, it’s about how to bring them to life and make an actual post from a prompt.
I would recommend using AI to generate content ideas but only if:
a) you have a strategy set up that you can base these posts on (I can help you with this!)
and b) you know how to bring these ideas to life.
- ChatGPT is trained on old data from 2021:
This means it doesn’t know what happened after that, for example, the latest Instagram updates or strategies that work now. This also means that, when you ask it to give you social media tips, it will spit out tips that were relevant in 2021. As we know, social media is an ever-changing environment and strategies that might have worked a few months ago aren’t necessarily relevant anymore now.
This downfall is particularly relevant for people who want to be seen as thought leaders because, for that to happen, you want to be able to comment on recent updates/events in your niche and provide your perspective on things. If you don’t do that, you will not stand out to your audience in the sea of experts. AI can also not replace your expertise & the knowledge you have gained from working in your business.
👉🏼 That’s also one of the reasons why I’m not afraid that AI will replace me as a SM Strategist. It can’t (at least not yet) replace a person who keeps up with trends and updates & interprets them for their audience which is what I do in my social media newsletter (if you aren’t on the list yet, sign up now! I promise it’s the best social media newsletter you will have read in a long time. And if it isn’t, you can always unsubscribe again)
- Copyright is currently a grey zone:
Obviously, I'm not a copyright lawyer so this is also not legal advice but from my research, I have understood that anything that is not created by a human can usually not be copyrighted. There are exceptions to this when humans and machines work together but, in general, we don't have any concrete laws yet on copyright when it comes to AI-generated content. It's still a bit of a grey zone and could potentially cause you problems.
- AI can be biased:
AI can be biased depending on the data it has been trained on which could lead to your content being seen by the wrong audience or your campaigns being less effective.
AI has also sometimes been found to be racist or sexist. We have seen that AI tends to sexualise females and that it often reinforces certain structural hierarchies and stereotypes that we have in society.
Example:
- Privacy concerns:
This could be relevant for you if you work in a business that is bound by strict confidentiality agreements. At the same time, AI also collects a lot of data about you and your audience that it might not use for purposes that you approve of.
Final conclusion: should we use AI for our social media marketing?
Yes and no.
There are certain tasks that AI can take off your to-do list (like brainstorming initial content ideas, researching topics, scheduling posts or transcribing videos) that can help you to be more productive and make content creation easier.
At the same time, AI still requires a proper social media strategy to work off of and a person who knows how to effectively use the tool. Remember: each tool is only ever as good as the person who uses it.
If you are serious about using AI in your business, there are plenty of resources online that can help you to write better prompts and use these tools more effectively. But please be wary of Instagram gurus who are now suddenly also AI experts and just want you to buy their courses 🫣
Talk soon,
Hanna