If the average human did nothing but read 24/7, they’d consume around eight billion words in their entire lifetime. But today, the most advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools are devouring over eight trillion words in just a single month of training. This is all according to Mustafa Suleyman, Microsoft’s AI CEO, in a recent TED Talk.
Love it or hate it, AI is achieving the impossible. Or at least what we thought would be impossible just two years ago. The possibilities feel endless: it can help you create an app even if you’ve never coded, plan out an entire itinerary for your next trip, whip up a supposedly original, radio-ready track in seconds, and even curate the perfect Spotify playlist.
And we’re only just scratching the surface.
AI has completely changed our everyday lives and revolutionised almost every industry, particularly B2B content creation, where its applications are becoming more and more popular due to just how efficient and cost-effective they are. And the benefits don’t stop there, either.
The benefits of using AI for content creation
AI tools are best when they are used to improve efficiency, save time, and optimise outputs. In the world of content marketing, they can help you:
- Generate new ideas
- Summarise information
- Reword and refine your existing content
- Optimise content for search engines
- Create custom images based on the context of your current project
- Answer your burning questions in a matter of seconds
There’s nothing handier than having a pocket research assistant nearby when you’re ideating and creating written B2B content. AI writing tools can refine the research process, keep a watchful eye on your spelling and grammar, and more.
Top AI writing tools for B2B businesses
ChatGPT was the first AI tool to give us a taste of what might be the most groundbreaking tech innovation of our time. It set a record for the fastest-growing consumer app, hitting 100 million users within just two months of its launch in November 2022.
The latest version of ChatGPT (GPT-4) can analyse web pages and deliver responses quicker than any human ever will. It even has a passable sense of humour, as long as you have a staunch tolerance for puns.
To prove it, let’s ask ChatGPT to write five headlines for an article about the top 10 invoicing and accounting software options for small businesses, but in a humorous tone.
This is what it generates:
- “Counting Sheep No More: 10 Accounting Softwares to Rescue Your Sanity (And Your Sleep)!”
- “From Chaos to Cash: Unveiling the Top 10 Invoicing Tools for Small Biz Wizards!”
- “No More Excel Hell: Meet the 10 Invoicing Apps That’ll Make Your Accountant Cry Tears of Joy!”
- “Get Ready to Ditch the Calculator: 10 Accounting Apps Even Your Grandma Can Master!”
- “Money Matters Made Fun: The Top 10 Invoicing Softwares That’ll Turn Your Frowns Upside Down!”
Not half bad, hey? You might need to develop a resilience to cheesiness, but those certainly aren’t the worst headlines to come out of a seconds-long brainstorming session.
If weak puns are a dealbreaker, ChatGPT isn’t the only AI tool on the block. There are plenty of other impressive AI-powered tools out there that are driving B2B growth, such as:
- HubSpot’s AI content writer (for content creation)
- Surfer SEO (for SEO content writing)
- Grammarly (for spelling and grammar checks)
- Perplexity AI (for research)
- Headlime (for landing pages)
Challenges with AI-generated content
This goes without saying, but in no way should AI be trusted to do B2B content writing all on its own. Just like any other system, you will find that it comes with its own set of challenges and limitations.
Here are just a few:
Content overload
One of the biggest challenges with AI-generated content is the fact that it cannot produce work that is genuinely original or creative. Most of the time, it will feel pretty generic and repetitive. This is particularly noticeable in long-form content, which is often the case in B2B writing. But this is exactly what you can expect from AI that has been trained on existing content and data.
Consistency and reliability concerns
What’s great about sophisticated AI content writing tools is that they can generate text that’s incredibly close to what a human would write. That said, this technology works based on probabilities. In other words, each time you use it, the output can be different – even when you use the same prompt.
Potential copyright infringement
If a business uses AI technology trained with internet-scraped data to write its content, it could put it at risk of facing copyright infringement and plagiarism claims.
Irrelevant, outdated, or incorrect content
AI may not always have access to the most up-to-date information and, even when it does, it lacks the critical ability to discern which sources are reliable. Misinformation is always dangerous, but it is especially threatening when it comes to content that is generated for industries like healthcare or law.
Human touch: combining AI with human creativity
The reality is that there is no path to progress where we leave artificial intelligence behind, especially in content writing. Fear of new technology is also nothing new. We can either ignore it or welcome it.
Sure, a human will never be able to crunch through 10,000 maths problems in seconds. But what we are capable of is dreaming up creative and original ideas and solutions, just by drawing from our surroundings. We can absorb details through our five senses, merge them, and take a trip to our minds’ abstract playground to bounce around ideas. That’s a limitless space AI simply can’t access (touch wood).
B2B needs the best of both worlds. AI tools were never meant to replace (very smart) human writers altogether – they are here to help us do what we do better and more efficiently.
Future trends in AI content writing
In our humble opinion, real-life AI isn’t – and will never be – movie AI. More likely than not, we won’t ever witness a super-intelligent robot going rogue and overthrowing humanity (although some might argue it’s already happening…to a much less dramatic extent).
Real-life AI is built on stuff like machine learning, decision science, cognitive science, and computer science. These tools have to be developed through careful consideration and extensive research. Otherwise, they simply wouldn’t function properly.
From this perspective, it’s highly unlikely that AI will ever be plotting world domination. So, no need to fear – Terminator isn’t here.
Instead, what we’re likely to see, especially in content creation, is:
- Advancements beyond just text-based interactions to support multi-modal content creation
- Increasing personalisation and customisation, such as varied writing styles and tones to suit individual preferences
- Expansion of language support and multilingual capabilities
- Solutions becoming increasingly tailored to specific industries, domains, and use cases
- Integration with content management systems (CMS) and productivity tools
- AI writing assistant providers implementing measures to mitigate bias, promote inclusivity, and ensure their platforms are used ethically
Did you find this article useful? That’s because a human researched it with the support of AI tools. The future of content creation is here, and we’re embracing it.
But AI-driven research only truly shines when it is complemented by deft strategy, mastery of metaphor, and a lively sense of wit. For more work like that, browse the rest of our work here.
