We’ve now had over a year to become proficient with AI writing tools like ChatGPT.
Many of us now use these tools to help with brainstorming, research, outlines, and first drafts.
And there is no question that companies large and small are attracted by the price and productivity benefits of using AI to help produce more content at lower costs.
But…
That’s an astonishing number.
To be fair, the IMF is careful to point out that they are absolutely not saying 60% of jobs will be replaced by AI. In fact, they divide things down the middle.
About 30% of jobs will be impacted in a largely positive way, through increases in productivity and improved skills. While the other 30% of jobs will be impacted in a more negative way, up to and including the loss of those jobs altogether.
Whichever way you slice it, these numbers are really, really high… and put us on notice that we need to take action before it’s too late.
Here’s a process any copywriter can use to incorporate both AI and emotional intelligence into their sales copy.
Interestingly, this process wasn’t structured and written by me. It was created by GPT-4. It even came up with our copywriter’s name… Emma.
All I did was provide the prompt.
That said, if you tried the exact same prompt yourself, you probably wouldn’t get quite the same result… for a couple of reasons.
My advice to every aspiring copywriter has always been, “Step one is to listen to your audience”.
Put another way, “If you don’t know who you’re talking to, how can you know what to say?”
When you listen to your prospects and your customers, you get a feel for the emotions they bring to the table.
Identify their fears and desires, and you can speak to those emotions in your copy. Get a sense of the language they use, and you can mirror that language in your own writing.
Which comes first, AI or EI?
Do you start your writing project with AI, and then tweak the outputs to make the copy more emotionally intelligent?
That’s how most people do this. And it’s how I do it myself, some of the time.
Start with a tool like ChatGPT to do the heavy lifting. Use it to do research for a new page, the outline, and a first draft. Once that’s done, you can add layers of more emotionally engaging copy to make the whole thing more appealing and effective.
But… it doesn’t have to be that way.
At the beginning of each year I step back, take stock, see where “I’m at”, and… more importantly… try to figure out where I’m going.
This year, the stakes have never been higher.
According to a survey by Neil Patel of agency NP Digital, over 60% of text content is now being created purely through AI. And 26.8% through a combination of AI and humans.
In other words, AI now plays a significant role in the creation of over 85% of all new content being written for digital media.