As weird as it might sound, this is a question that I get from potential clients who are contacting me about content writing jobs.  With AI firmly at the forefront of many people’s minds, this question shouldn’t be a total surprise, I guess.  After a great amount of thought, I figured I’d share my opinions and perspective on the matter!  

The main differences between manual content writing and AI content writing

If you’ve read my post about how AI has changed freelancing, then you know that I’m not actually anti-AI (which surprised me, to be honest). But the differences between manual content writing and AI content writing are stark enough that one is not a replacement for the other. Let’s go.

• Manual content writing reads like a conversation: From website content to product descriptions to long-form articles, properly written web copy or content should read like a conversation. It’s the writer speaking to the reader, and that inclusion is felt on both sides of the copy or content. Even if you can’t quite put your finger on it, the feeling is definitely there, and it either engages with the reader or it doesn’t.

• AI content writing is often long-winded and information-rich: Anything created by AI is essentially an equation. There’s a prompt, a word count, and some simple tweaks. The finished product focuses on only those things, creating long, complex, information-packed copy or content. Unless the reader wants to do a deep dive on the product or service, this can be alienating and can lose them.  

• Manual content writing entertains as it educates: This follows beautifully from the previous point. In information-rich content, a good writer will add entertaining phrases, gentle humour, and more. This helps break up the information and facts and helps remind the reader that there is a human on the other side of the screen. This can also help with information retention.

• AI content writing creates distance between the writer and the reader: No matter how much AI adjusts and “learns,” it will never read or “feel” human. There will always be that distance between the content and the reader. For the reader, this may feel as though the content is formal, awkward, or boring. That’s just the distance speaking, however, not the topic itself!

What is the best kind of content writing for business?

Can you guess what my answer will be? Probably! In most cases, manual content writing is always going to be the best kind of content writing for businesses. It focuses on the customer first, and the search engines second. Not only am I a huge fan of ethical content writing, but I also firmly believe that it holds the customer and business’s best interests at heart.

AI content writing can be useful when the most important part of the process is staying on budget. In many cases, AI-generated content can be a great starting point to help the business understand what readers may care about or ask about. At best, AI content can be stand-in content until a professional business content writer can get to work and transform the “rough draft” into the “finished draft”.

What do you think? Am I way off-base? I’d love to hear your perspective!