The maxim “content is king” is as true today as ever. Between website content, blog posts, case studies, sales copy, marketing emails, social media posts, and more, companies are expected to provide a continuous stream of unique, relevant, and highly searchable content. But the high level of creativity and stamina required to do so is extremely difficult to sustain without assistance.
Enter artificial intelligence, or AI. Just google “AI content generation,” and dozens upon dozens of digital articles pop up – The Future of Online Content Creation: AI vs. Humans; How Will AI Change Search and Content Creation? and AI Content Generation Won’t Replace Humans; It Will Make Them More Powerful. So yes, content generated by AI is a thing, and it’s something growing in popularity daily – not only in the zeitgeist, but also in the toolboxes of businesses worldwide.
How Artificial Intelligence-generated content can provide real-life benefits for rent-to-own businesses
AI writing software works by drawing data from the infinite articles and web copy available on the internet, and responding to information you input, generating all sorts of outputs, from social media captions to long-form articles. Some AI tools work to enhance what you’ve already written, while others create fresh content based upon your ideas or prompts.
For example, the following section is a 100% AI-generated article, written in response to a few key questions like What is AI content generation? How does AI content generation work? and How can AI content generation benefit retail business owners?
Content creation has a long and ever-evolving history. According to a blog post by Brafton, content creation is defined as “the process of conducting research, generating strategic ideas, crafting those ideas into high-value collateral, and then promoting those pieces to a target audience.” In its earliest forms, content creation could be traced back to the 1700s, when Benjamin Franklin created the annual Poor Richard’s Almanack, which he used to promote his printing business.
The birth of digital content creation began in 1993 when O’Reilly Media launched the world’s first company website, according to a blog post by Writer-Access. In the early days of the internet, content creation was primarily in the form of basic text and images. However, as technology advanced, so did content creation. In the 1960s and 70s, with the advent of home televisions, content marketing began to flourish, as noted by Digital Nexa.
Today, content creation is the foundation of all modern digital marketing efforts, and marketers are now creating more content that is created with the mindset of putting themselves in the shoes of their audiences, as noted in a blog post by HubSpot. According to Jose Angelo Studios, content creation has changed more in the last ten years than the last 200, and its future looks to be continuing to evolve at a speedy rate.
AI content creation uses algorithms to generate content, including but not limited to text, images, audio, and video. These algorithms are trained on large datasets of existing content, allowing them to learn patterns and generate new content similar in style and tone. The process of creating AI-generated content involves several steps, including data collection and preprocessing, model training and fine-tuning, and content generation and optimization.
There are several ways a retail business can benefit from using an AI content generator:
Overall, AI content creators can help retail businesses save time and resources, while generating high-quality content that engages and converts customers.
Not bad, huh?
And the “intelligence” part of AI means the more you use it, the better it replicates your natural writing style and voice. Algorithms for the win.
There are many AI content-generation tools available online for rental dealers to peruse and use. Here are three that have ranked consistently well among industry experts:
Naturally, AI content-generation tools like these cost money, but good content is definitely a worthwhile investment in today’s marketplace. We recommend doing a free trial test with them before committing to any one AI content generator.
So, the big question is, can AI replace human content creators, social-media managers, and marketers?
No. (Huge sigh of relief from the human currently writing this article.) But it will change content creation as we know it.
While AI content generators can save you time, money, and energy, help with brainstorming, idea prompts, and outlining, and help level-up your writing skills, they can’t serve as a substitute for originality, voice consistency, or sentiment. And while it’s likely we’ll see more and more brands and small businesses using AI generation to keep up with the constant demand for content that converts, the most effective copy still has a human touch to it.
Additionally, it’s extremely important to always edit and adjust your copy, to ensure it’s accurate, on-brand, and telling the story you want to tell.
With that caveat, your writing can still be original, human-sounding, and pleasurable to read when you get an assist from artificial intelligence software – so give AI a try!
PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS:
Retail businesses can use AI to generate product descriptions for their online stores. This can save a lot of time and effort, as AI can generate unique, high-quality descriptions for hundreds of products in a matter of minutes.
EMAIL MARKETING:
AI can be used to create personalized and targeted email marketing campaigns for retail businesses. AI can analyze customer data and behavior to generate personalized recommendations, promotions, and offers that are more likely to convert.
SOCIAL MEDIA POSTS:
AI can be used to create compelling and engaging social media posts for retail businesses. AI can generate catchy headlines, interesting captions, and eye-catching images to help businesses stand out on social media.
AD COPY:
AI can be used to generate ad copy for retail businesses. AI can analyze customer data and behavior to generate ads that are more likely to resonate with target audiences, resulting in higher click-through and conversion rates.
BLOG POSTS:
Retail businesses can use AI to generate informative and engaging blog posts that drive traffic to their website. AI can research industry trends, competitor activity, and customer preferences to create content that is informative, relevant, and valuable to readers.
COPY.AI
Copy.ai offers more than 90 tools and templates to meet your writing needs, from social media posts to website content. You can also select a tone to finetune how your copy feels – bold, friendly, luxury, etc. Copy.ai currently has about 4-million users, including Microsoft, eBay, and Ogilvy.
COPYSMITH.AI
With almost 200k visits a month, San Francisco-based Copysmith.ai offers 30+ templates, including Facebook ad copy, content rewriter, and event news release. You can also organize and store your content in folders, and install a Copysmith extension in your Google Chrome browser.
JASPER.AI
Jasper.ai claims it will produce “content proven to convert,” whether it’s a script, article, or even a book. The company has a growth vision, having acquired multiple writing tools like Headlime, Outwrite, and Shortly AI. Jasper currently has more than 80k users, including Google, IBM, and Airbnb.
HELPFUL TIPS FOR LETTING AI HELP YOU
An AI content generator can be a wonderfully helpful tool for solo writers and marketing teams alike. Not only is AI excellent for bettering the efficiency of your marketing team overall, but it’s also effective at increasing volume, decreasing costs, and saving time. Here are a few tips for making the most of an AI content generator:
Use it for writer’s block.
On those days when creativity doesn’t flow easily, an AI content generator can help. Many content generators have a template for topic ideas; you enter a brief description of the topic, as well as related keywords, then you leave the rest up to the software. You will instantly have hundreds to thousands(!) of topics to draw inspiration from.
Use it for research.
Research is arguably the most time-consuming part of writing. But the AI content generator instantaneously taps into a massive online database of information, eliminating much of the time you might spend researching – and less research time means more productivity.
Use it for SEO.
People writing blog posts or website content with an eye toward search-engine optimization (SEO), will benefit greatly from an AI content generator. SEO is used to help drive online traffic to a target webpage, raising its ranking with Google. AI will help you identify and incorporate relevant keywords, and build a basic framework for you to help you create content that will optimize its searchability.
Always review all AI-generated content.
It deserves repetition: AI-generated content can function optimally only with the aid of a human writer. Computers have a lack of voice and storytelling abilities, they don’t understand nuance and current cultural climate, and they’re sometimes caught plagiarizing. So when you use a content generator you must be sure to review all of the AI’s sentences for originality, accuracy and appropriateness, and sentiment.
