OpenAI’s ChatGPT, with its shockingly advanced language abilities, has triggered a fear-filled wave of excitement in marketing and Public Relations circles.
ChatGPT is able to produce a well-structured and natural-sounding output in just a few seconds. It’s also free, at least for the moment. This means that time-pressed marketing organizations may be tempted to take shortcuts.
If your job requires you to write short, formulaic content, then it is only natural that you are worried about losing your job.
ChatGPT is able to create content that looks like humans have written it, but it cannot establish a unique viewpoint or craft a compelling narrative. This is largely due to the fact that its outputs are entirely derived from predictive models.
ChatGPT also lacks creativity, depth, or perspective. If you write short-form blogs, emails, sales copies, or Social Media posts as a profession, you may want to consider harnessing your Emotional Intelligence to continue adding value to your business.
Robots can write, but only humans can connect.
To put it simply, you can keep your PR or marketing job by improving your ability to make meaningful connections.
You can use marketing copywriting to create connections between brands and audiences. You must not only tailor your writing to the personality and needs of your audience but also align it with your client’s or your company’s voice, principles, and overarching missions.
PR professionals need to tailor their pitches to each recipient’s individual goals or interests to connect with journalists.
ChatGPT, on the contrary, is prone to generic writing and nuance-free. It has a consistent voice, no matter who the audience is. ChatGPT cannot build meaningful connections.
By weaving unique human qualities into their work, marketers and PR professionals can distance themselves from the hollowness that ChatGPT communicates and convey a thorough understanding of human feelings and thoughts.
Copywriters can be less robotic.
Empathy and authenticity are the key factors that define a copywriter’s success. If you do not appear as a true representative of your client’s brands and goals, people will not believe what you say. Your work should sound like it was written by someone who has a genuine connection to the brands. This is different from a stranger or a bot (e.g., ChatGPT) that doesn’t have a real interest in the topic.
Copywriters who are marketing experts can inject nuances that reflect audience personalities and brand identities into their work. ChatGPT content cannot have the same level of authenticity as copywriters who have a close relationship with their clients and audience.
The PR skills that a machine cannot perform
While AI can make it easy to create a cookie-cutter pitch, PR pros, just like copywriters, can inject empathy and authenticity into their pitches. This will show that they have a thorough understanding of the brand and journalist, including their beats and past work.
The responsibility of PR professionals does not end with sending pitches. ChatGPT can’t replicate aspects of PR that require strategic planning, like creating new storylines that differentiate your client from their competitors, linking your client to the latest industry developments, and responding to crises within your company in real time.
Only humans are able to create the cohesive and strong narratives that audiences need in order to form meaningful connections.
A PR professional can also use a ChatGPT flaw to enhance their value: the inability of ChatGPT to include current stories and events.
ChatGPT can only currently process information that is already on the internet. This means that PR pros can get an edge over AI by constantly pitching stories about new developments in their client’s expertise.
By tying your pitch to current narratives, you can show journalists that you have done your research and are aware of how important it is to stay ahead.
ChatGPT: How to Make the Most of it
Copywriters and public relations professionals can use ChatGPT to simplify their work.
Even experienced writers may struggle to express their thoughts due to burnout or fatigue. ChatGPT can help in these situations by writing an introduction to a post on a blog, which gives writers the motivation to finish it themselves.
A PR professional can also use ChatGPT to find a different way to phrase an email or structure a pitch. AI is used to prevent exhaustion from affecting the quality of writing.
ChatGPT, on the other hand, could theoretically create jobs in editing and fact-checking or increase the value of a piece generated by AI. ChatGPT is often unable to provide accurate, current information and has no way to verify its stories. When you ask ChatGPT for a piece that includes citations, the citations may be made up or flat-out incorrect.
A human is needed to help with this. AI can produce the bulk of the monotonous content, but a human can verify the facts and citations and ensure the content is accurate and fully reviewed before submission.
ChatGPT – Enemy or Ally?
ChatGPT can be a valuable tool for copywriters, marketing professionals, and public relations experts if they understand its capabilities and limitations.
AI can improve the writing quality for both writers and editors. Now that writers know the risks of doing only the minimum, the content of the future may be more insightful, authentic, and empathetic than ever before.
AI will be at least a step behind as long as humans continue to improve their skills and build the relationships necessary for both PR and Marketing. This will allow more human success.