Olive & Company is in love with ChatGPT. We embraced it from the start and have advocated its potential ever since. ChatGPT and a growing offering of generative AI tools are changing marketing and branding.
- Is that a good thing? Absolutely.
- Are there limitations to what AI can do today? Yes.
- Are marketing professionals doomed? Not at all.
Like the internet, AI will significantly change roles, challenges, and opportunities. Here are some thoughts on what the near future of marketing will look like with AI tools.
ChatGPT Is Only the Start of AI Marketing
ChatGPT is the most discussed AI tool, but it’s not the only one for marketers.
As you may know, ChatGPT is limited to text. It can output code that creates visuals, but that’s splitting hairs. Ultimately, its output is always in text form. ChatGPT uses the same generative pre-trained transformer (GPT) engine that drives other popular AI writing platforms such as Jasper, Type.AI, and Copy.AI.
There are also AI tools that generate images and videos. Popular options include:
AI tools are making it possible to create brand positioning, messaging, content, videos—even PowerPoint slides and websites. Some people have even used ChatGPT to create business plans and sales models. We’re just seeing the first glimmers of what AI will do for marketing.
Here’s the thing. AI isn’t great—yet. It’s an awesome work-in-project. We’ll address its shortcomings later in this blog. First, let’s get you excited about ChatGPT by listing reliable, everyday uses.
The Best Uses of ChatGPT and AI Marketing Tools
We’re just seeing the first glimmers of what AI will do for marketing.
AI development is moving faster than we can write this blog. The tools are getting smarter, the applications broader, and API integrations more common. By the end of 2023, a significant portion of your apps and software will likely have some form of AI empowerment. Adobe has already programmed AI aspects in Photoshop, Lightroom, and Express. On March 20th, they launched a beta program for their Firefly generative AI software.
That’s all good for tomorrow. What about today? How do we use AI right now? Here’s a smattering of our favorite tactics.
- Generating meeting notes
- Producing executive summaries
- Researching topics
- Sourcing statistics and data points
- Creating content outlines
- Igniting ideation
- Forming compositional drafts
- Suggesting blog topics
- Producing FPO art
- Conducting preliminary keyword research
Clearly, we’re fans and users. We’re also exploring new options all of the time. What we use and do today will be very different next year.
Our Take: ChatGPT Is an AI Frozen Dinner
ChatGPT promises the world. What it delivers, at least for now, is more like frozen fettuccine. Why? A frozen meal is fast, easy, and sounds fantastic. What it delivers is so-so. No one serves frozen meals in an effort to impress guests. The same is true of ChatGPT.
At first, ChatGPT’s results seem jaw-dropping. The reality is much different. Like frozen food, once you dig in, you find it’s not nearly as good as a homemade meal. That doesn’t mean ChatGPT doesn’t have a place in your marketing kitchen. The key is knowing where and when using ChatGPT is appropriate.
Why ChatGPT Won’t Replace Your Marketing Team
Today, ChatGPT can get your work off to a strong start. But it doesn’t do the work for you. Here are our top perspectives on why you can’t rely on ChatGPT for your final products.
ChatGPT Is Not an Expert
When using ChatGPT, it’s your responsibility to be the content or subject matter expert. ChatGPT only knows what it knows. For example, it might generate a seemingly good blog—but that blog could be missing critical ideas or, in some cases, provide inaccurate information. It takes an expert to validate the content’s worth. Often, it also requires a writer to add perspective and address redundancy.
ChatGPT Doesn’t Know Your Strategy, Brand, or Long-Term Goals
Professional content is written to support an organization’s best interests. It highlights competitive advantages and underplays areas of weakness. ChatGPT doesn’t take that into account.
It may not highlight aspects that are beneficial to your brand or company. Nor will it fully articulate your brand, voice, and persona. Yes, ChatGPT can be “trained” to some extent, but for now, the training is tricky to sustain across a team of users. However, in the near future, adding tone and voice should become much simpler.
Lastly, ChatGPT doesn’t know your long-term business goals. Brands often rely on nuanced communication to allude to future offerings and upcoming innovations. That ability to place messaging “between the lines” isn’t achievable with ChatGPT today.
AI Hallucinations and Other Errors
Ideally, AI is smart enough to sort fact from myth. When it can’t, it produces what people call a “hallucination.” It thinks it knows, but the reality is much different. These hallucinations occur when ChatGPT puts forth information that it has not been explicitly trained to know. In other words, it uses false data or misunderstands the data and generates inaccurate results.
Sarcasm Goes Over Its Digital Head
It’s difficult for ChatGPT to grasp sarcasm and humor. A prompt that includes an obvious joke will likely be read literally. It takes things at face value and works best with clear prompts.
The Perfect ChatGPT Prompt Doesn’t Exist
You’ll achieve the best results using ChatGPT like a conversation—not a search.
One prompt can and should lead to another prompt. It’s not a single query like Google. The ChatGPT interaction builds as you refine the results. What’s more, how you go about writing prompts greatly impacts the quality of the results.
The better you know, use, and understand how ChatGPT works, the more valuable it becomes. This is where professionals separate themselves from a novice. When generating prompts, Olive factors in multiple ideas to improve results. A good prompt includes:
- The outcome you want (e.g., an executive summary, social media post, etc.)
- The format (e.g., 500 words, 155 characters, five main points, etc.),
- Items you don’t want (e.g., competitor names, data older than five years old, etc.)
ChatGPT Is Not Real Time in All Cases
The data in ChatGPT is accurate up to the year 2021. While that is evolving and improving, it’s also not real-time. So the results it delivers might be missing critical updates like legal changes, new research, or industry shifts. Again, you need to be an expert who knows the topic and can evaluate the ChatGPT content for accuracy.
ChatGPT Is Not Creative
ChatGPT can mimic style and formats but is not great at providing artful executions. Ask it to write a poem, and you’ll get a poem. But it’s not a poem that will impress you or an avid reader of poetry. It’s basic, formula-driven content. There remains a need for a skilled artist to take the results, give them a spin, and create something impressive.
ChatGPT Responses Aren’t Unique
The beauty of ChatGPT is that each response is different. Entering the same prompt five times will deliver five different responses. However, different isn’t unique. ChatGPT uses the same facts to produce the same overall results. Therefore your content will sound similar to everyone else’s content. Instead of distinguishing your brand, products, and services, ChatGPT embeds you in an echo chamber. You will be sharing its message and perspective, not your own.
What’s ChatGPT Doing to Keep Us Interested?
Two words: constant improvement. ChatGPT is evolving and learning. By the time you read this blog, ChatGPT will already be better. Here are some things that are happening right now to make ChartGPT a better AI tool for marketers.
GPT-4 is Getting Smarter
GPT-4, the most powerful version yet of OpenAI’s large language model. What’s GPT-4? Think of GPT-1, -2, -3, and -4 as the brains behind ChatGPT. Each higher-numbered version is a bigger, better, and wiser brain.
How smart is GPT-4? The advanced reasoning capabilities of the tool have been tested using the Uniform Bar Exam. GPT-4 passed by scoring in the 90th percentile. A previous version of ChatGPT only scored in the 10th percentile.
ChatGPT Opened APIs to Developers
On March 1st, OpenAI announced that it’s allowing third-party developers to integrate ChatGPT into their apps and services via an API. That is how your favorite app will add ChatAPI refinements. For example, there’s already a Google Chrome extension. Another example could be a stock purchasing app using ChatGPT to help you research market trends and historical company information, provide comparisons, and more.
Real-Time Data Feeds for ChatGPT Are Almost Here
Among the most significant limitations of ChatGPT is that the information is never current or real-time. But that’s changing. On March 20th, OpenAI said it is introducing new plugins enabling ChatGPT to interact with 3rd-party APIs. So what? It means ChatGPT can pull data like live sports scores, current weather, and anything else into its responses.
ChatGPT Has More Server Space, Bandwidth, and a Paid Version
It seems everyone wants to try ChatGPT. That means the servers are often full. Users get kicked out—or are not allowed to log in. That said, accessibility has gotten much better and continues to improve.
Now you can purchase a monthly subscription to ChatGPT. It provides guaranteed access and the latest capabilities like GPT-4. Free is great, but guaranteed login is better (at least for businesses).
The ChatGPT App for iOS
In May of 2023, ChatGPT released a free app for iOS. Be careful; there are a ton of lookalike apps in the Apple app store. Make sure you are downloading the official ChatGPT app by OpenAI.
The ChatGPT app works just like the website. It also shares the same login and account information. Working in the app retains your conversation history in the web version and vice versa—a very handy feature.
There’s also a talk-to-text feature. It relies on Apple’s built-in speech recognition feature, which works pretty well.
At the moment, there isn’t an announced release date for an Android app, but it is in the works.
How Professional Marketers Are Getting the Most From ChatGPT
Let’s revisit the idea that ChatGPT is like a frozen dinner.
When you or I prepare a frozen dinner, we read the box. If we’re feeling adventurous, maybe we add a spice. Now, give that frozen dinner to a professional chef, and watch them work wonders.
They will cook it with a different container, temperature, timing, and spices. They would use all of their culinary techniques. A chef separates the food items, knowing meat takes less time to cook than pasta. They might steam roast the vegetables to retain flavor or caramelize onions to introduce sweetness. They’d even plate it better knowing people eat with their eyes.
That’s exactly what professional marketers will do when using ChatGPT. Digital strategists, brand strategists, art directors, and copywriters are the chefs. They know how to take a frozen mass of a starting point, break it down, and build it back up into something special.
Professional expertise and technique will be more valuable than ever with tools like ChatGPT.
Let’s Be Real About ChatGPT for Marketing
Constant game-changing. That’s our biggest takeaway with ChatGPT and other AI tools for marketing and advertising.
Current weaknesses will be addressed, and the good stuff will improve. It’s easy to say AI tools like ChatGPT will put people out of work or reduce budgets. The truth is, like the internet, it won’t do either. It will just alter the way marketers and businesses approach everything. For every dollar the internet saved, it also created a new budgetary need. Ultimately, the improvement was the platform’s massive opportunities, not the initial perceived benefits.
So, if you enjoyed the internet revolution, buckle in. AI is going to be a wild and fantastic ride.
And in case you’re wondering, no, this blog wasn’t written in ChatGPT.
Interested in learning more? Contact us today.
