Hey there. If you've struggled getting all your writing done and you've been considering maybe getting one of those copy AI tools, but you're not sure and you can't really afford a professional copywriter, we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk about the pros and cons of copy AI tools here on the Resilient Faith Online Show. Welcome. I'm Arissa Shadrick, host of the Resilient Faith Online Show. I'm an online marketing coach and certified copywriter. In this podcast, you'll find a different perspective to the external and internal challenges we face as online content creators. Join me for some inspiration and practical tips as we create positive change online. To connect with me and my private Facebook group, go to MarissaShadrick.com forward slash community. Hello, hello. How are you doing today? Marissa here, so excited to share with you this episode. Really important episode. We're going to be talking a little bit about computers and technology and AI tools. And I know some of you are rolling your eyes thinking, I hate technology. But you know what? Technology is here and it's been here for a long, long time. And things are evolving. Even since last couple of years, a lot of businesses that used to meet in person are now using their computer to connect with Zoom calls. I know my husband, he's a salesperson, he's in marketing, and he's often traveled to be able to, you know, get those appointments with CEOs and such. And now it's like, you know, let's just get on the computer. It is changing our business environment. It's changing how we're doing business. And technology has been evolving and growing for a long, long time. I remember ever since I was a little girl growing up, my dad worked for Pan Am Airways. And I remember him talking about the airplanes, the 747s, and how wonderful they were and the technology in these planes, that they can practically fly themselves when they put them on autopilot. And even when I graduated from high school, I ended up getting a job with Bank of America. So back then, I remember when the announcement came at Bank of America that there were going to be these ATM machines installed. And everybody was wondering, what are those? You know, they're going to replace tellers. And everybody's saying, oh no, no, they're not going to replace tellers. We're still going to need tellers. And what happened? A lot of tellers lost their jobs. Just what we thought, right? Once I was married, everyone was saying that eventually everyone would have a home computer. And we're scratching our heads thinking, what the heck? Why would we need a home computer in the first place? Little did we know, right? And we started with these home computers that had barely any memory and would run out of memory very quickly, and they were huge, these homongous things. And we've got slowly acclimated. And now everyone has a home computer or multiple computers. They have a desktop, they have a laptop, they have maybe an iPad, an iPhone, lots of gadgets. Even our cars have advanced too. Remember back in the day when we used to have to buy an external GPS to be able to plug it into our car? I remember having one of those external GPS things that you kind of tap something in there to get directions. And now we use our phones, the smartphones that have tons of apps. And then we've been introduced to cloud storage because we can't contain everything in our devices. And everything has changed, and even personal fitness now. It's much more sophisticated now, the things that you can have in your home. It's very interactive, and there's a lot of variety for different age levels and so forth. So even that has changed. So who knows what the future of gyms are with all these conveniences that are being provided now that people can have something that's not going to take up a lot of space and still give you that feeling of a class or some type of workout. Who knows? You know, there's pros and cons to all of it. And then banking, as I mentioned, that's changed a lot, even since the ATM machines. You know, I opened up my business account all online. I never entered into a bank building. Everything is on the internet. Medical industry has also evolved. Oftentimes you book your appointments online, you don't have to call anyone anymore. They've got patient portals now with all your results in there. Schools, the same thing. My granddaughter, she's nine, she uses my iPad, and we ended up getting her an iPod because she has quizlets that she does for school to study. So everything is very interactive and has evolved, but we just don't notice it. But here's where we do notice it. If you're the recipient of any kind of customer service that's generated by a bot, it is frustrating because it kind of takes you in loops and sort of tries to figure out what you're asking and gives you this canned answer and it loops you back. And as you go deeper and you think you're going to get the answer you need and brings you back to the original answer, it's really frustrating. They're they're not very helpful. At least the ones that I've used are not very helpful. They drive me crazy. I really love customer service, real customer service. And so whenever I get any of my tools, that's one of the things I look at. And I mentioned that before. I look at the integration to make sure all my tech tools talk to each other. And I also look at the customer service. And that's why I've had my webmaster for over 10 years, Dan, he's amazing. He maintains my website, everything. I don't have to worry about it. If anything goes slightly bonky, he is accessible. He is accessible. It's amazing. I can actually send him an email. We can get on a call, whatever it takes. His customer service is amazing. So, like I've said before, if you need somebody, let me know and just email me at support at MarissaShatter.com. I'd be happy to give you an introduction because I'm so happy with his service. So, anyway, today we're talking about these AI tools, the one specifically for copywriting. The integration of AI tools is going to continue. It's not going away, it's part of the evolution of things, right? Trying to work faster, trying to work more efficiently. But at the same time, we have to pick and choose what we automate and not try to automate everything. And I know that's going to go against the grain of some other entrepreneurs that say, well, you need to automate everything. There are just some things that need human touch. Now, if you can automate, I'm all for it. I'll automate as much as you can, but you want to make sure you don't lose anything in the process because these tools can they replace human intelligence? I would say no. There are some pros to them, and we're going to go into it. I did a little research and I was looking at a prediction of technology in 2025 by PluralSight, and they were saying that they felt the advanced machine learning to bring computers to near human level intelligence is on the way, right? There's like 9 billion devices that are connected on the internet today. And now the new thing, the virtual and augmented reality, that's coming along and it's predicted to become like an $80 billion market by 2025. So not only is technology here, but a lot of people are embracing it too, right? And they're jumping on that technology train. Now here's the problem when it comes to AI tools. Now I've looked into this a little bit, obviously, because I'm a certified copywriter. So I want to be on top of these things and figure out what all the buzz is about and whether they work or not or what the pros and cons are. But let me put it to you this way: I'm bilingual. I can speak Spanish and English. My Spanish is not as good as my English, but I can communicate and I can understand what people are saying in Spanish. Now, if I was to write copy in Spanish, someone that understands a Spanish language would know that something is not quite right in the way I've communicated. It's a little off. Although I've done my best to translate in English into Spanish, it wouldn't have that nice human flow of the native language. And that's kind of the way I see these AI tools. It's almost like they're not speaking in their native language. And so it doesn't quite come out right. It predicts text from human input. So there's your starting point, right? First, it's important to know what to input to be able to get the output. And the text ends up being very predictable. And one of the things you don't want to be in copywriting is predictable, because predictable is boring. It will not stop the scroll. It does not catch a reader's attention. So we want to avoid that. Now, one of the positive things, because I want to be fair with this, is that it is a good way to see maybe a different point of view that maybe you didn't think about. So if you want to use an AI tool for brainstorming purposes, but there's other brainstorming tools out there. I use SimpleMind for brainstorming and I love it. So it might show you some alternative twist to something that you've inputted, but you still got to clean it up. The other problem is that some AI tools they don't pull from current information. It's not like Sophia, you know, the robot. When they ask her a question, she taps into the internet and she she's doing research. She pulls information from the internet to be able to give an answer. And some of these AI tools, they don't pull from current information from the internet. It generates text based on input. So you're gonna get that same old, same old type thing over and over again. I've also noticed that a lot of them they generate a lot of words, a lot of words that you got to cut out. And one of the things that I've realized as a copywriter, it's not what you write, but it's what you say that matters. There is a difference between what you write and what you say. What you say has to have a lot of emotional connection. And that, my friends, is human. So that's one of the things that you can't put inside of a tool. So no matter what AI tool you use, I feel, my opinion, is that it doesn't provide that done for you copy that so many people are looking for, you know, an inexpensive way to have all this copy done. Now it can end up too wordy and like I said earlier, it can end up predictable. It doesn't sound human, it could sound a little bit disjointed, and uh it could be very random versus being very intentional. So when you write copy, you're very intentional. You have a premise, you have something that you want people to think, to feel, to believe, or to do. If there's a lot of intention with that, so everything you write is around this intention, and you're not gonna get that from some type of AI tool. You won't find creativity because it's simply not human. The creative element will be gone. So sometimes you can be creative with copy and not to make it clever, but to make it clear and to make it very streamlined for that target audience that you're trying to connect with. So AI tools are limited. I feel as if sometimes it takes more work to clean up something that it tries to generate. Now, if you want to use it for maybe like a caption or something on social media and you have to crank out a lot of them, maybe it'll give you a starting point for that. And I've looked at some to see, but even in those, I've had to, it was more work for me to have to edit and change things and to say what I really wanted to say because I am a personal brand, right? I brand myself. So it has to have my voice, it has to have my personality in it, it has my humor, it has my quirks in it, and I share sometimes my vulnerabilities. There's no AI tool that can do that. And so when I communicate, I want it to be personal, I want it to be human to human. It would take more work to clean it up than if I just blocked out my best hours of the day when I'm most creative, which is in the morning, to write any pieces of copy that I need to write. And that's typically what I do. I have the habit of writing in the morning when I'm fresh, when I'm full of ideas, and I can write faster when I use that time. If I try to write in the afternoon, I can still do that, but it seems like it takes me a little longer. It's a little bit more work. But if I focus in the morning on writing, it helps. Now, the reason I mention this is because a lot of people struggle with getting all the writing done. One of the things I'll suggest is just get in the habit of writing. Find the best time for you to write. It may not be the morning, it may be in the evening, or maybe after lunch, or maybe on a specific day of the week that you can dedicate for writing and really map out is what is it that you need to write and have all those elements in place first. What is it that you're trying to have your audience think, feel, believe, or do the premise? What is the transformation? And that's why I like giving people writing prompts because I think we can extract a lot when we have writing prompts versus AI tools or templates. With that said, that's a nice segue into saying that I have a membership where I help solopreneurs, people that are online, whether they're coaches, whether they're course creators, or whether they're service-based businesses, I have a membership where I help them to write better copy, where they can ask questions, they can ask me questions and they can submit their copy for critique. So this membership, I'm just launching it, I mean, literally just launching it now. And it's going to be available for people to join this membership. It's an annual membership. If you're interested in something like that, or if you want to train your team, or if you want to develop a team, I have a special rate for the team members as well. But it's a place where you can, on an ongoing basis, use what you already have or what you're already creating, not add more to your table, but for an hour a week, you can sharpen, tighten your messaging to be able to get those clicks and sales that you want. So if you're interested in that, all you have to do is go to my website. You can go to my website and right at the top tabs, you'll see need help with a question mark. Click that, you can book an appointment, and we can have a conversation and I'll tell you all about it. It's really exciting for me to be able to help small business owners because I can do done for you copy, but not everyone can afford to hire a professional copywriter. And that's what I found in the past that many people still struggled and they didn't have the necessarily the resources to hire a copywriter every time they needed email sequences and sales pages, or if they want to freshen up their website, because it's an ongoing basis. It's not like you do it once and you're done. And so this allows me to help them in a way that's affordable for them and in a way that I don't have to devote all that time writing all that done for you copy as well. So it's a win-win. At least I feel it's a win-win. So if you're interested in that or you want to find out more about it, just go to marissa shatter.com and you'll see the tab need help and just fill out the book a free appointment form, and then we'll get together on a Zoom call and it'll be great to meet you, and we'll talk about some of your copy goals. I'd love to do that. So I hope this was helpful today. I know writing, it's an ongoing thing, it's part of what we do. And this is what you need to realize. If you are responsible for writing your web copy, if you're writing your email sequences, if you're writing things for your sales page, for your opt-in page, for your lead magnets, for your blog posts, you are a copywriter. Whether you admit it or not, if you are responsible for writing those words, you're already a copywriter. The question is, are you an effective one? Yep, that's the question. Are you an effective one? And it takes practice and knowing what to correct, because not knowing what to correct leaves you kind of in the dark. So that's all I'll say on that. I hope you'll take advantage of this opportunity to connect with me and you'll book an appointment. I would love to have a conversation with you. So until next time, take care. Bye-bye. Wait, before you go, if you found this podcast helpful, subscribe so you never miss an episode. Every subscription, review, or rating means so much to me. Remember, cultivate resilient faith online to create positive change in the world.