We’ve all seen the rise of AI over the last few years and how it’s reshaped digital marketing. For copywriters, tools like ChatGPT and Claude can create huge amounts of copy in seconds. Of course, if the AI is doing all the writing, then why are real copywriters even needed?

Are we all destined to become professional prompt engineers, spending our days coaxing the perfect paragraph out of a chatbot?

Spoiler alert: Nope! But let’s dive into why.

The Human Touch: Why Copywriters Still Matter

Copywriters will have to continue to wrestle with the role of AI in their work, but today, I’d like to share some of the major pitfalls you may encounter and how to use AI responsibly for your copywriting.

First, let’s make something clear: agencies don’t hire copywriters just to write prompts in ChatGPT all day. Writers are important because they can do things that generative AI cannot. As impressive as these tools are, the content they generate doesn’t exactly inspire anyone. Thanks to the way these models are built, their output all ends up sounding pretty repetitive.

Effective copy should excite people and keep them engaged. There are more brands on social media now than ever before. If you want to stand out from all that competition, you need writing that’s unique and precisely targeted to the audiences that matter. That requires higher-level thinking and skill than what an AI is capable of.

The Siren Song of AI: Resist the Temptation!

Of course, the temptation is always still there. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just let ChatGPT write this?” BEWARE: it’s a trap!

When you use ChatGPT this way, you don’t only produce worse writing — you actively dull your own writing skills. The more you rely on ChatGPT to help you immediately solve your problems, the worse you become at solving them on your own.

Finding the Sweet Spot

Now, before you think this is just another anti-AI rant from a luddite writer afraid of losing their job to a very eloquent robot, hear me out. There are actually quite a few ways these tools can help copywriters do their jobs better and faster than before:

• Researching topics
• Generating new ideas when you’re stuck
• Finding ways to reword specific sentences you’re not happy with

The key is to use the AI-generated content to inspire something great, not to replace your own creativity. Think of AI as a brainstorming buddy, not a ghostwriter.

The Bottom Line

go ahead and use AI to help your writing to your heart’s content! Experiment, play around, see what works for you. Just always remember this: you were hired to be a writer, so be a writer. Your unique voice, your creativity, your ability to truly understand and connect with an audience – that’s what sets you apart.