Using AI Tools For Content Marketing: An Interview with Christopher Melotti

6/25/2024

There’s no way around it – AI is all the rage right now!

Everywhere you turn, from LinkedIn posts to Google search results, and everything in between, all we’re hearing is AI. AI. AI!

Honestly, it’s now difficult to even find a product or service that’s not in some way assisted by AI technology these days. In fact, AI developers are building more and more platforms and tools to help you every single day.

Of course, with this has come a relentless rush to adopt AI and reap the benefits of this amazing technology.

That’s why so many companies are now jumping on the AI trend – but more often than not, they’re not even entirely sure what they’re adopting.

The hype surrounding AI is a bit mad right now

But that’s typically how it goes when a new technology of this magnitude is released to the world.

Now, we’re all just trying to find our own way in the new world of AI – but in a lot of ways, that’s much easier said than done.

Recently, however, Christopher Melotti, a qualified AI Ethicist and Business Strategist, joined Salted Stone’s podcast, “Under the Hood”, to provide a whole slew of great insights and ideas about the responsible use of AI and how to get the most out of it for your organisation.

We’ve summarised it, below. But you can watch it all here.

In a nutshell, Chris explains that, while AI is a fantastic tool and a real gamechanger, there are still a lot of considerations that must be made around:

integrating this technology into your organisation,
the standard operating procedures that should be followed,
your overall goals for adopting the technology,
and much more.

To help you gain a better understanding of what this means for you, we’re going to break down the podcast and focus on a few key quotes and insights from Chris throughout.

In doing so, we hope to show you how you can better implement AI into your operations.

Let’s start at the beginning: What is an AI Ethicist?

As the podcast mentions, Christopher Melotti is a multi-award-winning Content Marketer and Brand Communications Strategist based in Sydney.

More than that, he is also a qualified AI Ethicist and AI Ethics Policy Writer, as well as a strong enthusiast of Generative AI.

An AI Ethicist is essentially someone who goes into an organisation and writes policies and procedures (based on the company’s values, what they do, how they do it, and more) that stipulate the rules and governance around how they use AI to ensure that it is done ethically and responsibly.

Why?

Because without a framework, AI can easily get out of control – and right now, much of the world is focused on adoption, but few are focused on regulation and governance.

In other words, many marketers are eager to start using AI tools in their daily operations, but they don’t realise that there are still so many things to consider. This is exacerbated by the fact that there are so few people considered experts in AI that can help.

Here’s what Chris had to say:

“As a Copywriter and Marketer for 20 years now, I love the use of AI, and it definitely augments, but it doesn’t replace. What we’re seeing at the moment is a lot of marketers are excited about AI, everyone’s talking about it and there’s this mass rush for adoption, but with that comes confusion."

He then goes on to say that his own knowledge of AI has not come from studying.

Rather, it has come from practical use. He spends hours every single day talking to ChatGPT so he can learn more about it.

In other words, the more time you spend with the AI tools you’re curious about, the more knowledge you will gain and the better you will understand how to get the most out of them for your organisation – on both a productive and an ethical level.

The Human-AI-Human sandwich: Getting the most out of your AI tools.

According to Chris, the absolute best way to get what you need out of AI is to ensure that there is a human on either side of it.

This is how he trains everyone, from his students to the companies he works with to his own team.

“You as the human at the start need to make sure that you set up the ground rules and everything that you want. The more context you give your AI tools, the better.

Often, I speak to ChatGPT for an hour before I start getting good content out of it, and that’s what it takes, because you need to set up all the parameters."

What this means is, by using the right AI prompts, you can let tools like ChatGPT know exactly what you want them to do, and just as importantly, what you don’t want them to do.

The more specific you are with these prompts, the better the output you will receive.

That’s why Chris not only takes the time to explain the situation and the tone of voice he is writing in, but he also takes it much further than just the generic details. For example, if the client he is writing for is particularly worried about their reputation or has a certain goal in mind, Chris will let ChatGPT know about this intent behind the content as well.

This is what Chris refers to as the first part of the Human-AI-Human sandwich.

The second part is where the Generative AI tool comes in.

Of course, the tool’s role is typically over in just a matter of seconds – and this is exactly why so many people are tempted to use AI.

They believe that this technology can do their job or replace the role of a copywriter in just a few seconds. What they fail to realise, however, is that the real gold comes from the humans on either side.

The final slice of the sandwich – the human being editing the output of the AI tool – is where the real beauty emerges.

Taking the time to refine, craft and check the output that Generative AI gives you, rather than simply copying and pasting the output as is, is an extremely important element of the process.

Why?

Because your reputation is on the line.

Chris echoes this sentiment:

“When I train my team of copywriters and content producers, I tell them that the output alone is not acceptable. I always say that you must be checking, and when you ask for references, you need to physically find the reference and check it as well.

“As the person running these ChatGPT prompts, and any AI platforms, it is absolutely your responsibility.”

Think about it: while there are so many AI tools out there, the real power truly comes from harnessing these tools, just as in any other profession.

A bad farmer cannot blame their tools. They must change the way in which they use their tools if they wish to improve.

This same concept applies to marketers and content creators – and the Human-AI-Human sandwich is the key to continual improvement.

So, how do you know what AI tools to utilise in your content marketing?

With more than 7000 AI tools released in the past two years alone, it’s no wonder that marketers and business owners are often left wondering where to even begin with AI.

That’s why Chris believes in the importance of experimentation to determine what tools you should be using and what you can do without.

“First of all, try to get the free version and have a play, because the biggest thing you will find is that, as with anything like this that explodes in popularity, there are so many tools that have many different functionalities that overlap in so many different ways.

“However, you’ve also got to remember that they are not a replacement, they’re still an augmenting tool like anything else.”

In other words, don’t just buy AI tools and hope that you’ll find a use for them.

The tool has to be productive and useful to your organisation, and most importantly, your team needs to be adequately trained in how to use the tool to their advantage.

Chris believes that marketers should embrace AI tools, but that you need to do your due diligence, and often that comes from jumping in and becoming familiar with a system to learn its limitations and discover the role you need to play to get the most out of it as well.

Once you’ve done that, you can decide if it’s worth integrating into your systems.

Essentially, it’s about learning how to use AI productively. Remember, too, that it cannot replace you, so you still need to be vigilant about the way that you use it and how you use its output.

As Chris says:

“The rules of marketing still apply. Even if you use an AI tool, the 101 of marketing is still engagement.”

Put simply, if your audience isn’t finding your content interesting, it doesn’t matter how quickly ChatGPT and other similar tools are producing content for you.

As a marketer or content creator, you still need to ensure that the content you’re putting out there, whether AI-driven or not, is engaging enough to grab your audience’s attention.

Using AI to generate engaging short-form content for social media

According to The HubSpot Blog’s 2024 Social Media Marketing Report, 51% of marketers say generative AI is most helpful in creating social media posts, and 58% say that's what they use generative AI for.

Essentially, many content producers are using AI because it’s an easy win. You can scan the output extremely fast, and it doesn’t take a whole lot of AI prompting to get what you’re after.

Chris acknowledged the benefits of AI in creating social media posts:

“As a Content Producer myself, I don’t do a lot of social media posts, I never have, because they’re just too finicky and too small to charge for, so AI replacing this is fantastic."

What’s more, AI-generated social media posts can also be quickly tested for engagement, allowing for fast refinement to increase their effectiveness.

Of course, this still requires your human direction. As Chris put it:

“I always think of AI as a cannon – you still need to point it in the right direction for it to be effective."

In other words, you still need to prompt AI and tell it what you want, as well as the intent behind your social media posts. Once you give it the right information, it will hopefully produce something close to what you need.

“Imagine AI is like the curator or librarian sitting on the human library. It doesn’t know what you need, you need to tell it."

What Chris is saying here is that your Generative AI tool already has the knowledge that you need, but you still need to provide the right guidance to get that knowledge out of the tool.

The paradox here, of course, is that you can only extrapolate from AI information that it has already ingested from humans.

This means that, as humans, we must keep creating new and original content to be able to feed the AI so it can continue to provide us with new output.

This is something that many people don’t consider. Generative AI tools still need humans to be able to function as intended.

As Chris noted in the podcast:

“People see AI as a silver bullet, and that’s where you don’t get the good results. Where you get the good results is when you understand its limitations and you navigate around that."

Recognising the importance of long-form content in the AI era

Many think that, with the advent of AI, content is essentially dead, but it’s actually more important than ever.

With generic AI-generated short-form content in such abundance right now, long-form content is enjoying a huge surge in popularity.

Why?

People still want content that is unique, deep and original, with undertones of thought leadership.

Of course, the rules of marketing still apply.

You can’t bore your audience to death.

Your long-form content still needs to be clean, precise and engaging – something that AI struggles to produce, as it often collapses on itself and becomes quite repetitive when trying to create long-form content.

While attention spans are shortening, your audience will still engage if the long-form content you produce is relevant and valuable to them.

This is how you will get cut-through in the cluttered world of AI-driven content.

How does Christopher Melotti foresee AI driving our roles and responsibilities as content creators?

And where can you stay informed to find the right AI tools for your content marketing needs?

“For all marketers going forward, inform yourself and get involved, because AI is not going away. It’s here and it’s a great tool.

“As I said, I am using it myself every day.

“To stay relevant, every marketer, and actually, every person in business should be getting to know it and finding their own style and exploring and experimenting, because as I said, it’s not going away. AI is going to be here and it’s only going to get more prevalent."

Chris believes that we will soon start to see AI become the norm. Right now, it’s this exciting new technology and there’s a group of early adopters, but eventually, it will become the mainstream and that’s where it will really come into its own.

Once it does become part of our normal business day, we will then begin to shape our approach to AI with a new mindset.

The biggest key here is to not let go of your critical thinking. Because your critical thinking is what you need to truly get the most out of AI.

In the podcast, Chris reminds us that AI can’t do everything. It is not the be-all and end-all. As he mentioned earlier, you still need to point it in the right direction.

So, any final words of advice from Chris?

“Honestly, AI is a great tool, and I encourage every marketer to jump in. Don’t be scared.”

Of course, while you might like to learn more about the ethical use of AI and how to lead the responsible implementation of AI in your organisation, you’re time-poor, spread thin and may not have the resources or expertise to do this yourself.

That’s where Melotti AI can help.

Ready to discover the power of ethical AI integration for your content marketing?

Business AI Ethics and AI policy development for organisations is an absolutely essential part of progress.

As Chris said, AI isn’t going away. It’s only becoming more prevalent.

This means we need to encourage all corporations to take steps towards integrating ethical considerations into all AI strategies, reinforcing the benefits of responsible AI use for all stakeholders – from staff to customers and everyone in between.

We aim to guide businesses through the journey of ethical AI integration, promoting a thoughtful and proactive approach to technology adoption for corporations.

By understanding and addressing all of these topics, corporations can navigate the complex ethical AI environment to ensure AI initiatives are productive and ethically responsible.

Let's discuss your AI Ethics needs with Melotti AI

At Melotti AI, we champion responsible AI use in Australian Businesses. Engaging with us is not only straightforward, but a smart investment in your organisation’s future.

Our suite of AI consulting services empowers organisations to forge ahead with confidence and integrity in their AI Implementation.

Speak to us for all of your AI Consulting needs, including:

Email us at: [email protected]

Call us on: 1800 M MEDIA - 1800 663 342

AI ETHICS Insights