The Real Future of AI in Content Creation
The marketing world's a whirlwind of change, and AI's at the heart of it. From generating ideas to lending a hand with research AI tools are becoming part of the toolset here at Nexus and as an agency, we use AI to help our clients achieve the best results possible. What’s the real story with AI and content and how's it going to shake things up for agencies like us?
On a daily basis, we're all drowning in content, whether through social media, news, or TV and that can at times, feel like chasing an information bullet train. Breakthroughs are happening so fast it's hard to keep track. One of the most impressive advancements in AI is its ability to understand human language. The more detailed the prompt, the better the results. This can also contribute to fostering connections by assisting with creating hyper-targeted messages for the audience. AI can also analyse available information online and social media platforms to identify trending topics and themes, allowing marketers to craft content that aligns with current trends and interests while identifying customer concerns. For example, a food brand might be using AI to monitor discussions about healthy eating and identify a surge in interest in vegan recipes. This could result in a shift in strategy and lead to the development of new vegan-friendly products and content.
Additionally, companies like Meta and Netflix are leveraging AI for similar purposes. For example, Netflix uses AI algorithms to recommend series and films to users based on their viewing history and preferences. This personalised content delivery keeps users engaged and encourages them to explore new titles they might not have discovered otherwise. Similarly, Meta employs AI to enhance user experience across its platforms and most recently adding a function into messenger which allows users to ask Meta AI questions or ask to generate an image. Meta also uses AI to analyse user interactions and preferences, enabling it to curate news feeds, videos, reels and advertisements that resonate with individual users. This targeted approach ensures that users see the content that is relevant to their interests, increasing user satisfaction and engagement. Using AI, has allowed both Meta and Netflix to better understand their audiences and provide tailored experiences that drive engagement and loyalty.
The truth is that AI is getting smarter by the minute. It's learning the ins-and-outs of human language, understanding context and generating different creative formats, from images and videos to music. Just imagine the possibilities! AI could help visualise your brand's story, creating stunning visuals for social media campaigns or composing bespoke soundtracks for your video content. Tools like Midjourney can create incredible visuals from text prompts, offering a fast and cost-effective way to create bespoke imagery. Need to change the background on an image or generate a picture of a squirrel riding a unicorn through a rainbow? AI can do it. This is a huge advantage for creating unique and eye-catching content. Music streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify have integrated AI into their platform to compose personalised playlists for each user based on their listening habits and preferences.
However, it's not about replacing human creativity but about giving it a turbo boost. While AI can generate content, it's up to marketers to ensure that the content is aligned with brand values, tone of voice and engaging with the target audience, while achieving the desired marketing objectives. The human element remains essential in crafting compelling narratives, developing creative concepts, and building meaningful customer connections. AI gives marketers the tools to work smarter by speeding up repetitive tasks and providing valuable insights, but the human touch ultimately drives successful marketing campaigns. Therefore, it's crucial to only use AI to assist with content ideas and not as a replacement for human writers and editors. Human expertise is essential in crafting compelling narratives, developing creative concepts and ensuring authentic and engaging content. Marketers should leverage AI to automate repetitive tasks and provide valuable insights while reserving their creative energy for crafting compelling stories and building meaningful connections with their audience.
However, like any powerful tool, AI has its limitations. AI can write text, sure, but our human expertise ensures it sounds authentic and resonates with your target audience. For example, we used an AI tool to assist with writing metadata for a website we are working on. In a prompt, we outlined the keywords we would like it to include and where it should be positioned in the metadata. Result – the metadata provided was too long and did not include the keyword we had outlined in a prompt. This highlights the importance of human oversight and quality control. While AI can generate text quickly and efficiently, it's up to marketers to ensure that the text is accurate, grammatically correct (Think UK vs USA spelling), and aligned with brand guidelines. AI can also struggle with nuanced language and complex topics, requiring human intervention to ensure clarity and accuracy.
Furthermore, AI-generated text can sometimes lack originality and creativity, relying on existing patterns and structures. This can result in generic and uninspired content, sometimes even complete gobbledygook, and, therefore, fail to capture the target audience's attention. For example, we used AI to generate ideas for social content that tied in pop culture references and the subject we were talking about in the posts, and the results were riddled with wordplay, lacked relevance or emotional connection and therefore, were irrelevant.
Just like AI copywriting AI image generation isn't perfect. Sometimes, the results can be a bit… off - distorted figures, hands with seven fingers or even additional arms, strange artefacts, or a general lack of coherence. For instance, you're trying to generate an image of a cat sitting in a field of sunflowers. You might end up with a feline creature possessing an unsettling number of legs, or perhaps the sunflowers themselves are strangely elongated and resemble something similar to alien flora. Or worse still, the cat might be seamlessly integrated into the sunflower itself, becoming a bizarre, furry, petal-covered hybrid. These kinds of distortions are common, especially when the AI grapples with complex scenes or unusual combinations of elements. It's not just about physical anomalies either. Sometimes the AI struggles with elemental composition, creating images with a skewed perspective or the lighting is unnatural, casting an eerie glow over the entire scene.
Another common issue is the presence of strange artefacts such as blurry patches, pixelated areas, or even entirely random objects that don't belong in the image, which can sometimes go unnoticed at first glance yet, when used, allows viewers to quickly identify them as AI-generated images. Beyond the technical imperfections there's also the question of coherence. The AI might generate individual elements that look reasonably good in isolation but when combined, they don't look quite right. For example, you might have a beautifully rendered sky and a perfectly detailed field but the transition between the two is jarring or the scale of the elements is entirely off. This lack of coherence can make the image feel disjointed and unconvincing.
Furthermore the AI's interpretation of prompts can sometimes be unpredictable. You might have a particular vision in mind but the AI might take your prompt in a completely different direction, producing an image or content that bears little resemblance to what you were hoping for. Trying to then get it right can be time-consuming, especially when you're working on a tight deadline or have a very clear creative brief. The AI's understanding of nuance and context is still limited and it can often struggle with abstract concepts or highly specific requests. Therefore while AI content and image generation have made significant strides, it's still far from being a perfect tool. It requires careful prompting, a degree of trial and error, and post-processing to achieve the desired results. It's also important to remember that AI like any tool, is only as good as the person using it. A skilled copywriter, artist or designer can leverage the power of AI to create captivating content or stunning visuals. However they must still have a strong understanding of storytelling or design elements to get the best results possible.
At Nexus Creative Ltd, we're not just waiting to see what happens with AI in content creation – we're making it happen. We have integrated various AI tools into our day-to-day practices to assist us with delivering the best results for our clients in line with their goals and targets. By using AI to streamline some of our processes has allowed us to free up our time to focus on strategic content planning and creation which drives our client’s success. And we’ve seen the results and how it has paid off for our clients – improved social reach and interactions, streamlined processes, high-quality digital and print materials being produced, and ROI-driven strategies in place for many of our clients all due to using AI to free up our time to focus on what we do best. As an agency, we're constantly investing in our team and in educating ourselves in cutting-edge AI tools such as Midjourney, Gemini, and ChatGPT, giving our team the knowledge and skills to use them effectively and develop innovative strategies and using the power of AI to help with that. We believe that agencies that embrace and thoughtfully integrate AI will be the ones that not only survive but thrive in the years to come. The future is intelligence, and at Nexus Creative Ltd, we're ready to lead the charge!