AI in Content Marketing: The Future, or Just Hype?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is greatly evolving the way businesses approach content marketing. As organizations seek more efficient ways to engage their audiences and streamline marketing operations, AI-powered tools offer potential solutions that can create content faster and, sometimes, better. 

From generating personalized content to analyzing vast amounts of data for better decision-making, AI has shown great potential to change marketing strategies in previously unimaginable ways. 

But is this a lasting shift or merely a trend that will fade? Understanding how AI fits into the broader marketing landscape is crucial for determining its true value. In this article, we discuss whether AI is genuinely shaping the future of content marketing, or if it's simply the latest buzzword.

Key Takeaways

• AI is reshaping content marketing by streamlining processes, enhancing personalization, and enabling large-scale content creation.


• Despite AI’s efficiency, combining it with human creativity leads to better, more emotionally engaging marketing content.


• AI benefits include cost savings, data-driven decision-making, and bias reduction in content creation, especially in written formats.


• AI faces challenges like limited emotional intelligence, potential for generic content, and difficulties in creating visual assets.


• Successful AI marketing campaigns from brands like Nutella, BMW, and Heinz showcase the technology's creative potential when used strategically.

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AI in Content Marketing - What You Need to Know

AI in content marketing has come a long way from its early days when many were skeptical of its capabilities. While concerns and criticisms remain, it's becoming clear that this technology is in the early stages of widespread adoption. Some remain critical, but the potential is hard to ignore, particularly in textual content.

AI is making significant strides in generating personalized written content, from blog posts to product descriptions. Unlike AI-generated visual content, which can still feel a bit rigid, textual marketing is where AI shines. That said, while AI tools are becoming widely available, the ability to create truly unique, high-quality content isn't universal. It's not just about letting AI run free—it’s the thoughtful combination of human creativity with AI's speed and efficiency that yields truly impactful results.

JP Morgan Chase, an early adopter, partnered with Persado as far back as 2016 to use AI in creating ad copy. Their use of AI-powered tools led to significant improvements, with up to a 450% increase in clicks. By 2019, they signed a five-year deal, focusing on using AI not just to generate copy but also to optimize existing content. 

Kristin Lemkau, CMO of JPMorgan, highlighted that AI rewrote copy in ways that human marketers, limited by their own experience and subjective judgment, might not have considered—and it worked. Chase's AI strategy also involved using vast data to create personalized marketing messages for specific audiences, proving AI’s strength in interpreting and acting on human behavior.

Benefits of AI in Content Marketing

As AI becomes more ingrained in content marketing strategies, its tangible benefits for businesses are increasingly apparent. Here are several ways AI can deliver measurable value to companies looking to enhance their content marketing efforts:

1. Generate Marketing Material at Scale

AI can automate the production of vast amounts of content, allowing businesses to meet the growing demand for personalized and engaging material across multiple platforms. Whether it's generating product descriptions, email campaigns, or social media posts, AI-driven systems can efficiently handle these tasks at scale, maintaining consistency in tone and message while significantly reducing turnaround times.

2. Cost-Effective Content Production

AI enables businesses to streamline their content creation processes, reducing reliance on large creative teams. By automating repetitive tasks and augmenting human input, AI can decrease overhead costs associated with producing high-quality content. This shift allows companies to allocate resources more strategically, optimizing both content production and operational expenses without compromising on output quality.

3. Data-Driven Decision Making

AI thrives on data. By analyzing customer behavior, preferences, and engagement patterns, AI can deliver actionable insights to inform content strategies. This data-driven approach empowers marketers to create more targeted campaigns that speak directly to audience needs, improving content relevance and increasing ROI. 

Furthermore, AI can continuously adjust strategies in real-time, enhancing responsiveness to market trends and customer interactions.

4. Eliminating Bias in Content Creation

Human content creators are often influenced by conscious or unconscious biases. AI, trained on diverse and extensive datasets, can deliver more objective and unbiased content. This ensures broader appeal across varied demographics, helping companies to engage with a wider audience while minimizing the risk of alienating key segments through biased messaging.

5. Helps Visualize Content Ideas

AI serves as a powerful ideation tool, rapidly generating multiple content concepts without the need for extensive human effort. While these initial outputs may not represent final drafts, they provide valuable starting points for creative teams to refine and develop. This accelerated ideation process helps marketers visualize a range of possibilities quickly, enhancing creative exploration and decision-making efficiency.

Limitations of AI in Content Marketing

While AI brings considerable advantages to content marketing, it is not without its limitations. Understanding these challenges is crucial for individuals that are looking to adapt AI in their processes.

1. Limited Emotional Intelligence

AI is great at processing data and generating content, but it lacks the emotional intelligence and empathy that human marketers bring to the table. Emotional resonance in content often comes from understanding complex human emotions and contexts, which AI struggles to grasp. As a result, AI-generated content can feel impersonal, rigid, and cold and may fail to connect with audiences on a deeper, emotional level.

2. Generic Content

Without carefully crafted prompts and specific instructions, AI tends to produce content that is formulaic and generic. For instance, if two users ask AI to "write an article on how to make coffee," the resulting articles for both individuals will likely be similar and uninspired. 

This lack of originality poses a challenge for businesses aiming to stand out in saturated markets. The key to overcoming this is combining AI’s efficiency with thoughtful human input to ensure content feels unique and aligned with brand voice.

3. Challenges in Generating Visual Content

While tools like DALL·E and MidJourney have made significant strides in AI-generated visuals, there are still limitations, particularly when it comes to integrating text into images. These AI platforms often struggle with text placement and legibility within visual content, making them less practical for marketing materials like banners, ads, and infographics where accurate and clear text is essential. 

We definitely did not ask Midjourney to create a billboard guaranteeing you'll get your 'izza' in '30 mutes'.

As a result, AI’s contribution to visual content remains less reliable compared to its success in text-based marketing.

4. Ethical Concerns for Biasness

AI systems are trained on massive datasets sourced from the internet, and not all of this data is free from bias. There have been instances where AI-generated content has reflected harmful stereotypes or inappropriate language due to biased training data. 

While AI eliminates human bias, it introduces the risk of algorithmic bias, which can be harder to detect and manage. This presents a significant challenge for marketers, especially in industries where inclusivity and ethical considerations are paramount.

How to Get Good Outputs in Content Marketing with AI?

To get the most out of AI in content marketing, it’s essential to approach it with a well-structured strategy. Here are key practices that can significantly improve the quality of AI-generated outputs:

1. Write Detailed Prompts

AI operates by following the inputs it receives, which means that the quality of your output is directly tied to the quality of your prompt. If the instructions are vague or overly broad, AI will generate generic and unrefined content. The key to getting precise and valuable results is to provide detailed prompts that clearly define the content direction. 

For example, instead of asking AI to "write an article about digital marketing," a better prompt would specify the audience, tone, key points, and structure you want. This level of specificity guides the AI and ensures that it aligns with your marketing objectives. Always remember that AI is not meant to replace your thinking; it’s a tool to augment your efforts.

Here’s a visual example of the difference in quality you can expect from a generic prompt and something more detailed, which results in a much more brandable and advertisable output.

2. AI-Generated Content is Never a Final Draft

AI can rapidly produce content, but that doesn't mean the output is ready for publication. Whether it's a written article, image, or video, AI lacks the nuance and critical judgment that human editors bring to the table. AI-generated content should be viewed as a first draft or starting point. 

Afterward, human oversight is crucial to refine the structure, enhance the tone, correct inaccuracies, and ensure the content meets brand standards. A human touch is necessary for improving flow, readability, and emotional engagement, ensuring that the content resonates with the target audience. This iterative process of combining AI with human editing maximizes the value AI brings.

3. List Down Factual Information

One of the limitations of AI is that it often relies on generalized knowledge, which may not always be accurate or detailed enough. And, when it isn’t able to find information, it can often hallucinate it into existence. To create content that stands out and is trustworthy, it's important to provide AI with concrete factual information. 

Feeding it specific case studies, statistics, or industry data can lead to more informed and relevant content generation. This approach allows AI to use your inputs as a framework, ensuring that the content is not only more engaging but also factually sound. This is especially important in technical or industry-specific content where accuracy is non-negotiable.

4. Maintain Brand Voice Consistency

AI lacks the innate understanding of brand identity that human writers possess, which makes it essential to take extra care in maintaining a consistent brand voice. While AI can be programmed to follow certain language patterns, it often requires human input to ensure that the tone and messaging align with your brand’s unique style. 

After generating content, marketers should review and edit it to ensure that it reflects the brand's core values, voice, and personality. This may involve adjusting phrasing, adding emotional nuance, or tailoring content for specific target demographics to ensure that it remains on-brand.

5. Use AI as an Addition

AI is a powerful tool for saving time and streamlining workflows, but it should never replace human expertise. Instead, businesses should use AI to handle repetitive or time-consuming tasks, such as content ideation or basic copy generation, while reserving human talent for strategic thinking, creativity, and final refinements. 

This hybrid approach allows marketers to leverage the efficiency of AI while retaining the unique insights, emotional intelligence, and nuanced decision-making that only human professionals can provide. When used as a complementary tool, AI can significantly enhance productivity without compromising the quality or authenticity of your content.

Examples of Successful Marketing Campaigns Using AI

As we said earlier, AI is still in its early stages of widespread adaptation. However, here are three companies that didn’t hesitate to step out of their comfort zones and launch marketing campaigns that greatly benefited from AI.

Nutella's Unique Jars

Nutella's “Nutella Unica” campaign demonstrated how personalization can create a powerful connection with customers. By using AI to design 7 million unique jar labels, each jar became a one-of-a-kind collectible item. This approach resonated with consumers who value uniqueness and creativity.

The campaign resulted in all jars being sold out within a month, highlighting how personalized products can capture attention and boost sales. The use of AI was simply a tool to enhance the customer experience, but the real success lay in Nutella's ability to tap into consumer desire for individuality.

BMW and AI Art

BMW’s collaboration with AI in its advertising campaign showcased how innovative art can align a brand with luxury and creativity. For the 8 Series Gran Coupé, BMW projected AI-generated art onto the car, connecting with its target audience on an emotional level.

The campaign successfully reinforced BMW's long-standing relationship with art and design, while presenting the car as a symbol of sophistication. AI helped produce the artwork, but the campaign's effectiveness came from the way BMW engaged its audience by intertwining art, luxury, and emotion.

Heinz's AI Ketchup

In Heinz’s “A.I. Ketchup” campaign, AI was used to generate images of ketchup through the text-to-image generator DALL-E 2. The interesting outcome was that regardless of the abstract prompts given to the AI, the results consistently resembled Heinz's iconic ketchup bottles.

This playful and creative campaign engaged audiences on social media, inviting users to submit their own prompts, and resulting in over 1.15 billion impressions globally. While AI drove the creative aspect, the success came from Heinz reinforcing its status as the go-to ketchup brand, leveraging both innovation and audience participation.

Final Thoughts - Can AI Replace Human Content?

If you're a marketing professional worried about AI taking over your job, relax! AI is still far from replicating everything a human content creator or designer can bring to the table. However, for businesses, AI is an invaluable tool that can deliver great results when used correctly. Ignoring AI could mean missing out on scalability, productivity, and cost-efficiency, potentially giving your AI-savvy competitors an advantage.

That said, AI has its limitations, and it’s crucial to recognize where it falls short. If you’re looking to stay with a human-centered approach, Good Kids has you covered.

At Good Kids, we combine over 15 years of expertise with creativity and technology to craft content that not only captures attention but keeps it. We specialize in creating shareable moments that align with your brand's values while driving real business results. We've worked with some of the world's biggest brands and had a ton of fun doing it. Our commitment to innovation and human-centered design means every project is tailored for impact, authenticity, and engagement.

If you're ready to explore how we create smart, creative content powered by (mostly) real humans, get in touch with us today!