As a small business owner, can AI (ChatGPT in particular) actually help your small business marketing? It depends on how you use it. ChatGPT can be a great source for inspiration and information, but it also has downsides you need to consider.

 

How ChatGPT Can Help

 

ChatGPT is a great resource when you are feeling uninspired with your content marketing. Consider asking the AI for content examples for your industry. The key to getting the best response possible with chatbots is to give them as much information as possible. 

 

Example: “Can you share 5 reel ideas for the beauty industry?” Or if you want to take this question up a notch you can ask: “Can you share 5 short and funny reel ideas for a business that provides skincare products for older women.” 

 

You can also use this chatbot for help with keyword optimization and writing content. While we do not recommend asking for entire blog posts, it can be helpful with an ad script or a social media caption. 

 

We do not recommend just copying and pasting a ChatGPT response. For one, people can tell from the tone and structure that it is AI – which may cause you to look inauthentic. It is also possible that you may end up plagiarizing, because of how chatbots pull information from other sources. Instead, rewrite the response so that it works with your small business brand.

 

Example: We use ChatGPT for help with our podcast descriptions. It is difficult to be sure that a description is really OPTIMIZED for the keyword we are focusing on, so we use the chatbot to help us with keyword optimization. I write a rough draft that I share with the AI and ask it to rewrite and optimize the description for the keyword. Once I have the response, I look over the changes it made and craft the final description while pulling from both my original draft and the ChatGPT response. 

 

Things To Be Aware Of

 

We already mentioned that because of how AI works, it is possible to run into plagiarism issues. There are also other issues you need to be aware of if you are going to be using ChatGPT for your small business marketing. First off, it’s not always right. If you are asking the chatbot for specific information or statistics, you may want to double check that the response is correct. 

 

A great example of this is Google’s recent debacle with their AI search.

Google’s AI  ended up wrongly classifying some Reddit “meme posts” as factual, and used the information for  responses to related google searches. This resulted with responses like, “If you run and don’t look down, you won’t fall off a cliff.” Hopefully no one was injured.

 

Do not share data that you would not feel comfortable sharing with the public. It is best practice to assume that chatbots (like ChatGPT) will store the information you give it – meaning you do NOT want to be sharing confidential information. This is not limited to but definitely includes client information. For a full conversation on ChatGPT, AI, and how to practice safe use, check out this podcast episode!



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Feel free to share your thoughts with me, I can be reached at vivian@theseasonedmarketer.com!

 

Looking for more free marketing tips and content specifically for small business owners? Check out our podcast, S.O.B. Marketing Podcast. Every Wednesday we discuss a new topic to help small business owners take on marketing on their own. Listen to our episode of the S.O.B. Marketing podcast wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube! Have a topic you want us to discuss? Email us at Help@TheSeasonedMarketer.com!

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