The Truth About Using AI to Write Your Blogs and Website

As a small business owner, you’re focused on optimising your time. This means getting the best value for money on your supplies, employing reliable staff whom you can count on, and finding the fastest way to get yourself online. 

You need a digital presence quickly, and you can’t attract any customers or start your marketing efforts unless you have one. What happens next? You see an advertisement online about how an AI platform can ‘build you a website in minutes’ or ‘create blogs in seconds’. You then subscribe to an AI platform, without knowing about the challenges of AI-generated content. 

As a marketer and business owner, I understand. The offer sounds tempting when budgets are tight, but it really isn’t. Using AI in your content is a marketing red flag. And there is a lesser-known risk of having AI-generated content for your website. 

Let’s talk about this. 

TL;DR (Summary): The risk of AI-generated content is the loss of brand personality and authority as a business. While using AI to create your website content and blogs sounds great in the short term, in the long run, you’re left with a website that has zero personal connection, zero engagement, and no SEO (yes, even if you use SEO-friendly AI tools). To really get the benefits of AI content in your marketing, use it to generate ideas, refine your ideas with you, and come up with website or blog outlines. And always get a human to read and edit the final product.

Why does AI content feel so tempting? 

• It helps to generate content or a website page quickly 
• The cost of using an AI platform is cheap
• Anyone can use AI without any prior knowledge
• Unlike humans, AI rarely make mistakes 
• There’s no hassle of dealing with agencies or freelancers

Before I start sounding like your usual anti-AI writer, let me just say that I believe in the benefits of AI and what it can do. In fact, I use Grammarly to triple-check my work and also ChatGPT as my sounding board whenever I have an idea for my business.

However, within these short-term benefits, there’s a hidden risk of AI-generated content for websites: your brand personality becomes as bland as lodging your Business Activity Statement (BAS), and your credibility as a brand for people becomes almost non-existent.

The Risks of AI-Generated Content

There are many risks of AI-generated content, including poor SEO from generic content, and penalties for low-quality content. Then there’s also a possibility of damaging your brand’s reputation if authenticity, creativity, and lack of emotional intelligence is questioned.
Let’s look into this further. 

Poor SEO Results 

Time and time again, Google has mentioned that website content should be helpful, reliable, and focused on benefiting the reader to get noticed by its search engine. Artificial Intelligence cannot do this, simply because it does not have any originality. 

If you’re trying to rank for a search term (i.e. plumber in Perth), and you’re using ChatGPT to write your website page, all ChatGPT will do is take all the existing words and phrases that already exist on the web and duplicate them for your website. 

And if there’s one thing that Google dislikes, it’s unoriginal, duplicate content with keywords stuffed into it unnaturally.

To get noticed by Google, it is recommended that you create your website content with the E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) framework, which is a standard Google uses to evaluate content quality. 

No Brand Voice and Authenticity

Artificial Intelligence cannot capture your personal story, values, or tone. No matter how much you try to prompt it to ‘sound personal’, your copy almost always sounds robotic and generic. But why does having a brand voice matter?   

Think of the last time you bought a product or a service from a local business. 9 times out of 10, it would have come from an emotional place (i.e. you trusted the business, you understood the product, you knew that the business understood their products or services like the back of their hand).

Now, consider whether AI can convey the same level of emotions for your website. 

Wasted Time and Money

Although AI-generated content for your website may seem cheap at first, it’ll ultimately cost you more money and resources. A significant number of website owners have regretted using AI-generated content for their websites, particularly when the content is overused or relied upon almost exclusively. 

Many business owners who use AI in their content eventually regret it when they fail to generate leads or sales from the website, and statistics support this. 55% of customers are uncomfortable with AI content, and Google has classified this type of content as ‘low rating.’ 

I’ve seen many business owners try AI content, realise it’s not working months after their website launch, and start the entire process again. Isn’t it better to get it right the first time?

Customers Notice the Difference

Yes, they will. Your customers are smart, and they can tell when a piece of content lacks originality or human nuance. When you release generic content on your website, it sounds unserious and lax. It can also be an impression of how much effort you put into your business, and ultimately, them. 

Here are some sentences and words that AI content loves, and customers see it everywhere:

• The em dash (-)
• “isn’t just a buzzword” 
• “the landscape of”
• “ensure” 
• “treasure trove”

With so much AI-generated content online, your small business has an opportunity to create its own personality. This is what will give you an edge if you’re competing with other similar businesses. 

The Long-Term Cons of AI-Generated Content for Websites (And Why Human Content Matters)

In the long run, using AI-generated content will ultimately produce a multitude of similar, generic, and artificial content across the internet. Customers will see the same writing style, tone, and summaries across every business and brand, and already, we’re seeing some backlash from the public audience against AI-generated content online. 

For your business, it means little to no connection with your customers. It also tells your customers this: If I put this much effort into my marketing, I’ll put the same effort into what I’m selling. 

A lesson that I learned in marketing is this: Always assume your customers are sceptics. Assume they think you’ll cut corners, not do a good job, and disappoint them. Your marketing goal should be to prove them wrong. 

With unoriginal AI content, you’re proving them right.  

I’ll leave you with this food for thought.  

Conclusion: Human Copywriting (and Connection) Still Matters

As with most things in business, using the quickest and simplest methods isn’t always the best approach. While using AI content may seem like a no-brainer, the long-term risk can outweigh the short-term gains. Your business deserves a unique voice in a crowded market, which isn’t something AI content can do for you. 

If you’re looking to sound human, build trust, and find your brand personality in a crowded online space, let’s talk. Contact Inkspot to learn more about our website content writing services in Perth.  

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the main risks of AI-generated content for small business websites?
AI content can be highly generic, factually inaccurate, and miss your brand’s unique voice. This, in turn, will hurt your credibility online, fail to engage visitors (especially when competitors sound more human), and cause plagiarism or penalties if it’s not properly edited and fact-checked.

What are the disadvantages of using AI for content writing? 

AI content is unable to produce original ideas. Instead, it takes bits and pieces from various website sources on the internet. Using these repeated ideas has many disadvantages, such as losing your originality, brand personality, and failing to appeal to customers as a different provider than your competitors. AI content can also make mistakes, and you’ll be at risk of publishing misinformation on your website. 

Can AI content hurt SEO?
Yes, it will. Search engines value content originality, relevance, and expertise. AI-generated content cannot produce novel, unique ideas. So your content will be repetitive and low-quality, which may harm your rankings. Over-optimised or duplicate text could also trigger penalties from search engines and lower your website’s visibility and organic traffic over time.

Can AI tools replace a professional website copywriter?
No. AI content-generating tools don’t have the strategy, creativity, and emotional intelligence of a human, professional writer. A copywriter helps fine-tune your messaging so that it resonates with fellow humans, matches your SEO goals, and reflects your brand’s personality. However, AI can definitely speed up the drafting stage.  

Is it safe to use AI for brainstorming blog ideas?
Yes absolutely! AI is a great tool for generating blog topic ideas and outlines quickly. I use tools like ChatGPT to supplement my ideas, and encourage small businesses to do the same. However, you should refine, fact-check, and adapt ideas to your audience’s needs, and always add what’s unique about your business into the content mix. 

How do I avoid the risks of AI-generated content on my website?
Firstly, use a human copywriter at the early stages of creating your content. This means even in the idea stage itself. Use your expertise and skills as a business owner to add human insights, examples, and expertise into your content.  

You should also run plagiarism checks, update outdated references, and have a regular content review process to ensure your content remains relevant, credible, and SEO-friendly.

Why is human-written website content better for building trust?
Yes, human-written content definitely resonates better with your audience. It conveys empathy, understanding, and a unique perspective, which are qualities many audiences connect with. 

As a content writer, I collaborate with my clients to create content that reflects their real experiences, uses relatable language, and addresses customer pain points more naturally. This builds credibility and has a higher chance of converting your website’s visitors.