5 Easy Hacks to Ensure Your Creative AI Content Isn't Really Wonky

By Joey Mechelle Farque

The allure of artificial intelligence (AI) presents a fascinating promise: the potential to amplify our stories, reach, and impact. However, as recent events—like the now infamous Willy's Chocolate Experience debacle—have shown, relying too heavily on AI can lead to chaos rather than a path to innovation.

Here are five hacks to ensure your AI content doesn't veer into the wonky, sounding like you've let the machine take the lead:

Sidestep the AI Echo Chamber

The voice of your organization is its heartbeat. It's what connects you with your audience on a human level. AI, for all its sophistication, can sometimes come across as cold and unoriginal, and it tends to regurgitate a familiar set of phrases – think: “delve into,” “dive into,” “weave a tapestry of,” or the overly buzz-wordy, “navigating the ever-changing landscape.” While these can fill space, they hardly speak with your brand's voice. Challenge yourself and your team to identify these AI crutches and replace them with language that reflects your organization's unique tone, style, and personality. Remember, the goal is to stand out, not blend into an AI-generated monotone. Avoid letting your content become unremarkably wonky.

Keep Your Brand in the Driver's Seat

AI can generate content at a mind-boggling pace, but it should not dictate your brand’s direction. The brand you’ve carefully crafted to resonate with your donors and stakeholders must steer the content creation process. Edit, tailor, and sometimes outright discard AI suggestions that don’t align with your brand’s ethos. Letting AI dictate your narrative is akin to handing over the storytelling keys to someone who doesn't know the first thing about your mission.

Use AI-generated content as a draft, not a decree. Integrating your brand’s authentic voice throughout any AI-produced material is imperative, ensuring every message, campaign, or story remains true to your organization’s values and vision. Don’t allow your brand’s journey to be derailed by a misstep into the realm of the wonky.

Edit, Edit, Then Edit Some More

Never accept AI-generated content as the final draft. The edit button is your best friend when getting to know AI. Scrutinize AI-generated drafts for bland, repetitive language and infuse them with vibrant, specific, and engaging words that capture the essence of your cause.

Editing isn’t just about correcting errors; it’s an opportunity to inject personality and life into content that might otherwise read as flat, inauthentic, or formulaic. Make every word count and every message meaningful. The beauty of AI is not in its perfection but in its potential. Use it as a starting point. Each edit is a step away from a potentially wonky narrative, as disastrous as a script that improvises more chaos than charm.

Feed Your AI Quality Ingredients

AI is like a chef de cuisine. It’s poised to delight but the quality of the output depends on the ingredients provided. Feed it original thoughts and detailed briefs about real-life situations and the lives you’ve changed. By investing the time to train your AI with high-quality input, you transform it from a wonky crutch into a sophisticated tool that can assist and enhance your organization's stories. This approach helps avoid the dreariness of content that sounds like everyone else's. After all, your organization is unique, and your content should inspire action through authenticity.

Forge a Personal Connection with Your AI

I am in “a complicated relationship” with AI; at least, that would be my status on Facebook if I weren't married. AI and I have gotten very close over the last year. We fight a lot, but at the end of the day, Reggie (that's what I've named my AI) and I are copacetic.

Approach your AI as a nuanced, evolving partnership, one that flourishes with guidance, critical feedback, and the occasional dose of tough love. This balanced interaction, mindful of AI’s limitations and potential, ensures it acts as a creative ally rather than a dictator, preserving the authentic human touch in your content. Remember the Willy’s Chocolate Experience fiasco – where reliance on AI without this discerning partnership led to nothing short of giving each attendee an AI-scripted narrative that bewildered more than it enchanted.

As AI-generated content becomes more of a regular thing, safeguarding your organization’s unique voice is crucial. Rather than letting AI shortcut your way to monotonous content, employ it judiciously to enrich your authentic narratives. By dodging clichés and resisting the allure of autopilot AI, you ensure your content steers clear of becoming really wonky – because the last thing you want is for your message to be remembered as the equivalent of a dreary warehouse event that turned expectant smiles into collective frowns.