30-second summary:

• In less than six months, ChatGPT went from being a mystery to being a killer of copywriter jobs.
• ChatGPT and other natural language processing models are useful tools that marketers can use to build meaningful relationships with their customers.
• ChatGPT can’t replace your marketing skills or copywriting abilities, nor will it be able to create a strategy based on keywords. But it could allow you to spend more time doing important things.
• ChatGPT’s use is currently free, so you can try it and develop your prompting skills to make the best of it.

ChatGPT’s hype cycle has reached hyperdrive. In less than six months, we’ve gone through the stages of “What is ChatGPT?” “ChatGPT saves marketing” and “ChatGPT kills copywriter jobs”. Even by today’s standards of rapid technology adoption, that’s an impressive feat.

ChatGPT, with more than one million users registered now, is the most popular of the AI-driven models for natural language. ChatGPT, and its cousin DALL-E which generates images, are said to create content more quickly and accurately than humans.

Some have refused to use ChatGPT. They claim that AL language models will only be the newest shiny toy available to marketers and that they won’t replicate the human touch which elevates great marketing beyond persuasion into an engagement.

Who’s right? Everyone and nobody.

ChatGPT: Finally, a tool for copywriters only…

Each marketing function has its own set of tools that can help it succeed. Copywriters used to rely on their brains and a few tools borrowed from other marketing channels like keyword generators.

ChatGPT allows you to create conversations and copy. Natural language models such as ChatGPT cannot replace copywriters, just like keyword generators did not replace search marketers.

As with any tool – whether it is a digital assistant, a hammer, or a food processor – your success depends on how you use it. Your skills, your knowledge, and your experience will determine the outcome. ChatGPT can quickly go rogue in an inexperienced user’s hands, producing irrelevant, confusing, unproductive, or even offensive copy.

Marketers who believe they can fill in the gaps with ChatGPT or an intern are undervaluing their marketing programs and teams.

A tool that can help you create good first drafts.

Copywriters draw on a variety of sources to create effective email messages. Here are three examples:

• Numbers: Customer data and subscriber behavior, web and journey behaviors, and both successful and failed testing results
• Intuitive Knowledge: The unique voice of the brand, its equity, and individual customers, as well as the foibles and uniqueness of the market and the intended recipients. Where the intended recipients fall in the sales funnel, or where they are on the customer journey.
• Strategic Impact: What your email is intended to achieve or what you expect subscribers to do.

Every email you send should aim to build a solid foundation for this mountain of information. Persuade your subscribers to click through from the email and visit your website.

Many marketers need help understanding this. You can’t simply copy and paste the text from your website into an email. You can also enter a few prompts in the ChatGPT interface, and watch as it creates copy right before your eyes.

What you can do, however, is provide ChatGPT with enough information, in a well-written prompt, so that it can produce a first draft you can then refine, enhance, and test.

ChatGPT is the perfect solution to save you time, brainpower, and energy. Even the most experienced copywriters are terrified of the white screen or blank paper. ChatGPT will do all the hard work for you.

Expect nothing original or personal

It’s for this reason that I stress that ChatGPT can give you a good first draft, similar to an extended search, but not a polished version ready to be sent out for approval.

ChatGPT is not an AI language model. You get the results of millions of connections, based on the way the model was built, what other people have searched for, and what content, like a search engine, the model can discover.

Lauren Goode defines Ask Jeeves in, Wired as the “Ask Jeeves of the modern age.”

ChatGPT can give you original word arrangements, but these may be wrong or out of context. When I asked ChatGPT about the concept of email marketing holistically, I found out that they were wrong.

What popped up?

A holistic email is a marketing approach that focuses on a strategic, integrated, and comprehensive view of email. It involves creating and implementing email campaigns that take into account the entire customer journey from the first contact to the post-purchase follow-up.

Email campaigns that are part of holistic email marketing focus on building long-term relationships with customers, delivering value, and generating engagement. It involves segmenting email lists using data, creating personalized and relevant content, and using automation and optimization techniques.

Email marketing is a holistic approach that takes into consideration the role email plays within the marketing mix. It integrates email campaigns with other marketing channels to provide a seamless, multi-channel customer experience. It may be necessary to integrate social media, mobile, and other digital channels to create a seamless experience while supporting the marketing strategy.

Holistic email marketing is a customer-centric strategy that goes beyond simply sending emails to clients. It focuses instead on building meaningful relationships with customers that will lead to an increase in engagement, loyalty, and revenue.

ChatGPT did not hesitate to waggle a finger in my direction, but they made a good effort at answering.

I am an AI language model and I don’t know what Taylor Swift defines as holistic email marketing, but I will explain the term.

A holistic email marketing strategy is an email marketing approach that takes into account the entire customer journey and employs a comprehensive marketing strategy to engage subscribers in every touchpoint. This includes the entire process, from the sign-up to the follow-up after the purchase. …

In a similar way to Taylor Swift, who considers all aspects of songwriting and production, holistic email marketing aims to create an experience that is cohesive and meaningful for the subscriber. A holistic email strategy focuses on the entire customer and takes into account all their preferences and needs. This can improve engagement and conversion rates and help to build long-lasting relationships.

Both definitions are accurate because I coined the term over 20 years ago. Both use a large section of my work, including my speeches and presentations, as well as thought-leadership pieces such as this one. They are all easily accessible on the Internet. It’s good to know that my SEO efforts are paying off.

These reconstituted versions lack something. They’re accurate. They’re succinct. They’re also a bit dry, even Taylor Swift’s. There are no clever little references to titles such as “Call It What You Like” or “Shake It Off.”

Humor can go a long way. This email, from the personal care brand ‘Who Cares A Crap?’, shows how to combine generated copy and original content.

Use it only for testing

ChatGPT, and other models of its kind, can save you countless hours in preparation for A/B split testing or multi-variate tests. ChatGPT can generate variations reflecting different emotions, such as urgency versus scarcity or a direct hard-sell versus emotional appeal.

If you are stuck on subject lines, you can write a detailed prompt asking ChatGPT to provide you with 10 suggestions. See if you get any inspiration from those.

Keep your focus on the customer and be strategic

This rule is still valid – perhaps even more because the unfettered use of chat models in your email copy can cause your brand promise to be misunderstood.

ChatGPT is by far the easiest interface I have ever used. Try it out yourself and discover all the possibilities.

Remember, though, that ChatGPT, and other tools of the same kind, are the only tools you use. You will need to use your expertise and knowledge to guide them. You are the director of the customer’s experience and journey. Focus on your customer. What would make them click? What would be a positive addition to your brand? What can you do to save time?

ChatGPT will not be the invasion of robot overlords if used wisely. It could be a little R2-D2, a chatty AI assistant doing mundane tasks, freeing you up to do more important things, like saving Alderaan.