The word "old" has an uncharming ring to it. However, when colleagues refer to me as an "old hand", I take it as recognition. With more than 25 years of experience in content production (print and on-page), I have actually seen, experienced and, of course, written a lot. Technological upheavals have shaken up the market every few years and were perceived by us editors as a grateful opportunity for self-renewal. Windows has cultivated information processing. The World Wide Web cultivated information procurement. Smartphones turned our consumption of information on its head (and buried the MP3 player along the way). These were all important milestones in a continuous cycle of innovation.
AI in content is not a wave, AI is a tsunami
But now a new technological wave is rolling over us copywriters with extreme force. AI in the content sector is a tsunami with unprecedented transformative power. And there are two main reasons for this. Firstly, universal availability: ChatGPT alone counted around 150 million users per month at its peak last year.
And - this is point two - such a large number of "beta testers" is the best fuel for innovation and quality improvement. The competitive pressure from IT giants such as Apple, Google, Nvidia, Amazon and others also forces OpenAI, for example, to continuously increase the pace of development.
The (interim) result is impressive. While the quality of the first generative text drafts in ChatGPT in version 3 was still mildly ridiculed, its big brother in version 4 now delivers solid results that increasingly stand up to both style and fact checks. ChatGPT is still a long way from adulthood, but it's just now mastering puberty.
We see enormous potential for the use of AI in all areas of content marketing. Starting with research, text and image creation, machine editing through to localization, analysis and evaluation of large amounts of data. Provided that the AI is used by a specialist.
Market sentiment: optimism beats skepticism
The hopes and concerns of our customers are far more relevant than our internal view of the potential of current AI solutions. To better understand these, we simply asked them. From a pool of over 50 major brands, we invited 30 customers from the content department to take part in an online flash survey in January. The response was remarkable: 30 invitations were followed by 25 meaningful responses. These included DAX companies, large corporations, SMEs and hidden champions from the B2B sector.
The most important facts in brief: AI has long since arrived in everyday business life. 86% of respondents have already had experience with AI in their professional environment. And definitely with a professional approach. 9 out of 10 respondents stated that they use AI to solve specific problems. First and foremost for research and information procurement (76%). And more than two thirds of respondents are already using AI to create texts.
90% of respondents are planning to use AI in specific projects, but only a third - as of January - expect it to be used extensively and systematically in 2024
And what expectations are associated with the planned greater impact of AI in business? 96% of participants expect a gain in productivity and efficiency. Information procurement and text creation are already at the top of the list of use cases. Exciting: almost half of those surveyed are already using AI to improve service offerings, for example in customer dialog.
School grade "satisfactory +" for the first AI experiences
However, Chat GPT, Bard (Gemini) and Bing (Copilot) have not yet been able to build up a kind of basic trust. In particular, 84% of participants identified the lack of factual accuracy of the AI outcome as a problem. 64% also criticized the poor quality of the texts. Around 60% are concerned about the protection of company-relevant data during processing and about legal ambiguities in the marketing of content. The respondents therefore gave their experiences to date a solid "3".
Quality more important than text price - this still applies
In the area of text creation, AI will not be able to completely replace human action, even in future expansion stages. The survey participants take a similar view. Without exception, all respondents to the question: "If you had to choose between high content quality or the lowest possible production costs when purchasing content, which would you prefer?" opted for "quality". 64% of respondents are open to the use of AI for future content creation and expect high text quality with moderately reduced text prices in purchasing.
„We are ready to catch the wave!“
As a result, we can see: The demand for AI consulting and AI solutions is obviously high. The high expectations of increased efficiency and productivity gains are only slightly dampened by stumbling blocks. A lack of factual accuracy, sometimes low content quality and a lack of legal certainty are temporary hurdles, but do not justify the question of meaning. Our customers want and are planning to use AI, but will not accept any compromises in quality.
This is the ideal starting point for "catching the wave". The expertise in high-quality content and the performance gains already proven by diva-e through the use of AI are perfect complements, not contradictions. In the near future, however, it is not only the demand for smart and scalable prompt models for content production that will increase. Market forecasts, campaign planning, competitive analyses - the entire spectrum of content marketing can be played much more easily with the use of AI. We are waiting in the wings to embark on this exciting journey with you.
Hier erfahren Sie mehr zu möglichen Einsatzbereichen, der Implementierung und den Benefits von Künstlicher Intelligenz. diva-e bietet außerdem einen exklusiven AI Hub, damit unseren Kunden von aktuellsten KI-Entwicklungen in unterschiedlichsten Bereichen profitieren.
