Generative AI promises exciting potential for social media success. From engaging captions to catchy visuals, AI tools make it easy to create attention-grabbing social media assets.
AI-generated content on platforms like Instagram and Facebook is seeing significant engagement. Alongside that, AI tools are helping social media managers personalize and optimize content delivery for enhanced user interaction.
However, even though the possibilities are immense, one must proceed cautiously. AI-generated content isn’t perfect (yet!).
Mistakes happen, biases get amplified, and sometimes misinformation is spread unintentionally.
Any business looking to integrate generative AI into its social media strategy must be aware of its pitfalls, and devise ways to circumvent them. When you understand the shortcomings of generative AI, you’ll create social media content that is innovative, ethical, and truly echoes with your audience.
The Pitfalls of AI-Generated Content
AI creates great, usable content. However, there is a limit.
The internet is now littered with low-effort, AI-generated content that adds nothing of value. According to a report by NewsGuard, AI-powered content farms are on the rise, with many producing vast quantities of low-quality content designed primarily to generate ad revenue rather than provide quality information to readers.
The majority of AI-generated content suffers from a lack of originality or depth. This is because AI models rely on pre-existing patterns and structures. These patterns show up in the generated output which results in repetitive, generic content devoid of the human spark of creativity and insight that makes content shine.
Plus, over-reliance on AI tools obstructs a deeper analysis or unique perspectives. What results is surface-level content that contains errors or outdated information.
For instance, take a look at these three LinkedIn posts:
Aren’t all of these posts strikingly similar, even though they talk about completely different things? These are, very clearly, examples of obvious AI-generated content without any depth and nuance, the kind of content you want to avoid in your social media posts.
AI tools have become very powerful, no doubt, but they are not infallible.
Like any other tool, AI tools need a skilled hand to produce exceptionally good results. The goal is to take advantage of AI’s strengths while also mandating a human touch for quality, accuracy, and ethical social media content.
Things to Keep in Mind to Create Effective AI-generated Social Media Content
Today, around 44.4% of social media managers and marketers use AI for content creation. However, with great power comes great responsibility. You need to keep these eight essential things in mind to create high-impact AI-generated social media content.
1. Do not rely ONLY ON AI
Social media thrives on real connection, on moments when we feel like we're speaking directly to another person, or sharing something with a community. That feeling of authenticity and personal touch is what makes it special.
The Willy Wonka experience scam reminds us of what happens when that authenticity is replaced by a cheap imitation. Just as families were lured in by flashy promises and AI-generated images, audiences can quickly sense when social media content lacks genuine personality and connection.
While AI tools can absolutely help us polish our words, they shouldn't be used without any human intervention. Our own experiences, unique perspectives, and the genuine desire to connect are where the charm of social media lies. For the best possible results, use a tool like Highperformr’s Social AI to ideate topics and generate personalized drafts in your writing style and tone of voice.
2. Personalize the AI output
AI-generated content saves a ton of time, but it's a mistake to post it as it is. For the best results, edit the output to match it to your brand's voice. Make sure it fits the chosen social media platform and accurately conveys your intended message.
Generic AI writing also hurts SEO. The key is to personalize it and make it sound like organic content. The steps to achieve that are:
- Fact check the output
- Rewrite it in your desired tone of voice
- Shape it for your target audience and search terms
- Make sure it isn’t plagiarized from other sources
Highperformr massively ease this process by automating research and ideation for social content. Highperformr also helps you personalize your AI content and fine-tune the tone of voice, writing style etc.
3. Do not forget to cross-check the content’s accuracy
Sure, tools like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini can churn out pretty compelling captions, posts, and even long-form blogs, but don't mistake these for guaranteed accuracy. AI models hallucinate. Chatbots like OpenAI's ChatGPT have been found to hallucinate or generate incorrect information as much as 27% of the time.
Misinformation spreads like wildfire on social platforms. You need to be extra careful with AI-generated content for social media.
When using AI-generated content that includes historical or scientific claims, always fact-check against reliable sources. Your audience's trust depends on it.
4. Do not treat AI as a do-it-all solution
Using AI as a one-stop shop for social media content generation is a bad idea. It sacrifices authenticity, accuracy, and complex understanding. AI-generated content lacks the genuine personality and nuanced language to connect with social media audiences.
Tone-deaf phrasing or insensitive remarks can instantly, irreparably damage your brand's reputation. Plus, search engines value originality; heavy reliance on AI content can harm your search rankings. For the best of both worlds, use AI strictly as a tool within your content creation process for generating ideas or initial drafts, but always subject to human editing and infuse your brand's unique voice.
5. Do not over-automate
At the end of the day, social media is a social platform built for humans to interact. Relying too much on automatically, artificially generated content loses the genuine emotional connection between your brand and its followers.
When you automate your responses to social media comments or replies, your customers are treated to a generic, disconnected presence that distances your followers. Sometimes, your automated system might end up sending highly inappropriate answers to sensitive queries and stain your brain. While AI-powered automation is necessary, it should always be balanced with a healthy amount of human interactions.
6. Use detailed, precise prompts
The quality of the output of AI tools depends largely on the prompts used. Making your prompt as specific as possible is the best advice when using AI for social media content creation. Specifying the tone, voice, perspective, style and other distinct attributes guides the AI towards the exact kind of content you want.
For example, to create a social media ad, do not use a prompt like this:
“generate a short Facebook ad for the product - Hyper Protein (Protein bar)”
This prompt outputs:
Instead, specify the details of your product by using a prompt like this:
“We are a company called Hyper Protein, and we make quality protein bars for young people. Generate a fun, engaging, and witty Facebook ad for our latest chocolate-flavored protein bar. Highlight 2 or 3 USPs of the product in your output.”
This prompt outputs:
The second output is much more personable and matches the tonality used by your brand. Experiment with prompts with varying instructions to see what works best for you. Be clear and precise with your instructions, and you’ll be pleasantly surprised with the results.
7. Do not work with unoptimized AI content processes
Getting high-quality AI-generated content requires an investment of time. To get the best results, you need to invest time in testing and tweaking your approach. This optimization process includes training the tools of your choice to understand the nuances of your brand, audience, industry, and products or services.
With AI tools like Highperformr, you can even instruct the AI to adopt your brand’s unique tone of voice to ensure the output aligns with your established personality. Mastering the AI tools takes a bit of effort, but it pays off in the long run as your AI outputs become increasingly effective.
Finally, don’t publish and forget! Analyze how your AI-generated content performs. Compare its effectiveness against your original, human-crafted work to identify any significant variations. Track if this AI-generated content is helping you meet your specific content goals and KPIs.
Pro-tip: When you publish your social content with Highperformr, you also get access to a detailed analytics suite that tracks the performance, analyzes growth and provides actionable insights to tune your social strategy. Also learn which of your content is trending based on daily, weekly and monthly insights.
8. Consider the ethical considerations of using AI-generated content
Using AI-generated content for social media comes with ethical and moral responsibilities. Transparency is crucial because deliberately blurring the lines between AI-generated and human-written content deceives the audience. Disclose clearly when you use AI tools. Plus, to avoid factual errors inherent in AI-written content, religious fact-checking is a must.
The recent downfall of Sports Illustrated serves as a stark reminder of these ethical risks. The decision to use AI-generated articles with fabricated author identities seriously damaged the publication's credibility. The whole saga highlights the importance of transparency about AI use, the dangers of prioritizing AI over accuracy, and the value of human writers within the content industry.
AI for Content Creation: An Awesome Tool But Not a Magical Solution
Social media is a place to build a genuine presence for your brand, to showcase your expertise and your company's mission. Social media managers and marketers are increasingly using AI to save time and help them keep up.
While AI tools are incredibly useful, it's important to use them wisely. Consider an AI-powered social media management platform like Highperformr. Highperformr understands social media best practices and content automation strategy. A good social platform becomes an extension of your brand, saving you time while ensuring your content strategy is strong, targeted, and gets the results you want.
