Digital Marketing and the rise of the #neverGPT movement

Very recently I've come across a few content marketing agencies whose pricing pages (if they have one, most of them just puke up a Contact Us For a Quote form) proudly list No GPT Output as part of their feature set.

I can understand the sentiment. We're all flooded with content across our Internet travels that's clearly AI-generated:

• "Exciting news! Our new blog post is live!"
• A nine-sentence LinkedIn post, each sentence listed as a paragraph with a relevant emoji attached
• Unlocking the power of as the first four words in every article you read

Is #neverGPT really the answer though?

There's a market for artisanally-crafted content (maybe)

Generative AI, like a lot of technological advancements, is a tool. It can be used effectively or ineffectively, and the quality of its output improves dramatically when it's used by someone who knows how to leverage it. Tools make our work more efficient, which means we can offer more competitive pricing and scale to meet demand. Humans used to produce butter in a churn, but factories make it possible for Kerrygold butter produced in Ireland to be available in every grocery store in the U.S.

One way to look at the #neverGPT movement is to think of these agencies as differentiating their service in a (very) crowded market. Fancy grocery stores do sell hand-churned butter alongside the more mass-produced products. It costs $18 a pound, but if there are people who feel it's worthwhile... If content marketing agencies can convince customers that the output is worth the increased cost, that's a justification for promoting their #neverGPT stance.

Most people don't care

If you're reading this article there's a good change that you are knowledgable about generative AI, have a pretty good instinct for recognizing it, and think it's dull, bland, and vapid text. I'm actually the same way.

But as it turns out, we're in the minority. Most people don't actually care. They just want answers to questions. Every day tens of thousands of people decide they are finally ready to replace their electric toothbrush that died last month. If they come across your article on "The Best Electric Toothbrushes in 2023" they're likely to click on it whether it was written by GPT, a human, or some combination of the two. People don't care about the process or the tools, they want the answers.

The way forward

Orchestra would not exist as a company without generative AI. But we don't blindly generate-and-ship content. We use it for what it's good for. Article outlines. Research. Summarizing. Rewriting to match tone or grade level. It would take hours longer to produce material without generative AI, and we'd need twice the staff.

Already we're starting to see marketing service providers differentiate themselves around their use of Generative AI. There are plenty of tools that will churn out purely-automated articles, and there are now the #neverGPT butter-churners. Most of us are in the middle, excited about the possibilities of generative AI but cautious about how it's used.

If you're looking for digital marketing at a predictable price point, backed by AI-powered marketers who care, give Orchestra a try.