You've seen the horror stories on freelance forums - writers getting fired because their client's AI detector flagged their work as artificial. Or the cautionary tales of AI-generated articles stuffed with blatant inaccuracies and nonsensical gibberish. You can't afford those kinds of risks to your business and credibility.
Here are the top 5 ways you can get into trouble when using AI for writing content, and way to leverage AI that avoids these costly pitfalls:
Mistake #1: Treating AI Output as a Finished Product
Never publish AI-generated content verbatim without human refinement. AI tools are fantastic for rapidly generating rough drafts, outlines, and ideation. But they should only serve as a starting point, not the final deliverable.
Always allocate time for editing, fact-checking, and inserting your own brand voice. Establish a clear editing workflow with multiple checkpoint stages:
Have a human editor review the AI-generated draft and mark up areas that need rewriting, restructuring, or additional research.
Implement those edits thoroughly, inserting your brand's authentic personality, storytelling narrative, and proven persuasive techniques.
Run the updated draft through grammar, plagiarism, and factual accuracy checking tools to verify its integrity.
Conduct a final human review to approve the polished draft before publishing or sending to clients.
Treat AI output like a rough sketch that still needs layers of human creativity, nuance, and quality control applied on top. This human-in-the-loop process ensures you get AI's scalability benefits without any AI-related brand risks.
Mistake #2: Failing to Prompt Properly
Like a talented chef, AI is only as good as the ingredients you give it. You must learn to craft clear, specific prompts that steer the AI in the right direction. Vague prompts will yield vague, unhelpful results.
Get in the habit of including details like desired tone, content structure, target audience, and specific examples in your prompts. Here are some prompting best practices:
Specify precise details like desired word count, content topic, audience persona, and examples of content you want to emulate.
Provide instructions on tone and style, like "conversational," "authoritative," "lighthearted and humorous," etc.
Outline the preferred content structure, like "Introduction > Body > Conclusion" or "Problem > Solution > Benefits."
Give examples of successful content you've created in the past that aligns with what you want the AI to produce.
Use clear section headings and numbered/bulleted lists in your prompts to establish an organized flow.
The more thoughtful and detailed your prompts are, the more relevant and usable the AI's output will be. Treat prompting as a skill to continually improve through practice and iteration.
Mistake #3: Neglecting to Cite Sources
AI pulls information from its training data, which can inadvertently cause plagiarism issues. Always run AI output through a plagiarism checker before publishing. If any passages match other sources, be diligent about citing those sources or rewriting those sections in your own words.
Additionally, you should provide the AI tool with trustworthy source material to pull from during the prompting process. Don't allow it to randomly grab information from dubious sources on the open web. Instead, try techniques like:
Uploading your own proprietary data, reports, studies, etc. as source material for the AI to reference.
Specifying authoritative websites, publications, or subject matter experts for the AI to favor when generating content.
Providing excerpts, quotes, or data points you want the AI to expound upon and cite properly.
Using techniques like source citation prompting to instruct the AI on how to comprehensively cite any third-party sources it references.
The goal is to curate the AI's knowledge base with your own verified, properly sourced material as much as possible. This drastically reduces plagiarism risks while also ensuring higher factual accuracy.
Mistake #4: Blindly Trusting AI "Facts"
AI tools can confidently state inaccurate information as if it's a proven fact. Never take anything an AI says at face value, especially on specialized topics outside its main training areas.
Verify any key facts, statistics, data points, or claims using authoritative third-party sources before publishing. Implement a rigorous fact-checking protocol like:
Have human editors highlight any statements that need verification.
Cross-reference those statements against trusted sources like scientific journals, expert interviews, government data, etc.
For any contradictory facts, replace the AI's original statements with the verified information and proper citations.
If no authoritative sources can be found to confirm the statement, remove it entirely from the content.
You can also try prompting the AI to cite sources for any facts or statistics it provides. This makes fact-checking more efficient since you'll immediately know where that information originated from.
The bottom line is to never blindly trust AI as a sole source of truth. Its outputs should be treated as a first draft that requires meticulous human verification against proven facts.
Mistake #5: Using AI Without a Strategy
Like any tool, AI is only as effective as the strategy behind its usage. Establish clear guidelines for when and how your team should use AI throughout the entire content lifecycle.
Determine ideal use cases, approval processes, and quality control checkpoints to ensure consistent, scalable implementation. Here are some strategic considerations:
Use Cases:
Content ideation and outlining
First draft generation for long-form content
Rewriting and content repurposing
Automated response emails and chat
Content research and insight gathering
Approval Processes:
Require AI outputs go through defined editing workflows before publication
Implement automated scanning for quality control (grammar, tone, plagiarism, etc.)
Have subject matter experts review drafts in specialized areas
Quality Control Checkpoints:
Fact-checking phases for statistical claims and data points
Branding and voice alignment checks
Legal/regulatory compliance checks
Final human approval before publishing
You'll also want to establish governance around prompt engineering standards, ethical use of AI, and version control as AI models are updated over time.
Don't treat AI as an ad-hoc shortcut. Strategically integrate it into your content operations with rigorous processes to unlock its scalable benefits while mitigating risks. With a thoughtful strategy and the human+AI symbiosis, you can achieve the best of both worlds.
By avoiding these five critical mistakes, you'll be able to strategically wield AI writing tools without compromising your brand's integrity or credibility. AI will amplify your productivity by rapidly generating drafts and ideation. But you'll always maintain a human-in-the-loop process for editing, quality control, and inserting your authentic brand voice. Embrace this symbiotic human+AI approach, and you'll be able to meet your content demands with both quality and efficiency.
