Contents
Introduction
In the ever-evolving space of content creation, writers face the challenge of distinguishing themselves amidst a sea of information, requiring a delicate balance between innovation and authenticity……
Okay, so it’s evident that the sentence came straight from a ChatGPT. The unmistakable indicators of content written by AI are phrases like “In the ever-evolving space,” “Amidst a sea of information,” and so on. These phrases remove the uniqueness and joy of individual expressions, essential elements of the content that stand out.
In this article, I’ll explore some of the dullest and most generic phrases used by AI tools, and I will share some practices on how to use AI to create content that is still unique and valuable to your audience.
Leaning too much on AI for writing will make all content look the same. When the same words and styles are used repeatedly on different platforms, each piece starts to lose its uniqueness.
For example, consider again the opening phrase of this article: “In the ever-evolving space.” While it’s a convenient opener, its overuse in countless articles and blog posts has rendered it a cliché. Similarly, expressions like “embracing the latest innovations” or “harness the power of [something]” have become so “vanilla” that they fail to grab readers’ attention, let alone spark their imagination.
But more on this later in the blog…
Striving for Authenticity
As many authors are trying to get attention, being natural in content writing is a necessary strategy to connect with your audience and create a unique brand. Enriching your content with a unique style and personalization creates a clear narrative that inspires and engages your audience.
Every single writer has a unique set of experiences, perspectives, and stylistic preferences. Adopting and representing your individual voice means you’re true to yourself and your viewpoint. This authenticity is what readers are leaning toward and what transforms your content from generic text into an engaging piece.
With the latest Google update, which is more rigorous and almost intolerant to AI-generated content, it is of the greatest importance to keep the content authentic and provide constant value.
How to Stand Out Amid AI-Generated Noise
Nowadays, when AI can produce content en masse, standing out requires more than just avoiding clichés or tweaking syntax. You need to be personal and genuine. AI tools like ChatGPT can assist in generating ideas or polishing your grammar. Sure, nothing can mimic your unique, human writing style, but when mixed with your writing style and prompting skills, ChatGPT is the real killer.
Above all, I’ll lie if I say that ChatGPT hasn’t given me its friendly hand to write this blog
How to avoid dull and generic phrases and still stay unique?
When looking for fresh and exciting content, it’s important to look for worn-out phrases that lack original spice, especially those churned out frequently by AI tools.
Let’s take a look at some practical examples.
I’ve already said that ChatGPT helped me write this blog. So, let me share some insights into the writing process.
For one of the blog sections, I’ve prompted the tool with the following instructions.
👉 *I’m going to feed you the blog outline section by section. You will bear with me and write it based on the instructions I will give you.
Here’s the blog section:
Section 2: Striving for Authenticity
Highlight the importance of injecting personality and originality into blog writing. Encourage writers to focus on conveying unique perspectives and insights.
Then, here’s the output from ChatGPT
Look, it’s a generic output with a lot of fluffy words. So, I had to improve it.
After this, I gave the tool the following prompt
👉 okay, now analyze the text and list out all of the cliche, generic and dull phrases you often use
And here’s the answer
Of course, there are a couple of other overused phrases that are not mentioned in the ChatGPT output. But overall, it has done a great job for me with just two simple prompts.
So, here’s what happened. First, the GPT wrote a whole blog section in just a few seconds. Then, with another nudge from my side, it pointed out phrases and words that seemed blah. I’ve only had to remove them and add a personal touch, which took me less than 5 minutes. And look, the context of the section has remained the same; I’ve just played with words and added a “taste” of my writing style.
Furthermore, there’s a valuable resource known as AI Phrase Finder, powered by WordPress. The AI phrase finder has done a great job gathering the most used AI phrases in one place. The same site also offers an AI phrase checker. It lets you analyze your content to identify any phrases that might be overused or too generic. It could be a great asset to ensure your content remains unique and has a human touch.
I used the AI phrase checker for this article (without the intro part, which is intentionally left untouched), and it found only 1 AI phrase. Not too bad, right?
Tips for writing better content with ChatGPT
Now, let’s head over to give you some tips on nailing down content writing with AI.
1. Use ChatGPT to generate the initial ideas.
There are multiple ways to do this, but speaking from my experience, I usually feed the tool with a few keywords and ask it to generate ideas based on those keywords.
P.S. Just so you know, the idea for this blog didn’t pop out of ChatGPT or any other tool. Rather, it was cooked up during our office chit-chats. 😃
2. Get ChatGPT to write your blog outline.
After you’ve seen the suggested topics and chosen the one that you want to write about, the next step is to ask ChatGPT to create your blog outline. Make sure to ask what additional data is needed to support each point. If you want, you can also ask where quotes could be effectively used.
If you’re unsatisfied with the output, you can always ask for an improvement.
3. Tell ChatGPT how you expect it to write.
This is one of the crucial parts of the blog creation process. Sure, the tool does not have the capacity (not yet) to 100% mimic your style and voice, so if you want to get the most common style to yours, you have to show an example. The best practice is to give ChatGPT a few (5-10) snippets of your writing style and prompt it to emulate them.
4. Start feeding ChatGPT with your outline.
You have the idea and the outline, and you show an example of your writing style. Now, the next step is to feed the AI model step-by-step with the blog sections. This step-by-step approach is the best way to write good content. This will ensure that relevant keywords and topics are covered thoroughly and in the appropriate order.
5. Edit the content
You’ve got your draft, and that’s awesome, but there’s more to do. The most important task is to make the ChatGPT responses more human-like and eliminate all those cliché and AI-generated, overused phrases. Even with the best prompts and information aboutb your writing style, the output may not be perfect at the end. And then you’ll have to add your touch; don’t forget that.
Conclusion
So, wrapping it up, using AI in content creation is pretty handy, but let’s be real: It can also produce monotonous content that readers will likely avoid.
However, there are plenty of strategies you can use to keep your writings unique and authentic, even when you’re using nifty AI tools like ChatGPT.. The secret sauce lies in finding that sweet spot where we’re using AI to spark some fresh ideas, get content outlines, and smooth out the grammar, but also make sure you sprinkle in your own unique voice and style to keep things lively!
Moreover, tools like the AI Phrase Finder or your prompting skills are valuable in identifying overused or generic phrases. The ultimate goal is to create content that is unique, engaging, and personalized, which genuinely reflects you as a writer. Remember you’re not writing content for the Google crawlers, instead you’re writing content for people like yourself.
