With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in fields such as writing and image creation, it is easier than ever to obtain unique and topical information and pictures to go along with them. This is an exciting prospect for many businesses as it can be a great way to achieve significantly faster results for a fraction of the cost.
Beyond this, AI business tools can also be used to create new pathways for interactions between customers and businesses through prompting on a website or over social media platforms. Whereas before, a real person would have had to reach out to customers to receive and respond to specific feedback, AI can now do some of that heavy lifting.
But for all the good that AI can bring to your business, it, like any tool, has the potential to be misused when people are not properly trained, meaning there needs to be serious discussions about the ethics of AI. AI responsibility is a vital topic to cover, but many people have been quick to embrace AI without spending the time to think about its ramifications.
Responsible AI and its Use in Business
It is quite possible that excessive use of AI will be easily detectable by consumers, and the question of whether AI will outpace humans’ abilities to identify it or fall behind their detection is yet unanswered. As many people are quite hostile to AI at the moment as they feel it threatens their livelihood and is impersonal, making sure not to go overboard with AI use is still recommended.
It is no wonder that people are wary of AI as the past few decades have been full of AI-gone-wrong horror stories. Many people are quick to pull the trigger on accusing writers and artists of using AI, so while it certainly is a good way to create new opportunities, many in the general public still see it as a red flag.
A good way to get around this problem could be to be more open about where AI is being used, as somebody going into a conversation knowing they are talking to AI is better than them thinking they are talking to a person and feeling betrayed later when that is untrue. If using AI to prompt discussion on a website, a simple line introducing that it is an AI chat-bot that may direct the customer to a real person if asked could be a responsible measure to take.
The Canadian Government has a set of guidelines for their use of AI that may serve as inspiration when creating your own artificial intelligence guidelines; a document that more and more companies should have. By creating Ai policies and incorporating discussions of those policies into your onboarding process and company handbook, you can feel better prepared for the waves of new AI tools.
Ethical AI Generated Written Content
Artificial intelligence is best used as a tool to build a framework for content creation, rather than serving as a tool to do everything at the same time. Carefully constructing prompts that generate helpful points to write an article around can be a great way to use AI responsibly, assuming those facts are able to be confirmed and verified. AI is a great tool to conduct contextual research and find sources to back your points, and can also help you find ways to organize those points into an impactful order.
The problem with AI writing comes when the content you create contains false or poorly worded information. If AI is used to create blog posts or news updates and the information is not verified by a person, it could create distrust or even be directly harmful to readers. For the food industry this is especially true, as improper food preparation instructions or false information on what parts of a plant are edible could result in people becoming sick.
As long as caution is practiced and the facts produced by AI are verifiable and accurate, the ethical use of AI in written consent creation can allow for far more high-quality posts in a shorter amount of time. By using AI as a framework building tool and then having a human fill in the gaps with backable information, AI can be used seamlessly and harmlessly, often without people knowing AI was used at all.
Ethical AI Generated Art
When it comes to AI image generation, what is ethical becomes a bit muddier. At the moment, many people who are present in the art and photography world or overlap with them are incredibly distrustful and hostile towards AI business tools used to create art. Artists and photographers worry about their success and see AI as a direct replacement of them and even as theft of their work.
On top of that, many are receiving increased criticism of their own art from people jumping the gun on calling them out for using AI, even if none was used. These things in tandem have created a deeply volatile combination when it comes to AI as many artists worry about their futures. Because of this tendency towards hostility, extra caution should be taken when generating images.
Ensuring the images you generate are not obviously from AI is important to maintaining good relations with people impacted by the onset of AI, as well as helps keep your website relevant. If a consumer clicks on a web page and is immediately met with an obviously AI generated image or written content, they are likely to leave the page entirely which will negatively impact your bounce rate.
AI Business Tools Cannot Do it All (Yet)
While AI is able to generate content, it is not as simple as copy-pasting the results onto a page and publishing. The manual labor of setting up a few internal links, alt attributes to your images, and ensuring your targeted key-words are implemented correctly will still be required, though AI can help you create alt attributes and meta descriptions.
A fully AI generated article with no SEO work may be good enough to reach the criteria for search engines to crawl it, but it will not look very good to the search engine when it finds little to no optimization. Additionally, recent changes to Google search’s core are designed to locate AI generated posts with little quality information and mark them as spam.
It is much easier to write an article with the intention of SEO in mind and specific target keywords and internal linking opportunities on hand to begin with than to try and squeeze them into an article after the fact. Because of this, using AI business tools as framework generation tools may save more time than trying to use it as a catch-all and having your site ignored by Google’s crawler.
AI is a Tool for People; Keep Humans in the Loop
So while it is possible to use AI responsibly and can help save time and costs, it is not a miracle cure-all that can eliminate all the hard work of content creation overnight. As the internet becomes flooded with more generated content, people are looking for businesses who are “real” and work to foster human connection more than ever.
Artificial intelligence is a great tool that we are lucky to have access to and can even be used to provide more opportunities for customers and businesses to connect, but we have to ensure that it does not become more than a tool. As artificial intelligence evolves and adapts, it will likely gain more applicable uses and people may warm up to AI, but for the moment, using AI with a healthy sense of caution is still the best course of action.
While AI can be used to create new opportunities to connect with a customer base and provide feedback on their experiences, there still needs to be a human processing that information and implementing it as they go forward. If AI is given the task of processing feedback and determining the best course of action when moving forward, it may end up catering to the top and bottom percents who go out of their way to make connections which could be detrimental to the satisfied middle-ground customers.
As it is becoming more common to use AI to create new opportunities for connection, people are receiving more automated messages than before. Too many of these messages can actually serve to deter feedback rather than promote it, as people feel they are not being treated as human. Because of this, having a real human handle connections with customers after the initial prompting from AI will make customers feel valued and that you are worth their time.
The Division Between Those Who Use AI and Those Who Don’t
As AI business tools become more widely accepted and utilized, more changes are likely on the horizon. Primarily, AI is likely to have large impacts on administrative jobs and there is likely to be a clear divide between companies that use AI business tools and those who do not.
Subsections within bookkeeping, payroll, customer service, accounting, and data analyzing can all be automated, and that’s only with current technology, though AI has yet to be able to handle the complex foresight and insight required for those roles as a whole. We really have no way of knowing what else will be added to that list in the next five years, which makes investing into AI contain a fair amount of uncertainty.
Because of all these automated processes and the amount of money they save, the ability to use AI properly may become a more important skill set than some of the jobs AI will be able to replace. Companies that understand AI business tools and can effectively implement them will likely have a huge advantage over those that do not, so long as those tools are used ethically and responsibly.
While most large businesses will likely require a shift to AI in order to stay competitive, smaller companies who do not use AI will likely be given more opportunities to make a name for themselves as well. As more and more processes become automated, people may look to small, local businesses who will meet them with a smiling face more frequently.
While we have no real way of knowing what the next few years will look like in terms of AI business tools, it is safe to assume that they are here to stay and that more will be appearing on the horizon.
Why Human Connection Matters Now
With the onset of AI and every business scrambling to make the best use of it, people are beginning to appreciate real, human connection once more. If you are making moves towards AI use, make sure you are also keeping in mind the ways those changes will affect customer experiences and how they feel.
Nobody wants to feel unimportant, and the use of AI chat tools can do just that if the customer is at first unaware of the artificial nature. So while they can present a multitude of opportunities and make workloads lighter, why not redirect some of that freed up time towards reaching out a hand to make your customers feel special and valued in a world slowly becoming more and more automated.
What to Keep in Mind
In summary, AI is a powerful tool that can be used in a myriad of ways to help improve efficiency and automate some of the more monotonous tasks encountered in the day-to-day, but it should not be viewed as a replacement for people. Many people are worried about their job security and too much AI use without proper policy implementation could result in hostility both within and outside the business.
Additionally, it is imperative to remember that sensitive information should not be inputted into public AI, as if that information is pulled later, there is no legal course of action you can take to remedy that.
AI can bring success and should be utilized to optimize tasks where possible, but without proper policy creation and training, it can also be a huge incident waiting to happen.