Speaker 2: Today I get to talk to Stacey again, we had a joint episode a couple of months ago now, I think about business coaching and online business and it went really well. So now we are back to talk about AI in business. ⁓ Stacey, do you want to give us some background information for people that don't know you?

Stacy Braga: How do you use AI without losing your voice, your positioning, and honestly, your sanity? That's exactly what Sydney and I are digging into this week. Sydney is a content strategist, a fellow online business owner, and one of my friends, and we got together for another crossover episode. This time, we're getting into where we've seen AI slop, why outsourcing your expertise to a robot might not be the best idea, and how we're both trying to find the middle ground Thank you so much for listening to another episode of Cozypreneur. If you love the episode, don't forget to leave a review, share with a business friend, and thanks again for listening. Until next time.

Speaker 1: Hello, I'm Stacey. I'm a copywriter and messaging strategist, also a former teacher, and I'm glad to come on and talk about the spicy topics. Love it.

Speaker 2: Being that we both deal a lot with written things, you being a copywriter, me doing content, there's a lot of writing involved and seeing other people's work. How often do you see people using AI in their writing?

Stacy Braga: between staying on top of things but not losing what makes us unique in our business.

Speaker 1: feel like I've been on LinkedIn a lot. And that has been super interesting. So I almost feel like people are trolling me on LinkedIn, where they're like talking about why using AI, but I'm like, I can tell that you used AI on this post. And I can tell because I've used AI so much that I know the way like, especially chat, GPT, like, I know that the way that it's going to answer so I can tell and given like, most people are like using it and then adding in a few sentences here and there and like switching it up. But as a copywriter, like what I am trained on and like what I'm really good at is like creating structure around words and like clearly communicating something. And what AI does is rinse and repeat the same structure over and over and over again. And so if you don't know the structure, you probably won't notice it. But as somebody who knows the structure, it's like all I see on social media, especially LinkedIn.

Stacy Braga: So ⁓ let's in.

Speaker 2: Yeah, that's nuts. I've been spending a little bit more time on LinkedIn recently and I've noticed the same thing. It's interesting for sure. I see it a ton on like Instagram captions though, like all the time.

Speaker 1: interesting too, because it's like there are things where I'm not going to spend my time writing. Like I'm not going to spend my time writing podcast show notes. Like I'm sorry. I don't care enough. Like I put my time into like the episode and what I'm going to say. But at the end of the day, I don't think anybody actually reads my show notes. So I'm going to use AI to like turn my transcript into show notes. But then when it comes to like content and like engaging with your people, like I find you like lose the you-ness in it, right? And like that's what makes content really good is like that connection piece. And that's something that you talk about a lot is like finding that connection piece.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I 210 million percent agree. I'm so sick of seeing like all the AI stuff. And again, like I completely understand it's a tool and I use it for some things. And I don't think like just saying no one should ever use AI ever is realistic, especially knowing like the world is on fire and we're all super stressed and we have to look for shortcuts somewhere to be able to get everything done. But I think kind of focusing on where we take those shortcuts using AI is super important if you want it to actually help your business. It's kind of like in content in general, like just hopping on trends is still like wasting time if it's not going to actually help your business. Just having AI write things for you, whether it's an Instagram caption or an email or like a sales page, if it's not working, it's not actually helpful, even though you feel like you saved time.

Speaker 1: And I'm like such a strong believer on like less is more like doing like I feel like one really good position piece that actually talks about like what you do and how you help people is going to go so much further than like posting every single day that week and posting like generic crap that somebody else also posted. Because then that's not helping you stand out. That's not helping people be like, ⁓ this is the person I want to work with. And this is why so like I actually think that even though the whole world is telling you to speed up and go faster and do more, the thing that's actually going to work is to take a few steps back so you can go forward.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's going to feel better too, because there's just like a lot less stress of having to constantly churn out content wherever it is that you're sharing it, and you get like some breathing space, which is nice.

Speaker 1: breathing space is good, like that's where you get good ideas.

Speaker 2: Yes. Yeah. Which is also very important.

Speaker 1: I know.

Speaker 2: What are some of like the biggest tells that you think you see when you see like AI copy? Cause I have some that are like, I've noticed even I've just started doing like arc reading, like reviewing advanced reader copies of books and it's like super fun. But also I can tell like either some parts are written by AI or like they're having AI edit it. But there's a lot of the like sentence structures are kind of weird, especially like the thing you were talking about with like chat GPT where you can just tell it's like written by the way it writes words. It's like when it does like a question and then like two negative responses and then gets into like the actual answer of the question. I see that all the time and it drives me nuts.

Speaker 1: Or like, it's not this, it's that. Like that's on ChatGPT all the time. Or like, I always used to like write in threes, like three short sentences to like create that cadence. And it's like ChatGPT does that all the time now. So now I'm like, I can't do that anymore.

Speaker 2: I ⁓ dashes. I saw someone on threads the other day say that they see people using the Oxford comma and they immediately know it's chat GPT. And I wanted to die a little bit. Like someone who studied English, the Oxford comma is basically my best friend and I will not take the slander against it.

Speaker 1: Yep. Use actual punctuation as a writer.

Speaker 2: Right? Like, that's what we're supposed to be doing.

Speaker 1: It's so funny. Yeah, I think it's there are times where I'm like, is this AI? Is this just somebody who like actually spent a long time, like actually polishing this? But I think like for me, when you're seeing things that like sound really professional or like sound really polished, but then you're like reading it and you're like, what is this actually saying?

Speaker 2: Yeah, it's lacking like depth and nuance a lot of the time. Yeah.

Speaker 1: And that's the thing that I like talk about a lot is like the robots don't know your brain, right? They don't know your past experiences. They don't know like how you would approach a problem. They don't know all of this really great stuff that is actually why people want to hire you. And so like, if you're completely outsourcing to AI, like you're missing this really important piece in your marketing, which is actually your positioning, which is actually why people choose you. and you lose

Speaker 2: little important yeah just a little

Speaker 1: And it's hard, I get it.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and it sucks because again, we are also tired and overwhelmed and feel like we have to do all of these things all of the time, like churning out all the emails and posts and whatnot. kind of, it makes me think of like screen time, like parents using screen time for their kids, which I know is like a highly hot topic in any kind of mom Facebook group, which are just horrible places to be, but I am in them. It's like, you can't really acknowledge that we're using screen time a lot. without also acknowledging it's because people are working more hours than ever for less money than ever. And like everyone is just stressed and they need a break. It's like a symptom, not like the cause itself.

Speaker 1: And it's like, sometimes you just need your kids to be quiet so you can like, hear yourself think. It's interesting too, because I'm still involved in the local school community a little bit and they have been pushing AI into classrooms. I wonder if you've heard this about your kids in school because they're younger. But I know like at the high school level, they've been pushing AI in classrooms and like the teachers haven't gotten any training on it.

Speaker 2: Like the best five minutes of my day.

Speaker 1: they there's no sort of guidelines around how teachers should use it, how kids should use it. And it's one of those things where it's like, it is a tool. And I think it's important for kids to know how to use the tools that are available to them. But it's also really important to know how to write because writing is a thinking process. Like, that is like actually how you come to conclusions and how you like process things like writing is actually just thinking. And so if you're like skipping that thinking piece, like That's where you're losing the deck.

Speaker 2: Yeah, that's crazy. I feel like my kids are all in elementary school, but if that was like brought up by the school, I would like immediately be emailing. Be like, no, I don't like this. This isn't a thing we're doing. My kids are opting out. It's like, one, there's so many weird things that people do with AI to have like unrestricted access. I don't know how they would restrict what kind of output kids are getting. Like that would bother me. That would be very worrisome. And then two, yeah, there was also, I think MIT did a study on how AI is affecting brains and there's like, we're losing critical thinking skills, like cognitive function is down when people over rely on it, like it's nuts.

Speaker 1: I feel it. I can tell because if I go too deep into using AI, when I go into a Word doc, I've been trying to write my book as much as possible by hand, by typing. But it's a muscle, right? If you don't use it, the hump to get back into just writing, it feels really big. You're like, wait, how do I do this? What are my thoughts? And it's like, really, you do have to keep on practicing to make it. Otherwise, it is just so much easier to just be like, ⁓ hey, AI. This is what I'm thinking, write me a post.

Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I feel the same way when I use it too much as well. I have been trying like so hard to draft things out way more ⁓ in like Google Docs or something rather than just be like, all right, I need a post about this. What do you got for me?

Speaker 1: Yeah, same. And the other thing too is like, you have to think about like the privacy, like, especially like when it comes to kids, but also like for us as business owners, like everything you're putting into these large language models is being trained for other people who are putting prompts in. So like if you're putting in your voice and you're putting in what you do for business, you're putting in all of these things, like that is just like now wide open on the interwebs in these data centers and That's your intellectual property, right? So how are you like, I don't know, there's so much like weird legal gray area that we haven't figured out yet that I'll be interested to see like what happens. Probably nothing in this administration, but we'll see.

Speaker 2: Probably that brought up two thoughts for me one Did you listen to that duped episode where they go into like the legality like finer aspects of AI apart from just like the bad copy It spits out it was really interesting and like brought up a lot of points I haven't heard I can't remember if it was the free one or the paid one So if you're listening to this go search for the duped podcast and if it's there listen to it And if it's not I'm sorry pay for it. I

Speaker 1: It's worth it. It's like $7 a month. ⁓

Speaker 2: It's so good. And then the second thing, speaking of this administration and AI, I don't want to get too political. I always do actually. I'm not going to lie to you, but on my business thing, I'll try very hard not to. My husband works at the Pentagon. I went to go visit him and we did like a little tour when my parents came to visit because they wanted to see like the inside. You go in the big, there's like a kind of a mall area. There's like a bunch of different stores and like restaurants and stuff and like a food court. And there are these giant posters hanging on all of the pillars. And it's like an AI generated image of Pete, was it Hexeth has whatever his name is, the guy that can't do pull-ups. And it's him doing like the Uncle Sam pointer finger. And it says, I want you to use AI. And it's like the creepiest, most propaganda-y thing. And it also reminds me, I saw just the other day that OpenAI partnered with the DoD for something and a bunch of people. like immediately canceled and like uninstalled the app and stuff like 200 and something percent of downloads were uninstalled.

Speaker 1: I also uninstalled and unsubscribed. It's one of those things where I feel like you feel like you need it, but when you step away from it, you realize life is better without it. That's kind of how I felt when I got off Instagram and Meto products in general. Whenever I uninstall a social media off my phone, I need to do it for Reddit. That's been my last hanging thread, but it's like, actually, I don't actually miss it. I was just spending time there because I'm used to it. That's just like what I'm doing. It's my routine. But like when you actually step away from it, you're like, I don't actually need to be on there every single day. Like I don't actually need to be spending all of this time. It's funny cause I haven't even logged into threads in like weeks and I logged in the other day and there was like several people like had tagged me and stuff. And I'm like, wow, I just like missed all of these things, but they know where to find me.

Speaker 2: realized that because I was one of those people and then I was like next time I'm just gonna it was like someone looking for a copywriter and I was like next time I'm just gonna link her like contact page or like her freebie or something just make this easy.

Speaker 1: I know. it's just like, literally just haven't thought about threats in so long. But yeah, I think go outside, talk to real people. This is the solution to AI.

Speaker 2: Yeah, it is actually. I did my very first in-person networking kind of event and even just talking to the people there. And it wasn't specifically about women in business or marketing or anything, but we all happen to be women business owners who are also moms, which is my audience. And so even just chatting with them, got a ton of content ideas and somehow accomplished a bunch of market research without even meaning to. Talking to people is very, very helpful.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I would say like most of my content ideas come from having conversations with people who would be my ideal clients. I as much as I'm introverted and like to stay inside, like that is really, I tell my clients this too, like you can have all the marketing pieces in place, but if you're not having the actual conversations, it's not going to convert to sales. Like you have to talk to people.

Speaker 2: Yeah, that's like where so much of that positioning and connection piece comes from is knowing your audience. Random Google searches are not quite going to cut it, especially when everyone and their mom has some kind of online business now. Yeah.

Speaker 1: ⁓ I've kind of been seeing like two camps of people in my audience. One is like, they have not started using AI. They're like, everything is handwritten, like they're really trying to avoid it. And then there's like the other people who went so deep into AI that are now like burnt out on it and are like, my content's not converting. Like everything came out was crap. I don't remember how to write anymore. Like nothing feels good.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Man, that's rough.

Speaker 1: So I'm like, where is this like happy medium where like, you're using it in a way that is like helpful and saves you time, but it isn't taking over everything. And I think like that piece of like, where does it actually fit into your business? And how do you actually use it is going to be really important.

Speaker 2: Yeah. And I know you said you were doing all your writing like in Google Docs. So what ways like are you using AI in your business now that you find helpful as you, I'm sure, like trying to still figure things out as I am as well? Yeah.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I like it when I'm like feeling stuck. will sometimes be like, can you ask me some questions to get me unstuck, but I'm still like doing the brainstorming and doing the thinking. Also, sometimes I'll like post like an email that I wrote and I'm like, hey, like what's missing here? Like, what can I add to it? But I think like the more specific prompts, the easier it is. But I also think that like for me as a copywriter, like I I wouldn't want to tell my clients who don't know how to write copy to do that because I still spend like so much time being like, actually, like, that headline is trash, I'm going to like do a different headline or I can tell when something is off or wrong because I ran so much copy and I've done it for so long that I don't want to be like, Hey, random business owner, it's fine. Just use AI, right? Like, no, you have to actually like understand how to critique what is coming out of it. And that part takes skill.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and when you do use it for a lot of like copy stuff, I feel like taking the time to adjust it afterwards and like do those critiques takes so long. It's like you could have just written it yourself in the first place.

Speaker 1: Yeah, it's almost like I like, I almost like never want to like copy paste. Like it's like I have the Google Doc, sometimes I ask the AI questions and then I'll like tweak. That's why I like cloud better than chat GPT because it'll give you like actual like ideas on how to prompt it and not just rewrite it for you. won't be like, here's like chat GPT will be like, okay, here I rewrote it for you. And I'm like, no, you're still getting it wrong. But Claude will be like, hey, you're missing like an emotional piece here. Like, why don't you add a sentence here? And I'm like, then I can think about like, what is the sentence? So that feels better for me. So I'm never actually like copy pasting, but I am using it to like help me brainstorm. So I'm not just like sitting there stuck, but I'm also never zero. I'm not I'm not like, hey, I need to write a post today. Like I am starting, I brainstorm on my own first, and then I'll go back.

Speaker 2: like that. Yeah, that's smart. was going to say I like that you ask it to like ask you questions to help you like get past any kind of block rather than just having it like give you answers. Because I feel like all the answers are normally trash. ⁓ But having it help you.

Speaker 1: Yeah, how about you? How are you kind of fitting it in?

Speaker 2: I'm kind of in the same camp where I'm doing a lot of more like Google doc work writing on my own. sometimes if I am, this isn't specific to copywriting, but more for like general brainstorming, I'll just do like a whole brain dump and I'll be like, can you put this into like a to-do list and like make it make sense for me or something? Cause it's normally me like walking around my house, like picking up dirty clothes, like talking into my phone, like in a word doc, like transcribing it, trying to save myself time. So things like that I'll do. But yeah, I kind of like you said, I'm trying to use it a ton less. So I kind of haven't super figured it out yet though. So I'm interested to try the things you mentioned and also to hear what other people have been doing after they listen to this and reply to emails and whatnot.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm interested too. I do agree with what you said though, like making things structured. Like if you put in a brain dump and you're like, help me put this in order. Like I know that this doesn't flow. Like it is pretty good at that.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and then it's still like your ideas and stuff, but it's not, I don't know, turning what you did into AI slop or anything.

Speaker 1: Yeah, and then it's like when you think about like, you know, most of my clients, and I think most of your clients, like our service based people, like their consultants, they're people who are experts in something, right. And so like, if you are outsourcing your expertise into AI, like you're the thing that makes people want to work with you is not going to be conveyed through the output of the AI. And so that's like the piece where it's like, How do you capture the essence of what you do and capture the trust that you build with your people, even if you decide to use the

Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah for sure and I actually just thought of another way that I use it I have these like outlines that I follow for like when I write captions or carousels and I'll be like hook secondary hook Validate like all the pieces that I include in a post to make people like keep swiping through it I'll put that in and be like does what I wrote match this What do I need to change here to make sure it lines up things like that?

Speaker 1: Yeah, I think like really specific prompts are helpful. But I think like also like you have to be clear on like your positioning and what you want to say and like, yeah, so that you can be like, hey, you know, going into this launch or going into whatever it is that you're doing, whatever your goal is, this is how I want to talk about what I'm saying. Like these are the core messages that I want and incorporate that into whatever content. Otherwise, whatever it's going to give you is going to be whatever everybody else who does what you do is getting.

Speaker 2: And yeah, and even if you're writing it on your own, like that's something I always kind of have to help people find is like that thing that makes them different and including that in their copy to help them stand out and connect with the right people. It is. I had a Voxer day with Maggie the other day trying to figure it out for myself and I'm like, I can do this for other people, but I can't do it for myself to save my life.

Speaker 1: And that's so hard. Yeah, I feel the exact same way. write, it's like the copper's kid has no shoes because it's like, you're so close to it and you're so emotionally invested in the success of your business. And you just want to, you just want to do a good job, but it's like, you feel so awkward being like, Hey, I'm really good at this. And this is why my clients choose me and it just feels awkward. So that is also why I pay somebody to help me with my positioning because it's really hard to do for yourself. Like once I know it, I run with it and fly with it. that piece of figuring it out that AI can't do, that's... And it takes time. It's not like... And I think that's why AI is so bad at X. It's not like you're like, okay, I'm starting a business and this is exactly how I'm going to position myself. It takes conversations with real people and learning about your ideal clients and what's going on in the market right now and how do you actually solve a problem for them and why are you the right choice over somebody else? All of those pieces have to come from in your brain.

Speaker 2: Yeah. And it also changes over time, like thinking of how much social media has changed and how deliverables and products have changed and the foundation of that strategy has kind of changed. It's going to shift.

Speaker 1: of it. what do you think? What do you think? How do you think AI is impacting the way that the market is right now?

Speaker 2: horribly, actually. And I think we talked a bit about this in our last like joint episode too, but how like people are so hesitant to trust other businesses online and some of it is like from, you know, bad business coaches and like bad offers where people were kind of like felt grifted, but also it's bad AI content where, yeah. You need more trust than ever. And we know that from like so many studies that are being done before someone is able to buy. it's just like AI is not going to help you get that. And so it's constantly like filling our feeds. And in the online business world, we also have this mentality of like, if someone else is doing this, I need to be doing it too. Whether it's like a certain offer where like everyone was doing VIP days and then everyone was doing like memberships and all of those kinds of things, or how often we post or what types of things we're posting. So if people are constantly posting more because they're using AI, other people are going to feel the need to do it too. And it's just going to lead to like so much more content that isn't of the highest quality. That is still eroding trust and not actually helpful to businesses and making us all feel way more burnt out in a time when we really don't need that.

Speaker 1: And it's like, you don't actually want to read a lot of this content. When it, right, like that's the content you skip over when you're on your feed. You're like, okay, whatever. Who is this even, right? Like keep on scrolling. Not to like, I mean, if you're like listening to this and you're feeling bad, like I feel like I have also used AI and created crappy content. And now I'm like, I feel like now I'm trying to move away from that because... I feel like I don't know, I want my content to be reflective of my expertise and my brand and I want people to trust me to be able to do it for them as well and for it to not sound like generic slaps.

Speaker 2: Yeah, same. I feel like we've all done it. We've all done it to save time. And then I feel like a lot of people are realizing now from the people that I talked to and like I'm hearing from that it's just not working. Like they're filling their feeds, it's getting done faster, but it's not actually getting anywhere. They're not getting as much engagement as before. They're not getting conversions. Like, so it checks that off their to-do list, but what is it actually helping?

Speaker 1: Like to give a really good example, when I first started my podcast, I was using Chachi BT to turn my transcripts into blog posts and making a blog post for every single one of my episodes. That was so ineffective and such a waste of my time because Google knows when things are just like completely AI written. So they're not ranking it as like high authority, high trust. It's like not actually helping my SEO. People are not really reading it because they're not even though it's like based on my ideas, like it's not quality writing because it was just taken from AI. And then I'm like, why am I doing this every single week? It's not getting me any results in my business. And I think that's like the piece with AI where it's like, you do have to slow down to speed up to say like, where does this fit? Is this even worth my time? Am I just doing it because somebody else is telling me to do it because Pete Hexgith is like, hey, use AI. ⁓

Speaker 2: Right, pointing his finger at you angrily.

Speaker 1: Yeah, or is this actually moving the needle in my business? And I think what's actually moving the needle right now is, yes, your content and showing up and being visible, but also the actual relationships that you're building with people, your referral partners, your connections, like those are the things that are really going to help you stand out. And those are the things that are also going to inform your content.

Speaker 2: Yeah, 100 % agree. I helped someone start a brand new Instagram account end of January, early February, and they have like 12 posts, I want to say, so not a lot. But they already have almost 400 followers just from knowing their audience and connecting with other people. It is so much more about quality and connection than posting every day or hopping on endless trends.

Speaker 1: I will say though, you do have to show up. Don't go so far in the other direction that you never show up.

Speaker 2: Yes, that's true. That's true. You got to do it a little bit. I honestly, I posted once this week and then I was like, ⁓ man, I should probably do it again today. I randomly posted like, we had like just a crazy week of kids birthday parties and then like everyone got sick and it was just been like chaos. We found out one of my kids needed glasses and It's just insanity. had like five different doctor's appointments. So I just posted like a random carousel of like shit that's been going on. I posted a picture of like a loaf of bread that I made, random reviews. So was like, oh yeah, it's somewhat business related and just like other random things just to have something and start conversations.

Speaker 1: And you know, I posted a rant about health insurance on LinkedIn last week and that got so much engagement. I ⁓ was so angry. needed to put it out there.

Speaker 2: saw that. I would be too, honestly, like I completely understand.

Speaker 1: So yeah, think like don't feel like everything has to be like super connected to business either. And I think that's like also something that like AI just like puts you in a box. If you're using it to plan your content strategy, it's gonna give you like super generic strategy. And it's like, it doesn't leave room for you to talk about your loaf of bread or for me to rant about health insurance. And like, those are the moments I had somebody email me today and be like, Hey, I saw your post on LinkedIn like, I'm sorry you're dealing with that. Can we get a coffee chat?" That was because of that LinkedIn post that I have this connection with this person again, and that is moving the needle forward in my business, building my network. I think remember to step out of the AI box is my piece of advice too. ⁓

Speaker 2: for sure. And even those like random posts also, even if they don't lead to directly to any kind of conversion, they do just show a little bit of the you behind the business, which helps with connection. So give it, give it a go instead of AI, post something random and just see what happens.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I also saw people being like, ⁓ I'm making mistakes on purpose so that people know it's not AI. What are your thoughts on that?

Speaker 2: I it's funny, I know I've never done it on purpose but every time I accidentally have a typo somewhere I'm like, well, at least they know.

Speaker 1: I had one today. I wrote an email about my takes on AI. I'm doing this whole AI thing this month. Everything is themed around AI, which is really nice because this conversation fits really nicely into my whole theme. But I was trying to say that I'm not anti AI. But what I actually said was that I'm anti AI. But if you read the If you can tell that I'm like trying to take this like nuanced position, but like I just forgot the word not in there and I'm like, ⁓ my gosh, like, what a crazy typo.

Speaker 2: If it makes you feel any better. read that email. I thought it was great and I didn't even notice. So.

Speaker 1: That does make me feel better.

Speaker 2: Good.

Speaker 1: I was just like, ⁓ my gosh, people will get it. People will get

Speaker 2: They'll get it. It was fine. There was like so much good stuff in that email. Like it's fine.

Speaker 1: Yeah, what else? What else have you seen?

Speaker 2: I've seen some crazy takes from people who like sell AI stuff and like trying to get you to use it. And this also kind of ties into the last episode we did together because it was very like shame based. ⁓ Someone accused me of being anti-feminist by saying we shouldn't use AI because she was a woman business owner. I was like, Hey, me too. It was like, okay. People being like, yeah. She was like, well,

Speaker 1: I'm not sure where the dots are.

Speaker 2: where mom business owners, we need AI to like make sure we get everything done. And I was like, or we could do less. Crazy, crazy. And then there was another one that I saw where someone was like, if you don't start using AI in your business, you're going to be left behind and like your business is going to fail. I'm like, Oh, well, I'm interested to see how this goes for you as a business owner. I'm sure this is very like trust building for your followers.

Speaker 1: That's interesting because I have seen a few copywriters go deep into AI and then pivot away from it. So I actually wonder how effective that is of using AI as your differentiator, your unique value proposition. I actually think if people are like, I don't use AI, I think that would be a really unique value proposition.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I've seen some people like that online, mostly on threads, and I always enjoy seeing it. They have like some really good takes about, I mean, they also address like the environmental impact and like losing your voice and things like that. But it's always interesting to see.

Speaker 1: Yeah, it's hard. I think it's like one of those things where as consumers, like we feel responsible. Like I think about like, you know, the water usage in the data centers, but it's like one of those things with like, like recycling, like I, as an individual, try to recycle as much as possible. But like, really, the issue is all of these giant corporations, like creating so much trash and creating products that are just going to go like pile up in some random country somewhere and I think that there's this tension between what can I do as an individual? I can unsubscribe, I can boycott these companies, I can use them less, but how are we actually holding these people, these businesses, these corporations accountable for the harm that they're causing? I think that's a really hard thing to grapple with as a business owner.

Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. I think it, yeah, the solution will have to be kind of like part like legislative, like systemic and also like user because like boycotts work, I mean, but yeah, it's tough. Also, speaking of data centers, we live near like one of the biggest, like, I don't remember the exact wording, but like one of the largest like groups of data centers in the world. The effect on our electricity bill is Absolutely insane and I hate it so much. You are not like hundreds of dollars.

Speaker 1: That's wild. Okay. Everybody stop using AI to lower.

Speaker 2: Over my electricity bill, please.

Speaker 1: ⁓ I have a family member who lives in Philly who said the same thing about their electricity bills.

Speaker 2: Yeah, we got like a letter from Dominion Energy and they were like, oh, with all these data centers, know, prices are going to go up. It'll probably be about like $6 a month. And then it was like $160 more than usual. I was like, oh, yeah, $6. No worries.

Speaker 1: It just makes no sense. Why are corporations not paying for that?

Speaker 2: They're just now proposing a bill to like make it so they're covering the change. And I'm like, just now we're thinking of this? Just now? Like, it's wild.

Speaker 1: Yep, this is like where if everybody just slowed down, everything would be so much better because we could actually like, do the implications. But like, that's one of the tenets of capitalism is to do everything really fast and more. And that's, that's the problem.

Speaker 2: Yeah, that was a thought I had when you were talking about how to use AI and kind of grappling with the fact that a lot of it is on the data centers, like the owners instead of us, that saying there's no ethical consumption under capitalism. So even when we are picking where to shop and stuff and shopping local instead of Walmart or Amazon, if you have to, you have to. We're still struggling for cash and using the cheaper option is what's going to help you get through the day.

Speaker 1: Right, exactly. And it's the same in your business. you try to boycott every unethical tech company, you can't be online. My whole business is on Google and it just is what it is. I chose not to be on Meta, but I can't ignore them all. Otherwise, I have to run my business fully in person and I don't want to do that.

Speaker 2: That sounds hard and uncomfortable.

Speaker 1: But also how would people find me? Like I'm not like a door-to-door salesman, like I need a website.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Can you just like send out flyers like real estate companies do?

Speaker 1: True. Be like, excuse me, Sydney. Are you interested in... My parents get those all the time. Are you interested in telling your property? No.

Speaker 2: No, thank you. Stacey, you're doing like a, I can't remember what it's called, the talk you're doing or the- I will. ⁓

Speaker 1: I will tell you what I haven't told everybody else yet. So on March 31st, I am doing a no AI copywriting challenge. So if you want to practice writing a post or an email or like a section of your website, then join the challenge because I'm going to walk you through all of the thinking steps that come before the actual writing so that you have a really well positioned piece of copy or content by the end of the week and we're gonna do it all without AI and I've been writing all of the emails for it without AI and it's been a time. It's been taking me a long time. They feel good. They're like more funny than like what would come out of AI and I'm like, oh, I feel like I lost my personality in past emails. So I'm having fun getting it back. Good.

Speaker 2: But it's worth it. It's worth it. love that. I will be sure to put the link for that in the show notes and also join it because that sounds great. Yay. Love it. Well, thank you for coming and ranting and raving with me about AF.

Speaker 1: No problem.

Speaker 2: I am on Instagram and threads at SydneyOBrien.co and it's like S-Y-D-N-E-Y like Australia.

Speaker 1: It is yeah. Perfect. Cool. Thank you. Thanks.