Right here’s precisely how the HubSpot weblog staff makes use of AI

I’m going to be actual with you: I’m exhausted. We blinked, and it felt like every little thing was run by synthetic intelligence (AI). I’m being dramatic, after all, however AI is transforming how we work, play, and stay quicker than any tech I’ve seen in my decade-long advertising and marketing profession.

With so many modifications and unknowns, it’s been overwhelming even for the seasoned entrepreneurs and writers right here at HubSpot. However the extra we be taught, the extra we notice AI would not must be the enemy of content material writers.

When used as a considerate addition to a human-led content material creation course of, AI generally is a highly effective instrument that helps us all work quicker and smarter – with out sacrificing our human contact.

Right here on the HubSpot weblog staff, we have been experimenting with AI for some time now, and, like everybody, we’re nonetheless figuring it out.

However we have additionally uncovered some thrilling use circumstances which have streamlined a few of our extra time-intensive workflows, improved our output, and given us time again for deeper subject analysis.

We’re not about gatekeeping, so let’s speak by means of how we’ve introduced AI into our writing course of.

How HubSpot Bloggers Use AI in Their Writing Course of

Step 1: We use AI to interrupt by means of artistic blocks and generate concepts.

Each nice article begins with a spark of inspiration. Generally the concepts move freely; different occasions, we want assist getting off the bottom. That is the place our relationship with AI begins.

I’ve penned round 800 articles as a content material marketer, and even I nonetheless get author’s block. Once I had hassle up to now, I’d chat with teammates for ideas and concepts. However working remotely, there are fewer alternatives to speak casually like this.

Whereas AI cannot change chats with teammates, it has been a game-changer after I need assist fleshing out an concept or fascinated with learn how to strategy a subject. 

“Once I’m planning matters to cowl, AI is an extremely useful brainstorming buddy,” shares Fellow HubSpotter Caroline Forsey.

“I simply throw an concept or perhaps a common subject in a chat, and it kicks again angles, subtopics, and even potential titles. I don’t use its options verbatim. However beginning off with that artistic spark saves me hours on ideation, letting the human staff layer in voice and nuance from the get-go.”

I couldn’t agree extra.

Not too long ago, I used to be arising with matters for HubSpot’s Breaking the Blueprint column, and had some trouble getting started. I tagged ChatGPT in for some help, prompting:

“I‘m brainstorming article topics for a blog focused on giving marketers and business professionals from underrepresented groups advice and information they need to know. I want to target specific topics and concerns that are unique to these groups. I’d also like to touch upon topics related to the evolving role of AI on society and business. Can you give me some ideas?”

Here’s a peek at its response:

From there, I workshopped the suggestions and then met with a colleague to finalize the topics that best suited our audience.

Like I said, AI doesn‘t fully replace bouncing ideas off a colleague, but it can provide a promising starting point when you’re stuck. This got my creative juices flowing, and that’s all I needed. Once we have our direction, it’s time to dive into research.

Step 2: We power our research with AI as an information assistant.

With our topic and angle defined, we need to understand our subject inside and out. This is where AI becomes our research powerhouse.

As a content marketer and editor, my top concern is always quality and accuracy. I want to make sure the information I put in front of any audience is valuable and trustworthy. That means a lot of research, and good research takes time.

Generative AI can help exponentially here with its ability to gather and summarize information from multiple sources, often in seconds. In fact, 47% of marketers report utilizing AI for analysis already.

With regards to my very own analysis course of, I not must filter by means of pages and pages of Google outcomes to seek out the data I want. As an alternative, AI does a lot of the heavy attempting to find me and wraps it up into a pleasant, easy-to-understand bundle. It doesn’t simply give me a useful resource that may reply my query like a search engine; it offers me a solution straight.

Forsey additionally sees the advantages of utilizing AI for content material analysis.

She recollects, “As soon as, I wanted to put in writing a put up — sarcastically — concerning the variations between ChatGPT, Google‘s Bard [now Gemini], and Bing’s AI-powered search engine. So, I requested ChatGPT: ’Are you able to inform me the variations between ChatGPT, Google‘s Bard, and Bing’s AI-powered search engine? Please put the professionals and cons in a desk format.’”

Shortly after, Caroline bought again an in depth chart illustrating precisely what she wished in a couple of brief paragraphs:

Kaitlin Milliken, Senior Program Supervisor for our Freelance Author Community, considers AI an enormous a part of her analysis course of as nicely. She shares the way it’s helped her distill details about HubSpot merchandise when writing.

“After we write about merchandise, I will ask AI to elucidate in additional element what makes a sure product distinctive, and it offers me a listing of specifics that may assist inform my writing/enhancing.”

The end result? Utilizing AI for content material analysis and evaluation has helped us dig deeper and uncover angles and understandings we might have missed or taken extra time to return throughout with out it. Now comes the precise writing.

Step 3: We collaborate with AI on tough outlines and messy first drafts.

Right here‘s the place issues get fascinating. We don’t simply analysis and brainstorm with AI — we truly let it assist us write. However there are parameters to our strategy.

The HubSpot weblog staff doesn’t simply copy, paste, and publish AI-generated content material. Moderately, we use AI as a jumping-off level — that messy first draft to gas concepts.

One of many large causes individuals learn HubSpot articles is to be taught from real-life entrepreneurs, gross sales, and repair individuals. They need knowledgeable, verified examples and accounts of what works and what doesn’t.

That type of human experience doesn’t come from AI. Human judgment and storytelling can’t be replicated. AI can’t produce lived data, expertise, and insights, however it may rapidly collect preliminary, common data for our writers and editors to construct right into a closing piece.

Our writers use AI to save lots of time, notably for extra common, instructional articles. Many, together with myself, use AI to draft the extra easy sections of weblog posts to allow them to deal with extra impactful ones.

For example, I’ve usually turned to AI to draft conclusions in latest months. With the majority of my article content material finalized, I pop into ChatGPT and ask it to draft a conclusion that matches the tone and concepts shared. From there, I refine and edit to my liking.

HubSpot author Tristen Taylor additionally makes use of AI for weblog intros and conclusions. She explains:

“Earlier than utilizing AI, I usually discovered myself rewriting introductions and conclusion paragraphs a number of occasions. Now that I’ve entry to those instruments, my time for finishing weblog articles has been reduce down tremendously. AI can seize the subject, intent, and focused key phrases I want by means of refined AI prompts.”

She provides, “It additionally permits me to refocus on the content material or data of worth that readers are in search of, as a substitute of ruminating over small particulars firstly or finish.”

Our staff has used AI in our artistic temporary and outlining course of for over a 12 months, and we‘ve began experimenting with AI-generated first drafts. Up to now, we’ve discovered AI drafting to be a useful time-saving measure for some matters, although not all.

For extra common matters, equivalent to “what’s” and “learn how to’s,” it frees up extra of our writers‘ and editors’ time to talk with different consultants, collect distinctive examples and case research, and “humanize” extra generic matters total, however AI can’t supply the unique concepts wanted for op-eds and thought management items.

Learn: Tips on how to Humanize AI Content material So It Will Rank, Have interaction, and Get Shared in 2025

That is the place our philosophy comes into play: “AI assists, people lead.” AI helps ideation, drafting, and iteration — however individuals make the ultimate name. AI gathers the items; we put collectively the puzzle. We by no means publish AI-generated content material with out considerate human editorial oversight.

Be taught extra about our AI rules right here.

Step 4: We use AI to investigate knowledge and uncover insights.

Numbers don‘t lie. They add credibility to our articles, however they don’t all the time inform their story clearly both. Here is how AI helps us make sense of our knowledge.

Numbers will not be my sturdy swimsuit. When confronted with survey knowledge or efficiency analytics, my head spins a bit, so when the prospect of utilizing AI for knowledge evaluation happened, I couldn’t have been extra excited.

Earlier this 12 months, I examined this use case for our State of Inclusive Advertising and marketing 2025 report. ChatGPT permits you to add spreadsheets, so I connected the file and requested it to offer me probably the most vital tendencies coming by means of the info.

Initially, the agent simply returned a simplified spreadsheet (womp), however after I requested that it clarify the qualitative tendencies in paragraph type, right here’s what I bought:

Might I’ve distilled these tendencies with out the assistance of AI? Sure — however not within the minute or two it took ChatGPT.

Senior Employees Author and Web site Editor Amy Rigby echoes this, reflecting on analyzing knowledge for our web site advertising and marketing report.

“LLMs are extremely highly effective at figuring out patterns in knowledge, particularly ChatGPT’s o3 mannequin. I used ChatGPT to assist me spotlight tendencies and additional section our web site advertising and marketing survey knowledge, leading to a a lot deeper, richer report. I used to get pissed off with ChatGPT as a result of its math was steadily unsuitable, however the o3 model has enormously improved.”

Whereas it’s tempting simply to take the tendencies AI finds and run, double-check them. As we all know, AI could make errors and make issues up. That is the biggest challenge marketers report going through with AI, so take the time to spot-check your knowledge to make sure the agent didn’t take any liberties.

(Observe: OpenAI simply launched GPT 5, so hopefully, it’s improved on this space.)

Step 5: We experiment with AI-generated visuals to reinforce our content material.

Nice phrases deserve nice visuals. Here is how we use AI to create compelling imagery and interactive components that will in any other case be out of attain.

So, I fancy myself a eager self-taught graphic designer, however writing stays my first and most refined ability. Whereas written content material nonetheless issues, client content material consumption habits and shopping for habits more and more demand extra visible and interactive mediums like movies, infographics, and quizzes.

This type of superior content material is out of attain for me and entrepreneurs with restricted design and improvement expertise.

Fortunately, many AI instruments can be found now to assist us. In reality, our AI Trends for Marketers report discovered that picture and design turbines are tied with common chatbots for the preferred AI instrument entrepreneurs use.

Source

Senior advertising and marketing supervisor and AI blogger Martina Bretous showcases generative AI’s prowess on this space in her collection “Is it Actual or AI?”

In it, she crafts quite a lot of multimedia content material (i.e., video, audio, pictures) utilizing AI and challenges readers to see if they’ll determine them. For example, this video of a phenomenal yellow chicken she featured was AI-generated on PikaLabs.

Spectacular, proper? I additionally used ChatGPT to create this extremely particular featured picture of a piggy financial institution representing a Fb finances.

Supply

General, AI helps us create visible components that may actually improve the expertise of our content material and make the ideas simpler to understand. There are tons of strong AI video and AI picture turbines, together with HubSpot’s Breeze, that you should use to do the identical.

Step 6: We use AI as a top quality management examine.

Earlier than any piece goes stay, it goes by means of our enhancing course of. And sure, AI performs a job right here too — however not in the best way you may count on.

Whether or not we notice it or not, we’ve been utilizing AI for proofreading and enhancing for many years.

Give it some thought: spell and grammar examine on Microsoft Phrase and Google Docs, “autocorrect” on iPhone, Grammarly — even non-writers depend on these instruments to reduce misspelled phrases and grammar points that would come off as negligent or unprofessional.

In the present day, this has simply gotten extra superior.

“Individuals are rightfully involved about AI’s potential to hallucinate in enhancing, however one factor that will get misplaced within the debate is that people make errors, too,” displays Rigby.

In latest months, she has turned to AI brokers as proofreaders and even editors for her articles.

She continues, “Each author is aware of the expertise of being too near their very own work to see it clearly or being in such a rush to fulfill a deadline that they miss one thing. So, along with human editorial oversight, I see LLMs as one other set of eyes, an additional layer of verification.”

“I fact-check all of my articles, however for extra assurance, I generally run them by means of ChatGPT or Claude and ask the AI to flag any errors, which I can then take a look at extra intently. AI usually does catch typos and errors that I missed.”

She doesn’t simply cease at grammar and spelling. Rigby recommends asking brokers for suggestions on even learn how to enhance your writing.

She says, “I generally ask AI to critique my work, poke holes in my logic, and level out weaknesses I could not have observed.”

I wish to immediate it with one thing like, ‘Assume like a digital marketer who will learn this piece to determine which software program to purchase. What issues would they’ve after studying this? What questions would come up that weren’t answered within the piece?” This helps me return and re-examine and strengthen my arguments.”

Rigby has additionally constructed a customized GPT referred to as StyleScout for our staff’s inside use, which helps writers rapidly scan their drafts for fashion inconsistencies. This was as straightforward as importing our inside fashion guides to the GPT and letting AI deal with the remaining to make sure our content material is persistently on model.

“Earlier than I submit an article, I can run it by means of the GPT and get a line-by-line breakdown of something which may violate our fashion pointers. Sure, AI generally returns outputs which might be overly pedantic or heavy-handed. That’s why human judgment all the time will get the ultimate say. It is my duty to examine that what it tells me is wise and correct. If it isn’t, I disregard it.”

Try our free Masterclass “How to Create Custom GPTs That 10x Your Marketing Results” to discover ways to construct a customized GPT in your staff.

Step 7: We use AI to whip up “microcopy” (i.e., meta descriptions, social posts).

The article is written, edited, and able to publish. However our work is not accomplished—now we have to advertise. That is one other space the place AI shines.

For some cause, author’s block strikes hardest after I write meta descriptions or social posts for my weblog articles. Maybe it’s subject burnout, or I’m simply too near the items to distill the true golden nuggets of data.

Regardless of the cause, rapidly producing the proper messaging to advertise your content material is certainly one of my favourite makes use of of AI. For example, right here’s what ChatGPT gave me after I requested it for some social copy primarily based on this text:

It’s not excellent, nevertheless it offers me one thing to take and make my very own.

Jamie Juviler, HubSpot Supervisor, Employees Writing & AEO, has additionally leveraged AI for meta descriptions. He suggests feeding your introduction paragraph into an AI chatbot after which asking it to supply a 100-150-character meta description.

The great thing about this strategy is that AI handles the preliminary artistic carry, releasing us as much as deal with refining the message and making certain it aligns with our model voice.

Bonus: AI helps us keep present on the trade.

It might sound cliché, however the rumors are true: Advertising and marketing modifications rapidly. Fortunately, AI helps our weblog staff sustain with it.

Juviler explains his strategy. “On this new realm of AEO and, extra broadly, AI-powered advertising and marketing, I have been leveraging Gen AI as an data consolidation agent.”

“We‘re always flooded with AI-related information, suggestions, and applied sciences, so each time I come throughout a brand new piece of data — whether or not it’s a video, weblog put up, podcast, e-newsletter, and so on.— I run it by means of a custom GPT I’ve arrange that helps me decide whether or not it’s essential or new. Whether it is, the AI modifies a private monitoring doc I keep for the trade as wanted.”

This technique permits Juviler to remain on prime of the stream of AI information with out getting overwhelmed. This idea is also used for different tendencies we cowl, like electronic mail advertising and marketing, creator monetization, and social platform algorithm modifications, or any subject of curiosity in your trade.

We’re on this collectively.

Like everybody immediately, our staff is studying as we go in the case of AI. The expertise has its advantages but additionally drawbacks, and with always evolving expertise and unclear rules, it’s a little bit of the Wild West. However we’re figuring it out.

We wish to lead with transparency with our viewers, so we’re dedicated to sharing how we use AI in our work, because it evolves, and each step of the best way.

We’ll embody a disclaimer on any put up we write that has been AI-supported, letting you realize that we used AI to finish the put up. And also you’re welcome to dig into the HubSpot Media AI pointers to be taught extra.

We don’t know what tomorrow holds, however we all know AI will assist us all navigate this altering panorama. We all know AI cannot change the humanity behind the HubSpot weblog — and we’ll by no means take that human connection with no consideration.