Many founders I talk to fall into one of two camps when it comes to AI.
The first camp believes ChatGPT and tools like it are magic. Press a button, get perfect content, watch the leads roll in. No effort required.
The second camp believes AI is the enemy of authenticity. That using it means selling out. That real creators do everything themselves.
Both camps are wrong.
The truth is somewhere in the middle. And finding that middle ground is how you actually get results without losing your soul in the process.
How AI and ChatGPT can benefit founders, writers and creators
The opportunity here is staggering if you use these tools correctly.
If you record a talking head style video or just talk into your phone for 10 minutes, you can use AI to chop that up into video clips for YouTube Shorts, TikTok, Instagram Reels and LinkedIn.
You can take the transcript and run it through ChatGPT to get a blog post, a couple LinkedIn posts, some tweets, a Medium article and a Substack newsletter.
All from taking 20 to 30 minutes to create one content asset and then repurposing it skillfully using best practices and templates for each platform.
The creation is becoming easier. The distribution is becoming easier. The automation of that distribution is easier and more approachable than ever.
How to make sure you avoid slop and get the most out of it
Here is where most people go wrong.
They spin up a piece of content based on a keyword. They use ChatGPT to create a draft. Then they run it through some obscure software that claims to be a humanizer.
The tool says things like humans have high perplexity and burstiness. It gives you a score of 95. Therefore a human will enjoy this.
That is thinking about why content is effective in the absolute wrong way.
The content that performs well is not generic tactical advice. It is the posts where you spend time inserting stories, unique perspectives, case studies and things from lived experience.
When you just dryly describe a concept without any uniqueness or information gain? Crickets.
I am on LinkedIn all day long. I see people clicking a button and generating what appears to be content without infusing any of themselves into it. And the comment section is either dead silent or people are calling it out.
The content does not fail to connect because it is AI generated. It fails because there is nothing fundamental presented where readers can connect.
My personal beliefs around AI and how I use it day to day
I will say this a million times over. All technology is neither good nor bad inherently. It is a tool and you will get out of it what you put into it.
If you have yourself well defined, you have a great business model, you understand your target customer and you have a clear understanding of what you want to communicate, then using these tools to edit or deploy content across platforms or to repurpose it is just smart.
It is good business. And it is useful for your audience too so they do not have to hear your pure stream of consciousness but they also do not have to deal with something that is not you.
I use AI as a sparring partner to sharpen my thinking. I use it to draft from transcripts of me talking. I use it to challenge my ideas before I publish them.
What I do not do is ask it to think for me or replace the parts that make content actually resonate.
Before you start prompting or writing
This is the part most people skip. And it is exactly why their outputs feel flat.
Before you can use any tools effectively, you have to have a firm understanding of your unique beliefs, value systems, verbal identity, the messaging you want to put out into the world and your unique perspective based on your own lived experience.
Without that foundation, it does not matter how good your prompts are.
Define your unique verbal identity
Not everybody likes to hear this but I do not care.
You have to understand yourself first. Introspect and think about what your values are. What are the things you cannot help but care about? What are your non-negotiables?
This is a list of three to five things that define who you are and how you show up.
Then you need to get specific about style, tone, voice and taste.
What does your writing sound like when it is at its best? Are you direct or conversational? Do you use humor? Do you tell stories? What phrases do you naturally use? What words would you never say?
Take all of this and make it into a document. Upload it as a custom GPT or add it to your ChatGPT memory settings. This becomes the foundation that every piece of content builds on.
In the beginning I thought that the more context I gave ChatGPT, the better the output would be. So I threw everything at it. Documents, examples, notes, transcripts.
What I actually ended up doing was providing too much of the wrong context. The real mistake was using quantity over quality and specificity.
It is much better to include the right amount of the right information. A clear verbal identity document beats a hundred random files every time.
Clarify your key messaging pillars
What are the core messages you want your business to put out into the world?
This has to be aligned with what your customers or target audience actually want, think and need. Your personal values and your company messaging pillars should piggyback off each other but they are not the same thing.
Write down three to five messaging pillars. These are the topics you will return to again and again. The themes that connect your content to your business goals.
When you combine a clear verbal identity with clear messaging pillars, you give ChatGPT the constraints it needs to actually help you.
Use ChatGPT voice mode to have it interview you
This is the unlock most people miss.
Instead of staring at a blank page trying to write, just talk.
Pull up ChatGPT voice mode or any recording tool. Tell it to interview you about a topic you care about. Spend 10 to 20 minutes talking through your ideas.
You do not need a detailed brief or research to talk intelligently about something you have lived and that you understand. Your customers and your business are things you know deeply.
Once you have that transcript, you have gold. Real words, real thoughts, real stories in your actual voice. That becomes the raw material for everything else.
Best writing prompts for ChatGPT
Here are the prompts I use most often. Copy and paste these directly. Replace the bracketed placeholders with your own information.
1. Interview expert to pull out ideas
Use this prompt to have ChatGPT interview you or a subject matter expert to extract insights and stories.
You are an expert interviewer helping me extract valuable insights for content creation.
Interview me about [TOPIC]. Ask me one question at a time. Wait for my response before asking the next question.
Focus your questions on:
- Specific experiences and stories I have had related to this topic
- Mistakes I have made and what I learned from them
- Contrarian opinions or beliefs I hold that differ from conventional wisdom
- Concrete examples and case studies I can share
- Advice I would give to someone struggling with this
Ask follow-up questions to go deeper when I give surface-level answers. Push me to be specific and give real examples instead of generic advice.
Start with your first question.
2. Create blog posts from interview transcripts
Use this after you have a transcript from a voice recording or interview.
You are an expert blog writer. Using ONLY the information in the transcript below, write a narrative-driven blog post that is clear, skimmable and people-first.
Requirements:
- Write in first person using the speaker's voice from the transcript
- Use the speaker's original words and phrases wherever possible
- Keep paragraphs short, between 1 to 3 sentences each
- Include specific examples, numbers or steps that appear in the transcript
- Do not fabricate facts, stories or data that are not in the transcript
- Create a benefit-focused title under 65 characters
- Structure with H2 and H3 headings that tell a story when skimmed alone
- End with one concrete next action for the reader
Target length: [WORD COUNT] words
Here is the transcript:
[PASTE YOUR TRANSCRIPT HERE]
3. Create newsletters from interview transcripts
Use this to turn a transcript into an email newsletter format.
You are an expert newsletter writer. Using ONLY the information in the transcript below, write an engaging email newsletter.
Requirements:
- Write in first person using the speaker's voice from the transcript
- Open with a hook that creates curiosity or states a bold opinion
- Keep the tone conversational like you are writing to a friend
- Use short paragraphs and plenty of white space
- Include one main insight or lesson as the focus
- Pull in a specific story or example from the transcript
- End with a single clear call to action
- Keep total length under [WORD COUNT] words
Here is the transcript:
[PASTE YOUR TRANSCRIPT HERE]
4. Create LinkedIn posts from interview transcripts
Use this to extract multiple LinkedIn posts from one transcript.
You are an expert LinkedIn content creator. Using ONLY the information in the transcript below, create [NUMBER] different LinkedIn posts.
Requirements for each post:
- Write in first person using the speaker's voice
- Open with a hook that stops the scroll in the first line
- Keep paragraphs to 1 to 2 sentences maximum
- Use line breaks between paragraphs for readability
- Focus on one specific insight, story or lesson per post
- End with a question or call to action that invites engagement
- Keep each post under 200 words
Make each post feel distinct. Pull different angles, stories or lessons from the transcript for each one.
Here is the transcript:
[PASTE YOUR TRANSCRIPT HERE]
5. Edit content to fit your personal style
Use this when you have a draft that needs to sound more like you.
You are an expert editor. Edit the content below to match my personal writing style.
My style guidelines:
- Tone: [DESCRIBE YOUR TONE - example: direct, warm, energetic, conversational]
- Sentence length: [SHORT/MEDIUM/VARIED]
- Vocabulary: [SIMPLE/TECHNICAL/MIXED]
- Phrases I use often: [LIST 3-5 SIGNATURE PHRASES]
- Things I never say: [LIST WORDS OR PHRASES TO AVOID]
- Point of view: [FIRST PERSON/SECOND PERSON]
Edit the content to match these guidelines while preserving the core message and structure. Make it sound like I wrote it, not like AI wrote it.
Here is the content to edit:
[PASTE YOUR DRAFT HERE]
6. Challenge your ideas or narrative structure
Use this before publishing to stress test your content.
You are a thoughtful editor and critic. Review the content below and challenge it to make it stronger.
Specifically:
- Identify any claims that are not supported by evidence or examples
- Point out sections that feel generic or could apply to anyone
- Highlight areas where the narrative loses momentum or becomes confusing
- Suggest where a specific story or example would strengthen the argument
- Note any places where the tone feels inconsistent
- Question any assumptions that might not hold up
Be direct and specific in your feedback. Do not be nice just to be nice. I want to make this better.
Here is the content:
[PASTE YOUR DRAFT HERE]
Use Meet Sona to easily create authentic content with AI voice interviews
Meet Sona helps founders, consultants, and coaches define what makes them special and turns 10 minute guided interviews into weeks of tasteful LinkedIn, newsletter and blog content.
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