If AI Can Write Your Copy, Why Would You Pay Me?

I use AI.

Yes, I said it.

And considering I’ve been a professional copywriter for more than 17 years, you might expect me to follow that confession with a long list of reasons why AI will never replace a real writer.

But I’m not going to.

Because I like AI.

I use it to bounce ideas around, challenge my thinking, research things I don’t understand, untangle the mess in my head, and occasionally tell me what some terrifying new SEO term means without me getting lost down a research rabbit hole.

And here’s the weird bit.

I don’t even think of it as AI anymore. She’s called Mini Mon Brain and feels more like a funny little colleague sitting beside me while I work. I throw an idea at her, she throws something back, I tell her when she’s gone completely mad, and eventually we land somewhere useful.

But here’s the interesting part.

The more I’ve experimented with AI copywriting, the more certain I’ve become about the value of an experienced human copywriter.

Yes, AI can write your copy

Let’s get this bit out of the way.

AI can write a website page, a blog, an email, a product description, a LinkedIn post and probably a reasonably convincing birthday message to Aunty Margaret.

And it can do all of that frighteningly fast.

So if you’re a business owner looking at your website and thinking, “Why would I pay a copywriter when I can ask ChatGPT to do this?”, I understand the question.

It’s a fair one.

And it raises a bigger question for my industry too:

Will AI replace copywriters?

I don’t think pretending AI can’t write good copy does anyone any favours.

It can.

Sometimes it can write really good copy.

But I think we’ve been focusing too much on the writing part of copywriting.

Because putting words into sentences has never been the whole job.

You’re not really paying me to type words

When I work with a client, I’m listening for the things they don’t necessarily realise are important.

Sometimes it’s an offhand comment halfway through a conversation.

Sometimes they’ll tell me what makes their business different and I’ll think, “Nope, that’s what everyone in your industry says.”

So I keep asking questions.

Then they tell me something else.

And that’s it.

That’s the thing their customer needs to hear.

Finding that takes curiosity, instinct and judgement. It comes from years of interviewing business owners, working across different industries and learning what makes people pay attention.

AI can give me ideas.

But I need to know which idea is worth keeping.

Knowing what to throw out matters too

This might be one of the least glamorous parts of being an experienced copywriter.

I know when copy is technically fine but just… blah.

I know when a sentence sounds clever but says absolutely nothing.

I know when we’ve squeezed a keyword in one too many times, and it needs to leave immediately.

I know when something doesn’t sound like the client.

And yes, I know when something sounds like AI.

That judgement didn’t arrive with an AI writing tool or software subscription. It came from more than 17 years of writing, editing, interviewing, researching, getting feedback, working with SEO teams and writing more words than I could ever begin to count.

AI hasn’t made that experience less useful.

If anything, it’s made it more useful.

The prompt isn’t the magic bit

There’s a lot of talk about writing the perfect AI prompt.

Prompts certainly matter. Give AI a vague instruction, and you’ll probably get a vague answer.

But I don’t think becoming brilliant at prompts suddenly makes someone a brilliant copywriter.

You still need to know:

• Who are you talking to and what do they actually care about?
• What makes this business different?
• What should we lead with, and what doesn’t belong on the page?
• Does the copy actually sound like the person or brand it represents?
• Is it useful? Is it accurate? Does it make someone want to keep reading?

And if SEO is involved, are we giving Google and increasingly AI search systems enough context to understand the page without making the human reader feel like they’ve wandered into a keyword convention?

That’s the thinking behind the writing.

How I use AI for copywriting

So, what does AI and copywriting actually look like for me?

I don’t hand over a client brief, put my feet up and say, “Off you go, Mini Mon Brain. Let me know when you’re done.” Nice try, but that’s not how this works.

And if a client or agency has a no AI policy for a project, I respect it. Full stop.

What I do use AI for is thinking. I’ll bounce around ideas, research something I don’t understand, explore different angles, organise the jumble in my head or ask Mini Mon Brain to look at something another way when my own brain has clocked off early.

Sometimes she comes back with something excellent.

Other times I stare at the screen and think, “Mini Mon Brain, you’ve completely lost the plot.”

But strangely, even the rubbish can be useful. Knowing what I don’t want often helps me work out what I do want, and off we go again.

That’s the bit I think gets lost when people talk about using AI for copywriting. I’m not handing over the thinking. I’m giving myself another way to think things through.

The final decisions are still mine. And so is the responsibility for the work.

What using AI has taught me about being a copywriter

Here’s something I didn’t expect.

Using AI for copywriting has actually made me more confident in what I bring to the table as a copywriter.

When AI first started getting frighteningly good at writing, of course I wondered what that meant for people like me. If anyone can open ChatGPT and produce a perfectly decent webpage in seconds, where does that leave someone who’s spent more than 17 years writing them for a living?

But the more I’ve used AI, the more I’ve realised that being able to write the words was never my biggest skill.

It’s knowing when they’re the right words.

I can tell when something is missing. When an idea needs pushing further. When the obvious angle isn’t actually the most interesting one. When something sounds polished but doesn’t really say anything. And when a piece of copy is technically good but just doesn’t feel right.

That’s probably why Mini Mon Brain and I work so well together. She can throw ideas at me all day long, but I’m the one deciding what stays, what goes and what needs another go around the block.

And weirdly, instead of making me question my value as a copywriter, it’s done the opposite.

It’s reminded me that experience isn’t just about being able to do something.

It’s about knowing why you’re doing it, when it’s working and when it needs to be better.

AI vs human copywriting: maybe it’s not a competition

I understand why some writers want nothing to do with AI.

I also understand why businesses are experimenting with AI copywriting. If there’s a tool sitting there that can produce a first draft in seconds, of course people are going to try it.

I don’t think pretending AI doesn’t exist is particularly useful. And I don’t think handing everything over to it is the answer either.

For me, the interesting bit sits somewhere in the middle.

I bring 17+ years of experience, judgement, curiosity and a pretty good radar for what sounds human and what sounds like… well, AI.

Mini Mon Brain gives me another way to explore ideas, question things and sometimes see something I might have missed.

Put the two together, and I reckon we make a pretty good team.

So, if AI can write your copy, why would you pay me?

Because you’re not paying me just to write words.

You’re paying me to know which words are worth saying in the first place.

And after more than 17 years of doing this, I reckon that’s still worth something.