How to Write a Blog Post with AI: A Step by Step Guide + Free Checklist
How I cut my writing time down by 75% with AI.
“I am just a little frustrated that they sound like AI, and I am worried that someone is going to read it and then think ‘Oh, that is written by AI’ and then stop reading them.”
That is what I expressed to my mentor about my Areté Tallow blog on our last call.
Luckily, she is a copywriter and has experience using AI, so she was able to give me some tips.
After listening to her advice, and learning while writing my last batch of blog posts, I came up with a 10-step plan:
1. Write an outline
I go ahead and write rough drafts of all the headings and subheadings. Then I flesh things out by adding bullet points in each section.
This will help the AI organize your thoughts better. It will also help to make sure your blog has a logical flow.
2. Make sure Chat GPT knows my voice
I do this by copy and pasting around five of my previous non-AI written blog posts and giving it a prompt like: “You are an expert writer. Here are five of my blog posts. I want you to analyze them for style, length, voice, and format. I want you to know my writing voice, so you can help me to write a blog post on X.”
3. Dictate the first draft into Otter AI
One issue I have repeatedly run into when writing with AI is making my posts sound authentic.
By speaking the first draft into Otter AI, it saves me all the time of writing the first draft (what would probably be 45 min is now 5 min), and then I paste that voice transcript into Chat GPT along with the outline.
I then write a prompt like: “Here is my voice transcript and outline for my blog posts on X. I want you to take the voice transcript, make it more concise, and write a blog post using my outline.”
Pro Tip: Claud AI is better than ChatGPT for getting your writing voice correct. (Unfortunately, Claud has a cap on how many prompts you can use on the free version).
4. Refine the post
Usually, at this point, there will be a good blog post, but there will be several tone mistakes.
I then go through and tell Chat GPT the specific things I don’t like (it is ok to be very picky here). I will then repeat this process a few times until I am pleased with it.
Quick tangent—There are two main things that I use ChatGPT for: coding and writing.
When I am coding, I realize how many adjustments to the prompts and refinements I need to use. It is very easy to tell when something worked because the code will either work or not. Writing is more difficult. There is no point where you can 100% say “this works.” You just have to feel it.
I always try to go for more prompts than fewer and lean towards the side of pickiness when it comes to writing.
Pro Tip: One thing I have noticed that makes the blog post sound more authentic is if you force Chat GPT to be very specific or to use the specific story or example from your voice transcript.
5. Compare it to my voice (with stats)
There is a tool called the voice verbatim tool. With this tool, you can put in your previous writing; it will analyze your writing and tell you all sorts of things about your tone, sentiment, average sentence length, etc.
I like this because it gives you some hard stats on your writing, so it’s not as much guesswork (like the coding).
To check if the AI post is similar to your writing style, put the AI post through the Voice Verbatim Tool, and then read the stats. Adjust the post as necessary.
Pro tip: You can use prompts like, “make this post 10% more positive,“ or “add 15% more short sentences.”
6. Manually edit
Take your post and just manually edit anything that doesn’t sound like you, and add any details that ChatGPT may have missed.
7. Put it through an AI checker
At this point, my post mostly scores as 100% human written, but it’s a good step to do anyway.
I have used QuillBot AI checker. The thing about QuillBot is that it checks for four different things:
AI written, AI refined
AI written, human refined
Human written, AI refined
Human written, human refined
It will even give the percentages that each how you post scores in each category.
If your post is coming back as AI written, two things to do are:
1. Make it more specific/add personal experiences
2. Vary your sentence length
8. Read over the post
Read over the post one more time to be sure there are no grammar/spelling errors.
9. Have mom check it
If your mother can’t catch any AI, then you should be good to go!
10. Add photos and schedule
Making a custom infographic is an important point for SEO (search engine optimization). So, if that’s something you are trying to go for, then that is important, but if not, then just add some relevant pictures.
You can learn more about how to create a great infographic from Neil Patel here.
So, there you have it! That is my current process for writing blog posts with AI. Feel free to check out the Areté Tallow’s blog to see how the posts came out!
For the future, here are some things that I plan on implementing:
Keyword checker.
One simple thing I could do to benefit my SEO would be to tell Chat GPT that it is an expert at SEO, and what keywords I am trying to rank for in the blog post. Then I would run it through a keyword checker. ( I’m sure you could probably use ChatGPT for this as well).
I have heard that you are supposed to have your key words appear six times for a thousand words.
Run through a plagiarism checker.
Chat GPT can often make plagiarism mistakes, so especially as a blog grows, it is vital to check your posts manually for any signs of plagiarism.
I hope you found this helpful! Remember, this is the system that works for me, so feel free to play around with it until you find your unique technique.
Do you have any tips for writing with AI? I would love to hear them!
Happy blogging,
Serena Atkinson
P.S. Here is a summarized version of my AI checklist. Feel free to make a copy to your Google Drive and keep it for reference.
