Spanish-style roofs

Read time: 3 min 16 sec

Whatup Reader!

Welcome to April!

Let’s get right into it: I'm going to use this email to toot my own horn and also impart a warning.

The Website Messaging Audit that I rolled out in February has been going phenomenally. It is one of the best services I have ever launched, and I truly want to take as many people through it as possible.

One of the things that I do as part of the Website Messaging Audit is what I call copy-consulting. I specifically and intentionally don't call it copywriting because I don't just write the copy out for you and tell you to slap it on your website.

TV gif. Danny Devito as Frank on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia shakes his head very quickly and stares through his glasses with fearful; eyes. He says, “nope…”

My process involves a super-comprehensive intake form followed by a super-chill intake call where I get to hear your voice and understand your vision, and then I sit down on my own time, usually very late at night (you can ask Lex) to audit your website. When I run the audit, I provide suggestions on how to change the copy. I offer guidance and direction, but I don't just flat out write copy for my clients. Why not? Because then it would just sound like me trying to sound like you.

Even if you don't think you're a good writer, you have a voice. You have values. You have views. You have opinions. You have preferences. You have experience. You have expertise. And all of that shapes how you communicate and how you write.

Yes, I will absolutely provide structure and suggestions for the order in which the words get placed on the page, but the actual message, that comes from you, and that is why I don't just copy-write for people; I copy-consult. It is a team effort.

In running these audits, one of the things that I have noticed at an increasing and alarming rate is people's tendency to outsource their writing to AI, be it ChatGPT or Claude or Gemini or whatever your LLM du jour happens to be.

Y'all do not do this. Please for the love do not do this. Not only can everyone tell that AI wrote it, it's just straight up not good.

Writing that is produced by AI reminds me of the homes that I see being built in my neighborhood. Now I am far from being a NIMBY. I don't even know if I can actually be a NIMBY because I don't own the place where we live, but my point is that I'm all for building more housing and building affordable housing. What I'm not for are these whack-ass, farmhouse-style, cookie-cutter behemoths that are going up on every block.

Fam, I live in Southern California. If it doesn't have a Spanish-style roof, I don't want it.

These new builds go up in the neighborhood, and because the developer doesn't have to actually live in said house it automatically gets the good-enough seal of approval. It has walls and windows and doors and a roof (again not a Spanish-style roof), and even though it’s boring AF, the boxes have been checked and it’s ready for a listing price of $1.8 million. (You think I’m joking.) Meanwhile the house looks like it would be named John Smith if it was a person. It's devoid of any kind of personality. It looks the same as everything else. It's algorithmic, formulaic, bland, basic, and there is literally zero substance to it.

That right there is exactly how it sounds, and how it reads, when AI is used to create the copy. It checks the boxes, it has the words, it has the punctuation, and it also has zero personality.

I get it. Not only is it tempting to use AI because it can seemingly get the job done in a fraction of the time, but it also has a bit of that Las Vegas slot machine dopamine hit thing going on, where it's "thinking" of an answer and you're dreaming up all the possibilities it could generate.

Spoiler: what AI generates will never be as good as what you can create.

And no, I'm not saying this as some AI-hating boomer. You all know I fucks with AI. Big time. I've got a whole other website, blog, vlog, newsletter, and podcast that is solely dedicated to AI. But a hill that I’ll die on is that AI is best used to handle the boring, repetitive stuff.

Let it do the copy and pasting for you. Let it format things for you. Let it organize the files for you. Please don't let it write for you.

MOAR Spanish-style roofs.

Happy Tuesday, Reader.

Maestro out.

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