Mirroring Your Brand Voice: Comprehensive Training for AI Writers

Take your content strategy to new heights with 3 ways of training an AI to reflect your brand's tone of voice.

Written by
Adam Villaume
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April 24, 2024

As an SEO marketer, I'm sure you're no stranger to the evolving world of content creation. With the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, writing AI content has become a game-changer for boosting organic traffic and saving precious time.

But here's the catch - how do you ensure that the AI-generated content aligns perfectly with your brand's tone of voice?

In this blog post, I'll guide you through three ways of writing AI content that not only ranks well in search engines but also speaks directly to your target audience in your unique tone.

Read more: AI SEO Content Generator: How It's Changing the Game for Writers

I'll take you through three ways of training AI to reflect your tone of voice:

  1. A simple three-step prompt that works well
  2. An advanced approach that takes more time but creates better results
  3. An easy, one-click solution that utilizes an SEO tool with a web crawler

Get ready to unlock the power of AI and take your content strategy to new heights!

1. The simple three-step prompt to make AI write like you

For this method, you need access to a generative AI, such as ChatGPT, and a single good piece of content you have written. It should be a text that you are proud of and believe expresses your tone of voice or that of your brand.

Generally, you get better results the longer the text is: More text means more data to work with.

The three step-prompt goes like this:

  1. Open the content generator and type the following: Please define a tone of voice based on the text below.
  2. Copy+paste your selected text into the chat and hit "send". What follows is a description of the tone of voice used in the provided text.
  3. Go through the description and weed out anything that doesn't sound like you or add something you believe is missing. Save the description.
Combined example of the initial prompt and the response from ChatGPT.

Now, you have a description you can add to any prompt to make AI write like you:

Please write a blog post about [topic] in this tone of voice: [Insert description here]

This method often works surprisingly well, but if you are unhappy with the results you might have to try something a little more advanced.

2. The Advanced Approach that Trains AI to Write Like You

When it comes to generative AI, more data is always better. So if you are struggling to make the AI write like you, or your brand, you might want to try feeding it more data.

However, working with an AI through a chat interface such as ChatGPT, there are limits to how much data you can feed it at a time.

That's why you want to prompt the AI correctly so it understands to analyze all of the texts you paste into the chat.

It's the combination of more data and specific prompts that make this method more advanced, but the results are also better and more consistent.

To train an AI like ChatGPT to write like you, follow these step-by-step instructions:

Step 1: Set the scene for your writing style

Start by explaining the purpose of the training and the examples you'll provide. Use the following prompt:

"I'd like your help in creating articles for [purpose]. Your first task will be to understand my writing style based on examples that I give you. After that, we'll create some content. To start, please say GO AHEAD, and I will paste examples of my writing. Keep saying GO AHEAD, and I will paste new examples. When I am done, I will say FINISHED. At this stage, please do not do anything except confirm that you have saved the writing style."

Example of the beginning of the advanced approach to training an AI on tone of voice.

Step 2: Add your writing

Once you have the go-ahead from the AI, copy and paste text from your articles, newsletters, books, or emails into the input box. Choose samples that represent your style, including sentence length, vocabulary, tone, and format.

Paste at least three examples, ideally totaling at least 1000 words and covering different topics within your niche. After pasting the last example, type "finished" to indicate you're done.

Step 3: Name your style

Although optional, it's helpful to name your writing style. Let the AI know your intention by using this prompt:

"Great. Let's call this '[your initials] writing style'. First, can you summarize [your initials] writing style in a few bullet points? Focus on the sentence structure, tone, and voice."

Example of ChatGPT defining a tone of voice from the advanced approach.

Step 4: Ask for what you want

Now that the AI understands your writing style, you can instruct it on what you want it to write. Begin this prompt by saying "thanks" to show politeness - yes, politeness can actually improve the interaction with AI. Then, explain the context and provide clear instructions on the desired output.

For example, if you want to write thought-provoking articles, you can say:

"Every week, I send a thought-provoking article on a different topic. Each one introduces a different way of thinking about a common concept, is three paragraphs long, and ends with a question to the reader. Can you create one of these for me in [initials] writing style? Please use the topic of: [topic you want to write about]."

Include all necessary details and specifications within the prompt.

Step 5: Ask for edits

The initial response from the AI may not be perfect, but it will serve as a first draft. Prompt the AI with:

"Thanks. Please can you make it more [how you want it edited]."

You can ask for specific changes, such as making the text more light-hearted, serious, longer, shorter, or with fewer adverbs.

Give clear direction and provide additional details if necessary by using the prompt: "Include [any additional details]." Iterate this process as needed until you're satisfied with the final result.

The advanced approach works by providing examples and giving clear instructions, which ensure that AI produces content that meets your requirements.

However, it takes some time to complete the process. Finding the necessary content pieces that meet the requirements on quality, tone of voice, and topic variation alone adds even more time to it.

If only there was a way to automate the process of defining your tone of voice.

3. The easy one-click solution that trains an AI on your content

If you don't want to fiddle around with prompts in ChatGPT and feed it content over and over to train the AI yourself, there is an alternative.

Some AI content generators, like SEO.ai, are equipped with web crawlers that can scrape your website for content and analyze it to determine your tone of voice automatically.

The process only takes a moment and provides you with a description of your tone of voice the AI will use going forward to ensure all the generated content sound like you or your brand.

Example from SEO.ai of defining and selecting a tone of voice.

At SEO.ai, it is part of the quick setup when launching a new project:

  1. Paste your company website URL into the domain field
  2. Enter a name for the project and select a language (there are more than 50 to choose from)
  3. Click the "audience" field, and you will get a list of suggestions based on your company's expertise and field of service.
  4. Click the tone of voice field to see a suggestion based on an analysis of the content on your website.
  5. You can then choose the suggested tone of voice or define one yourself.

That's it!

You don't have to spend time going through all your content to find the absolute best or worry about whether the prompts are right, or having to save your tone of voice separately.

With SEO.ai, you only need to supply the website address, and the AI does the rest.

Mirroring Your Brand Voice: Comprehensive Training for AI Writers

This is an article written by:

Adam is an experienced content writer with a background in journalism and a passion for technology.