Using AI in My Creative Business

Disclaimer: The following post is my opinions for my business only. In no way am I casting judgement on others who think or do differently.

I have done a lot of thinking about the use of AI, especially in creative businesses. It most definitely has its place in repetitive tasks and data analysis. But where does it fit into a business like mine? And with all of the AI created content out there, how do we know what is actually real?

I’ve spent quite a bit of time playing around with ChatGPT. At first, it’s amazing. It’s nice to have something to bounce ideas off of, to help reign in all of my thoughts, to help with marketing and business planning…. But then, I noticed inconsistencies in its answers, the constant flattery, and how I can now tell when others are creating with the same tool. The language sounds the same. That hit the warning bell for me. I don’t want someone to be scrolling and reading my post, only to say they know that was written by ChatGPT.  It also has real design and dimensional limitations. It might suggest an idea, but when you ask it to sketch it who knows what it will come up with. I ask it to specifically show me an image of one thing, and it does something completely different. 

As a small, creative business, one is required to have knowledge of so many different areas. Not only the art and process, the design, the marketing, the budgeting, social media, writing and editing, photography… The list goes on and on. It’s very enticing to use AI to help fill in the areas that might not be one’s strengths (like writing Instagram captions or website descriptions, planning Instagram posts, editing photos…), but I have realized that it takes the individuality out of the work. We are one person running a business, and it’s acceptable to not be brilliant at everything. It’s okay to be real. 

A friend and I were shopping for books on jewelry repair, We found one that seemed to cover everything we needed, so we ordered it. When it came, it was total garbage. It wasn’t at all what was described in the description, it had no factual information, the table of contents was just plain wrong and didn’t match the books, there were no images. It was absolutely useless. Claiming to be written for the lay person who wants to be able to fix their own jewelry, the only thing it would be good at is to help someone ruin something precious.

Obviously that is an extreme example. But, in my opinion, this is sheer laziness and greed, and not using AI as the tool it could be. But my personal opinion (and I am not trying to be controversial) is that so many of us have fallen into the AI trap because it is easy, and it is less expensive than hiring professional assistance. It’s alluring, for sure. Have someone do my writing for me? Yes, please! And, as I said earlier, there is a time and place that it can be very helpful.

I’ll be completely honest. I love using AI to change sterling silver jewelry into gold. I absolutely love working in gold, but I cannot afford to hold a lot of gold inventory. So, I make the majority of pieces in sterling silver and then use AI to create the 14K gold images so the customer can see what it will look like. This to me has been one of the best uses of AI that I have found for my business.

After much thought and experimentation, I have decided that AI does not have a place in my business (aside from creating those gold images). I know that this decision is not the correct one for everyone, and I completely respect that. There are things I truly struggle with, writing and marketing being two of them. But a core tenant of my work is authenticity, so I want to be sure that I carry that through from start to finish. It might mean that I don’t have the most flowing words or the best Instagram posts, but they will be authentically me.