How to Keep Producing Authentic Content while Scaling Your Company

Scaling your company does NOT mean you suddenly have to hire someone to start posting for you every day.

Have you ever found someone on YouTube for the first time and just binge-watched their content for the next few days straight? Yeah, me too. When you find a content creator you’re interested in and then discover they have a whole library of interesting, amazing, quality content waiting for you to discover… it’s actually kind of like Christmas.

If you have an online presence, it’s because your clients crave your content. Think of the content you produce for your audience as their “diet.” That diet can be a nutritious variety of authentic content that keeps them fueled up to take on the world, or it can be generic, junk food content that leaves them feeling lethargic and gross. If you want to build a strong, healthy audience, make sure you’re feeling them the content they’re actually craving while keeping things healthy and sustainable for the long term.

So what happens when you go from posting high level content once every few days to having someone else post generic, recycled stuff for you daily? You lose your binge-ability.

As your business scales, you might be finding yourself feeling overwhelmed to the point that you just can’t find time to produce the same level of content that you built your audience with. The struggling to maintain a certain level of content production can tempt you to rely on generative AI or delegate content creation. But is that the right approach? In this article, we’re diving into ways to keep your content authentic and binge-able without burning out. 

1. Start voice recording your thoughts as they happen.

If you’re a thought leader (or want to be), then your thoughts actually need to come from you. You don’t need to handle the entire content process yourself, but you still need to be a part of it. Sending your team effective notes that they can translate into a fully finished content piece helps fill the gap. 

2. Hire a ghostwriter.

A good ghostwriter can help you produce the level of high quality content you’re looking to create. The best ghostwriters serve as your partner rather than your subordinate. They work with you to craft content that truly fits your style, voice, and brand. Look for ghostwriters specific to your niche and have a knowledge base that matches your industry for a winning combination.

3. Schedule more time to create in the medium you find the most fun.

If you hate writing, make videos instead. If getting on camera sucks, start a podcast. Hate talking? Write instead. Whatever medium you find the most fulfilling, make time for that. Content creation shouldn’t be stressful, so stop making it stressful. Focus on getting into a flow that lets you create in the medium you most prefer, then send that content on to a team who can translate into other mediums for you.

4. Use Generative AI programs in a thoughtful way.

Yes, ChatGPT can write you a blog, but it can’t read your mind. It also probably doesn’t actually sound like you either. If you’re going to use Generative AI programs, you need to make sure you’re using it in a way that supports your creative process rather than undermining it. How do you do that?

• Help it learn your voice. If you’ve ever thought, “that sounds like it was written by a robot,” and it was published in 2023, there’s a good chance you’re right. The default voice for most Gen AI programs is an amalgamation of the way all content written within a certain language sounds. That means those programs end up sounding incredibly generic, even if they can produce well-written content. You can ask these programs to quiz you on your brand before you start writing, or feed them samples of your work, to help them get a little closer to your voice.
• Edit judiciously. Don’t use what these programs spit out in their raw form. Make sure you’re aligning what they produce with what you actually wanted to say. Full disclosure: I initially tried to have ChatGPT expand on this blog post for me by feeding it a half-written version I’d drafted in a hurry. I ended up only using two sentences from what it created. The rest just wasn’t up to my standards for my content. Keeping my content valuable and authentic is more important for long term growth.
• Take advantage of having a second “writer” to bounce ideas off of. One of the big advantages Gen AI programs offer is their ability to stage a conversation around your content. It can be hard to write in a bubble, especially if you’re dealing with burnout or writer’s block. I only expect Gen AI programs to produce small chunks of usable writing for me. The bigger value is their ability to generate a whole bunch of “bad” ideas. These “bad” ideas help me narrow my own focus and get closer to the heart of what I truly want to say.

Remember: Scaling your company does not mean sacrificing content quality by resorting to generic, recycled posts churned out on a daily basis. Your clients crave your unique perspective and insightful content. Straying from your authentic voice risks diluting your brand and losing the binge-ability factor that drew your audience in the first place. Preserving your authentic voice and providing valuable, binge-worthy content is key to sustaining a thriving audience.