As the top Plumber Marketing Agency in the U.S, plumbing companies often ask us about AI content and its effectiveness in ranking websites. Google’s August 2022 Helpful Content Update warns explicitly against using AI-generated content. Furthermore, a subsequent October Spam update seemed to target AI-generated content further.
Despite these warnings and apparent algorithmic follow-throughs, Google’s Danny Sullivan pushed back against the notion that AI-generated content is precisely the problem.
At Plumbing Webmasters, we believe in producing the highest-quality human-generated content for our clients. As a result, we recommend not using AI content generation tools for your plumbing company website.
While there are measures you can take to refine AI-generated content to deliver your message adequately, it’s unlikely to reach the quality level of content produced entirely by humans.
Table of Contents
What is “AI” Content?
AI content is text generated through content automation tools like Jasper. AI. There are several other tools similar to Jasper which range from horrible quality to mediocre quality. These tools produce text through natural language processing (NLP) and natural language generation (NLG).
Why Plumbers Use AI Content
Some plumbers utilize AI content tools to expedite their content generation process. For example, using a tool like Jasper, plumbing companies can create dozens of website pages in half the time it would take to handwrite them.
The Danger of AI Content Generation for Plumbers
The introduction notes that sites using AI content have been targeted in recent Google algorithm updates. While some industry experts believe this to be a correlation, not equaling causation, there’s enough anecdotal evidence to make plumbers think twice before utilizing these tools.
Losing rankings on your plumbing website can decrease organic traffic, resulting in a loss of lead volume. The goal of organic SEO is to maintain sustainable rankings and drive consistent streams of traffic to your website. As a result, it’s better to invest in handwritten plumbing content written by industry experts.
How to Detect AI-Generated Content
If you suspect your marketing agency is using AI-generated content on your company website, try testing the content with tools like GPT-2 output detector or AI Content Detector. Be cognizant that these tools are not 100% accurate and may occasionally produce false positives or negatives.
Still, they can give you a general idea of whether your website content was produced with AI-generation tools.
Handwritten content from industry experts should outperform AI-generated content 100% of the time.
Unique Content Alternatives for Plumbing Companies
While AI-generated content is terrible, the traditional and stale way of producing plumbing content also falls short. Unfortunately, the latest algorithm updates still hit websites using handwritten content if their text sounded generic, uninspired, and regurgitated.
DataPins
Google values unique content that offers insights that only you can provide. As a plumbing professional, proof of work is the best way to showcase your unique expertise. The DataPins tool allows you to create pins for each completed job. Pins come with geo-coordinates, images, captions, schema markup, and auto-publish to the corresponding page.
Research / Studies
One thing AI cannot produce is original data. For example, suppose you create content assets with data about anything related to the plumbing industry. In that case, you are sure to stand out from competitors. Furthermore, these content assets often receive the most natural links from other websites, strengthening your domain authority.
Final Thoughts on AI-Generated Content for Plumbers
AI content for plumbers is probably a bad idea in 2023. Recent algorithms have warned against using AI content on your website, and subsequent studies have found a measurable correlation.
While some in the industry push back against the notion that AI is driving these traffic drops, there’s enough evidence to dissuade business-minded plumbers from relying on AI content-generation tools.
Still, ditching AI software is insufficient to ensure high-quality content for your plumbing company website. You still must focus on original and unique content that produces insightful value for your target consumers. Examples of this include using DataPins and creating data-driven content assets that reveal unique insights about your industry.
