My Dirty Little Social Media Secret

I hate social media.

I’ll happily admit I’m just as addicted to it as everyone else. I spend way too much time scrolling through various feeds and feeling empty inside, watching the world carry on as a series of posts with tiny glimpses inside other people’s lives.

But as a business owner, I really don’t like the whole “social media strategy” thing. It’s so complicated. It’s so fiddly. It takes a ton of time, and it changes so often I just can’t keep up.

Honestly, I’m terrible at social media promotion.

I try. I take courses and workshops, I follow a lot of experts online, the whole deal. But I feel like the whole thing is throwing spaghetti against the wall to see if it sticks.

Here’s my dirty little social media secret…

This is the one place in my business where I rely heavily on AI to do the work.

Yep, me, who rails against AI regularly. Who loudly proclaims that I write everything in my newsletter (which is still true) and for my clients (also true).

I let AI write my social media posts…mostly.

My Basic Social Media Strategy

I try to post something on social media for my business 6 days a week.

Most of the time I’m pushing people toward the latest issue of the Email Marketing Ecosystem newsletter. I also put out “thought leadership” style posts to show who I am and what I’m thinking.

I post regularly on:

• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Instagram
• Substack

I post somewhat irregularly on Bluesky as well.

Each of these platforms has a different “voice” and feel to them, not to mention character length. This means I need to write my posts to fit the environment.

I was once told that LinkedIn is the social media equivalent of the office water cooler and Facebook (IG didn’t exist at the time, yes, I’m old) is the equivalent of the bar after work.

I try to keep all of my business posts professional, regardless of the platform, but I don’t usually post the exact same text across all platforms. Maybe I’m overcomplicating things. I don’t know. I’m not a social media expert, I’m an email marketing expert.

Instead of trying to write all of these posts in their individual styles myself, I use AI to do it for me.

How I Let AI Write My Social Media Posts…Mostly

As we all know by now, AI, and LLMs specifically, are great at taking a bunch of information and spitting out what they think should be appropriate responses, based on the expertise they are drawing on at any given time.

That’s why so many AI prompts begin with “You are a (fill in the blank) expert.”

I am using this to my advantage.

I have set up voice and brand guides within my chosen AI system, which is currently a platform called Sintra. It offers “helpers” which are agents that are designed to be experts in specific areas.

I use the social media “helper”, cleverly named Soshie, to write all of my social media posts.

I give Soshie the weekly issue of the Email Marketing Ecosystem newsletter, which I write entirely myself, then ask it to give me a certain number of social media posts.

I include images, usually the ones you see in each Email Marketing Ecosystem newsletter. I take most of these pictures myself. Sometimes I find them on Creative Commons photo websites. Occasionally I ask Soshie to create images for me, like I’ve done in this issue.

This is what Soshie looks like. The “helpers” are all adorable and very friendly. I’m sure this is by design.

Once Soshie is done reorganizing my words into social media posts, I review everything it has written and edit, sometimes heavily.

I’ve found that the more specific I am with my instructions, the better job Soshie can do at getting close to what I want.

I also ask Soshie to remember the edits I make each time, so it can continue to get better at my brand voice.

Generally speaking, I’m pretty happy with the output I get. As mentioned, I do edit each post individually before I let it out into the world, but Soshie is getting better and better at “being me.”

Why am I doing this?

I feel like by letting Soshie essentially riff off of my own words, it’s able to turn out engaging social media posts faster and better than I could on my own.

Am I ready to turn my social media campaigns over to the robots?

Heck no!

Soshie has an automatic function that does write social media posts. Nothing goes out without review. This is a standard setting and I approve. I wouldn’t let a human post for me without review until I was confident they really had my voice and brand message dialed in.

I’ve read some of the early posts Soshie created automatically. They were awful. Needless to say, they were all deleted.

Now that I’ve been feeding it more and more information and it has seen my edits, Soshie is getting better. But again, nothing goes out without my personal review and editing.

Aren’t You a Professional Copywriter? Shouldn’t You Be Good at This?

Yes, yes, I should.

But just like you and everyone else on this planet, I can get stuck. Especially when it comes to writing for a medium I’m not great at.

I need help sometimes too. I admit it.

I did the hard part, writing the actual newsletter issue you’re reading right now, as well as all the other ones you’ve read.

I don’t mind letting the robots repurpose what I’ve written.

They have all of that social media knowledge absorbed into their databases and programming. If they can do a better job without me having to spend tons of time on this particular task, I am happy to let them.

I have said many times that many of my Email Writing Accountability Group members use AI to write their emails. I have no problem with this, as long as they edit and refine that content into their own voices and add their personal stamp to it before they hit “Send.”

We all need help in some areas of our lives. For me this is one of those areas.

What About That Whole “Being Human” Thing?

Yes, I regularly talk about being human and supporting humans in this very newsletter. And I still believe in that.

I also regularly say that AI is a tool that can make some parts of our lives better. In this case, I am using that tool to take on a task I don’t like and don’t really want to do.

I am using my own humanity to connect with other humans, through my own words, as remixed by the robots.

I do respond to social media comments myself in most cases. I don’t get that many, so it’s not hard.

I did mention that I’m terrible at this whole social media thing. This is one of many reasons I prefer email marketing.

How Do You Write Your Business Social Media Posts?

You now know my dirty little social media secret. I hope you’ll still enjoy my social media posts out there in the wild, even if you know I had help writing them.

How do you do social media?

Do you write everything yourself?

Do you let the robots write your first drafts, then edit like I do?

Have the robots taken over your social media presence entirely, channeling their inner you?

Please comment below or email me and tell me all about your own social media successes, or trials and tribulations.

I am genuinely curious. Despite the fact that I hate social media, I do try and I am always interested to learn what others are doing, especially if it works well for them. I read every email and I will respond personally.

Finally, thank you to everyone who reached out to offer their condolences on the loss of my cat, Nanner. It’s been a challenging week for me and for my remaining cats. Things are good here, but it still feels weird not to have him with us.

Today’s real photo (taken by me, not generated by Soshie,) is one last picture of Nanner, enjoying being King of the Couch.