Webinar: ChatGPT, SEO, Ethics & the Legal Industry with John Reed and Allen Watson

December 16, 2022

ChatGPT launched last week to fanfare, bemusement, and shock among the technorati. Join me, and legal content luminaries, John Reed and Allen Watson for a no-holds-barred conversation around ChatGPT.

Perhaps, like me, you didn’t anticipate AI driven content delivering natural language content of the quality (?) and with the speed that ChatGPT delivers. It raises tons of questions – including the ethics of AI driven content, the SEO response from Google and the future of both content marketing efforts and content development, as a whole for the legal industry.

Bring your tough questions… I’m going to ask John and Allen if they see this as an existential threat to their business.

Transcription of the video:

Conrad Saam: [00:00:00] John and Allen are the only two people. That we trust to ever develop content for our clients. And, I can say with a high level of confidence that we’ve spent a lot of money on bad content, right? but not with these two. And so, this has been a trial-and-error experience.
We’re speaking from a theoretical perspective more than an experience perspective, and so I want to get into it. Yeah. So really quickly, John, can you give a very quick 60 seconds elevator overview of Chat, G P T, and how it works?
John Reed: Yeah, it’s, uh, you know, I talked about it with some on my team and we now refer to it internally as hell, 9,000, from Space Odyssey.
You know, uh, it is, I think if I have the history correct, it was designed to be a better chatbot for companies, hence the name Chat, G p t. But the applications for generating [00:01:00] content through. This is what this mechanism is all about. Um, you can ask it questions, you can have it explain something, you can give it certain directions, like include keywords or we’re just talking about finding a reputable source, and I’ll let Allen talk about that.
But it is producing content that, um, that comes pretty close to the touring test. Um, I would say in a scary. Um, uh, I’m more scared for its abuse than I am for its use though, so, yeah.
Conrad Saam: Yeah. And so, you guys have both, you know, I’m assuming, generated a bunch of content, uh, Allen overall feedback, right?
So, I, you know, I, I, you’ve got a good post on this., overall perspective, just a high level of what’s coming out of chat GPT.
Allen Watson: Uh, well, my first thoughts were, do I even need to dig into this? Right? And then when I did my immediate next thoughts were, oh, [00:02:00] shit.
And because it was good, I was not expecting it to respond with well-thought-out content. And I read it and I went, wait a minute. That sounds like stuff that I’ve written, like, that’s scary. Uh, but then I did, you know, I did some digging, you know, and we’ll, we’ll, we’ll get into the post and. You know, it, it does, it’s pretty surface level.
There are a lot of flaws that I think can be overcome. But, uh, initial thoughts are we really have to take this seriously. If we ignore it or put our head in the sand, we’re going to, uh, we’re going to regret it, especially in the business that we’re in. Uh, but also, I want to be at the forefront of understanding it because, well, we’re going to be behind if we don’t.
So that’s my initial thoughts anyway. Okay.,
Conrad Saam: John, your perspective?
John Reed: Uh, I, I don’t, you know, when I looked at it, I was always looking at it, not from today, but down the road.
Conrad Saam: Okay. Um, so, you know, have we landed it down the road already? Are like, are [00:03:00] we already there? Like, I thought this might be something that’s fine, 10 years out, but it feels like to some extent we’ve landed a bit.
John Reed: No, I think things have been accelerated a lot here. Okay. Um, you know, I, little things I did searches as we would do, or basic content we might do for an FAQ, maybe a, a more evergreen type of post. Then I took it, I ran it through Grammarly and there was some, you know, minor stuff, but that’s what we might do to one with one of our writers.
Right. But then I hit the plagiarism check on Grammarly and it came up. Yeah. Zero. It’s not now for. And maybe it’s just what I was asking about. Um, you know, and we’ll talk about Google duplication, spotting, and all that kind of stuff. But, uh, uh, my, my impression is to hate it. Um, my impression is, as Allen said, to understand it and know it, I can pick it apart and say, well, there’s no tone.
There’s no voice, there’s no personality. Right. [00:04:00] Um, but as I, as I say, That I can see where that’s going.
Conrad Saam: So, you mentioned plagiarism, Allen, uh, I know you, you’ve done some, some plagiarism tests also, share your finding.
Allen Watson: You know, uh, so, you know, I, I, I started asking regular prompts that we would normally do if we’re making a, just a basic page, personal injury or whatever.
Uh, you know, one thing I asked was, you know, tell me about car accident compensation, uh, in California. And the answer came back to 33% plagiarism. That’s, that’s quite a bit. And I think that it was 250 words. You know, I asked about giving me moped injuries. I was just throwing things out there. 23% plagiarize. I never, and I still have not gotten anything that’s been less than 15% plagiarized.
Um, now that is workable because you can, I mean, I plagiarize myself all the time because I’ve been doing this for so long. But it’s a lot of work on the back end to have to go back in and, you know, A [00:05:00] lot of inaccurate information. You know, I got, I asked it a question that I knew was going to be a little bit more complicated, uh, is, are there damage kept for, you know, a successful personal injury claim in Michigan?
It gave me a half right answer. Right? It didn’t specify between, you know, the medical malpractice, non-economic damages from regular. So it’s those kinds of things, but it spits out, I think, you know, you quoted this on LinkedIn, it spits out information as if in a really convincing. Do you think it’s real?
And an editor who maybe, or a writer who’s doing this, who doesn’t maybe know the source material is going to miss that and it’s going to end up on a lawyer’s page, and then someone’s going to be in trouble. So, I just don’t know if it’s there yet. You expressed Yeah, we, we, we should, yeah, go ahead.
John Reed: We, should talk about how you can be more specific, whether you want certain keywords included, whether, whether you want to.
Quote or, or cite from a reputable source, that to me, I think is the game changer. That it’s taking directions. It’s not, it’s not [00:06:00] taking, you know, describe premises liability in getting that when you say, and I want it to have slip and fall, or, you know, open and apparent or open and obvious, those types of things and focus on it.
And it’s not doing it in the bad hat keyword wording that we were used to in the past. It’s clean, it’s, it’s readable.
Conrad Saam: [00:00:00] So, Allen, you said this, I thought it was very articulate. I, I ironic, you know, ironically, were articulate with, with exactly what we’re talking about here, but you wrote, uh, Chad, GPT presents incorrect information as if it’s a fact and in a very convincing way.
Right? I think that the question is, can you, oh, can, can you use AI to overcome that incorrect information piece? And I don’t know the answer to it. I, I think the answer at this point is no.
Allen Watson: Not yet, I don’t think, but I think it’s going to figure it out. Um, that’s the thing. And I, you know, just a little while ago asked it, I said, I want a 500-word blog post for a law firm on the topic of how dangerous distracted driving is.
And I want you to use statistics from reputable sources with citations, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t pop out with something that looked good, uh, with sources, uh, at the end still came back, 17% plagiarized. But, uh, and probably more on Copyscape. Grammarly tends to underestimate that. Uh, the, you know, it’s, it’s a scary thing and I, I [00:01:00] just, I want to know how to use it.
I want to figure out if it’s going to, you know, replace writers, which is the ethics part that we’ll talk about. Right. Um, but it’s, it’s, it does, like, as John said, it takes directions and it, and if you don’t like what it spits out, ask, rearrange your question a little bit or say, I need you to add this to that.
It will do it.
Conrad Saam: I had my, one of my experiences, I tried to get it to write, uh, uh, instructions for me to talk to my kids about getting divorced in Wisconsin. Um, using old English Shakespeare, right? And it conflated divorce and old English Shakespeare explaining old English Shakespeare and divorce to my kids in Wisconsin.
Right. So, it, it didn’t get the stylistic piece, but then your kind of. Change how you, you approach that and, it does change its approach. And, and what I, what we learned is asking for a Shakespearean sonnet, it gets, because it understands what a song is. Right? Um, and so those types of things are, are really, really fascinating the way that works. [00:02:00]
You, touched on the ethics of this, right? What? And I am by, I’m a marketer. So, by definition I. Low on the ethical, moral side of things, as a group. But, uh, you know, what are the ethical questions this raises and, and, and how do you, how do you see that evolving?
Allen Watson: Well, I mean, as with any tech, right?
The human element, that’s the thing for me. I have, I really, uh, enjoy the team that we built at Blue Seven. And, you know, the first thought with this, you know, I don’t want to be forced to have to change, and then they’re all the team’s gone. Uh, right. You know, no matter what kind of tech we’re talking about, we must look at the human element of how this affects people instead of looking at it in a cold way, without any regard.
Um, you know, I think, you know, I, I don’t know where we go. Do we come, do we, do we move forward? And say, we don’t need you anymore. Go figure out something else to do. [00:03:00] Do we trust, uh, everything that we’re getting off of this, uh, in the long term? I don’t know. It’s just such a, it’s a philosophical question for me because I don’t know.
I don’t know where we go. Um, John, maybe you got any ideas?
John Reed: Yeah. You know, I, I, um, and, and I don’t think my head in the sand too much. I’ve been accused of worse. When we’re dealing with, in our world, a market of attorneys who have been trained in the written word. Yeah. Um, who, who want that, particularly in, in litigation, want that flare, want that signature voice or whatever, and what they’re writing.
I think you’re going to have too really. Tear that away from a lot of people to be able to accept. I mean, there are people that still don’t use the tools we talked about. Grammar check, spell check, site, check, whatever. They’re still doing it by hand. Right. So, I feel some comfort in that. Um, [00:04:00] but I don’t know what it looks like over a long time.
I, long term I, I would say there are ethics in, there’s ethics. I, I, if I can, I’m going to speak to the legal ethics. Sure. Go. Which is, which is. This isn’t going to stay in marketing content, right? This is, you know, somebody’s going to try. Just like there’s the, you know, there’s, there’s talk right now about some real concern at the high school and college level, you know, And, and about plagiarism that way.
But the biggest concern is for now, you can’t trust that it’s all correct and with legal nuances and right rules and, and, you know, shades of, you know, fault and whatever. I, I, I, I think we’ve got a little bit more runways left. But I, you know, I can’t say it any better than Allen said.
I think we all have a responsibility to our people. Um, and our people, we hire our people because they’re very talented and, and they like adverbs, which is something that Chat CPT isn’t [00:05:00] really doing yet. Right. So, and
Allen Watson: you know, that, it, it, the nuance. I have a, I had a client, um, I think, well he’s, I think he’s in the, in the attendees now.
You know, there’s a very particular way that they, like posts done and there’s zero chance that chap G p t would have, would be able to do that. I know for sure that they’re going to need a human writer, you know, always, um, it’s, you can’t pull out current information and current laws yet that, that, as I pointed out in the post, people really underestimate what it will take to have this program run real-time with data connected to the internet.
We do not have that computing power, and we will not have that for quite a while. But it, it can’t, it’s, and that’s a metaverse kind of thing, and the computing power just isn’t there. And it’s, we’re, we’re. decade or more away from even coming close to it being all-encompassing. It’s just reading from 2021 backward right now.
Right. Uh, so this, that, that is a that’s a big thing. Uh, but [00:06:00] this, this can be a good tool. If I wanted to come up with topics for H two s in a post and I asked it, what are, you know, this is such a good tool to use for that, because I don’t need to worry about inaccurate information. I just need headings. I asked it to come up with.
Uh, Tim’s blog post for a divorce law firm to see what it would do. It gave me, eh, then I said, get more creative with it. I, I mean, the immediate thing, I asked it and it, I’ll be damned if it didn’t give me some, just some good topics to write about that I haven’t thought about. Well, I’m sitting here racking my brain for hours at a time, thinking of a content strategy.
It can do it for you. That part I think is fine. No ethical problems whatsoever, and you get to keep all your human. So that’s the, yeah, cater to the content assistant. That’s,
John Reed: I’d call it a content assistant. You know, we say virtual assistant, it’s, but it’s a content assistant. And, in that view, I think, as Ellen said, I’m comfortable with it.
I, I love it.
Conrad Saam: Do you envision work like working with your people to use this as a tool to make what they’re delivering better? Is that what you’re saying? [00:07:00]
Allen Watson: I would, uh, and we’ll, we’ll, we’ll talk about it, but also, I really worry about like, it’s going to get too easy and well, it just will have to be a deep conversation we have with our team, uh, to copy and paste that over.
If it looks good, then I can use it, right? But I don’t know at what point Google’s going to come along and be able to read the fingerprints of this type of content. And then suddenly, we have spent a year. Populating attorney websites with Yeah, AI-assisted, or AI content. And then bam, a new update comes out.
And then, what happens to your website then? So, are you going to take a chance right now and then go all AI when in the future you’re going to be screwed? And you know this, I thought about this a little while ago. Uh, if AI is just making more AI content, then AI is going to keep borrowing from ai. It becomes like a self-fulfilling prophecy, but All it’s going to take is one person to go, you know what, we’re going to step out of this.
I’m going to be a human writer again. And then suddenly that human writers ranked better than AI content again. So, I think I really, once you start digging and looking, [00:08:00] it’s exciting. It’s nice for law firms to think, I don’t have to have a content team anymore. I can just do this.
But I think if you start looking at, if we don’t talk to them about why, without it sounding like we’re self-serving, uh, they’re going to be a problem down the road. There’s just a lot to think about.
Conrad Saam: So, I, I, I am familiar with this, but I’ll ask the question so it’s not Conrad talking. Can you talk about Google’s perspective, either of you on Google’s perspective, on AI-generated content, and have either of you gone deep on what this means for today’s SEO content development world?
Yeah. All right. So let me, let me read this. Sorry. Go ahead.
Allen Watson: Yeah. You know, obviously, I have, they, they’ve mentioned it. Google has talked about it, but I don’t know what movement there, they’re making. Surely, they’re brainstorming right now. I’m,
Conrad Saam: Yeah, so this, this was a, a statement that came out from Mueller on, uh, April 6th of this year.
So, I think they had a little bit of pride in this. Um, this is very much, again, Google’s spam [00:09:00] guidelines, and I’ll, and I’ll read it for you. Uh, this is small talk about Google’s positions for us, these would essentially still fall into the category of automatically generated content, which is something we’ve had in the webmaster guidelines since almost the beginning, and people have been automatically generating content in lots of different ways.
And for us, if you’re using a machine learning tool to generate your content, it’s essentially the same as if you’re just stuffing. Shuffling words around or looking up synonyms or doing the translation tricks that people used to do, that kind of thing. My suspicions, maybe the quality of content is a little bit better than the old-school tools, but for us, it’s still automatically generated content.
And that means for us, it’s still against webmaster guidelines. We would consider that to be spam. Um, my counterpoint on that is like some of the stuff on law firm websites is pretty garbage, right? It is. And, and I, and my, my cynical perspective is, uh, this actually might be a better experience given some of the stuff that’s on law firm web.
I hate to say that, but like,
Allen Watson: oh, we just did a post on bad [00:10:00] and we literally titled a bad law firm content. So, I guess we’ll rank for that keyword somewhere, which I don’t know if that says a good or bad thing, but, um, this does much better than some of the stuff that we found and put out as examples.
But also, they were probably using some older form of ai. Uh, a non-native speaker and didn’t edit it. Um, but I, you know, this again, as someone who’s been doing this a while, I really could find use with this tool. I’m excited about it. You know, at the end of my post I said, look, if we run from this, it’s just not, it’s not going to work out.
Like it’s not going to work out. Uh, we got to figure out how to use this as another tool, uh, to improve the posts that we do. Uh, I think, I think, I think it’s a good thing. Um, but we must just know how to.
Conrad Saam: There’s a comment from David Murkowski here. Uh, Chad. G p t looks. I look at it like Photoshop. It’s a tool, but just as we would never give a writer an assignment and not review it.
I think the same hold truths here, um, secondary and I appreciate the plot. It’s here. Connor made a great [00:11:00] point on, uh, lunch, our legal marketing the other day. For those of us who think AI is junk, how does it compare to much of the junk that is already out there, right? And there is a lot of junk already out.
Here’s a question from Mr. Romano out of Portland, Oregon. Isn’t this just a modern or updated version of spun content, which has all been prohibited by Google? Do you guys agree with that?
Allen Watson: I mean, it is, but it’s, it’s thinking right? That’s the scary part. Can it think itself, out of, the fingerprints of the algorithm to detect it? Right. Uh, I, this is just so, it, it, it’s hard to even describe how much more advanced this is than what has come before it. So, we, Google probably over there panicking, going, oh shit.
Um, this is better than we thought. So, we must figure out how to either let it be, which they’re not. They’re going to find some way. To detect it. What they do [00:12:00] with that, that’s up in the air. Right. But yeah. Yeah. It can be spam content, but eventually, it’s going to spin itself. I think it will eventually spin itself into non-existence if we don’t figure out how to use it.
John Reed: John. No. You know, it’s the old joke that everything that can be written has already been written. Right. Um, what if this is writing? What’s been written better? Um, yeah. Yeah. So, I, yeah, it’s, it’s, uh, it’s love. It’s like I said, it’s love hate, you know, love to hate it, hate to love it.
Allen Watson: Um, you really, if you want to get really puzzled, you, um, copy a post that you, whoever, anybody in the comments, take something you’ve done recently and copies it in there and asks it to write it better and see what happens.
Uh, you’re either going to cry or you’re going to go, oh, I’m fine. If you’re crying, then you should maybe revaluate how you’re writing content and use it to improve, uh, Uh, you know, again, and if you’re [00:13:00] not using a plagiarism checker and you think you’re going to get away with copy and paste and, uh, this stuff, it’s just not there yet.
So be aware of that. Um, and even if you do get yourself and edit yourself to a, like a 10% or less plagiarism, keep in mind if Google comes around and detects those fingerprints eventually and decides to knock the website down, there’s going to be a lot of hurt law firms and somewhere they’re going to complain.
Conrad Saam: Um, one of the things that I have heard, so actually let me ask you a question before this. When, when you’re talking plagiarism checker, is that a that there is no, um, like it is a, it is a direct, direct cut and paste. Right. On plagiarism.
Allen Watson: It’s usually, well, a lot of times its similar content, but I’m getting if I asked it about distracted driving Yeah.
Uh, it’s going to be it, I had some stuff come back from other law firms. Yeah. From state. Um, Driving handbooks? Uh, I mean, because it is, it does, I mean, it’s drawing from all [00:14:00] these sources and it’ll, if you tell it a simple prompt, it’s going to just copy and paste these and amalgamate them into an Okay. An answer for you.
Conrad Saam: Okay. Okay. Um, one of the things, the questions that I had was, does this, do you see a change in consumer behavior? Like I, we’ve spent a lot of time talking about the long tail and content for a long. This can generate uniqueness to an individual. A, a request. I did, I did the other day. Again, I’m doing this divorce in Wisconsin theme, uh, I’m, I’m getting a divorce in Wisconsin.
I need, some guidelines to talk to my children about that. One of my kids has autism. Um, what are the laws, and can you make this specific to the laws in Wisconsin? Right. No one’s going to be writing. I, I mean that long tail, I’ve always kind of mocked the long tail, but like, do we come to a point where us.
This is a replacement for search where I’m getting personalized. Like, like we, we work in this paradigm right now where like the search engines are [00:15:00] going to take me to the content that’s useful to me. What if the engine is generating content that is useful for me? Right. Do you see that shift at all?
Allen Watson: Yeah. It’s something I think you ask it. I have to, you know, think a little bit more about that because yeah. Uh, it, what, what are they getting at? Yeah, they’re getting their answer. I guess now, if a, if a, if a law firm writes a post like that, their goal is to, hey, let’s help you answer this. Also, we want your business, right?
Uh, so how do we, what’s the next step though, that person does, would you need, if you’re looking for all that information, does that help you? Does it, it gives you the answer you need. Um, but what’s the next step right for you, uh, and how are you going to eventually find a law firm you need? You know, I’m just thinking about what, what happens if this does if this were to replace, you know, search altogether.
I just, I don’t know how we, I don’t know how we get there, because then how do we find the things we need? Yeah. You know, I don’t know.
John Reed: You know, I, I, [00:16:00] uh, I’m back to the human element. Okay. Um, and that is, I’m going to speak directly to what Alan said when it comes to choosing an attorney, it’s not going to be what you.
You’re still going to have a need to see that attorney in video or, you know, see her, uh, giving a presentation or photos on social media when she’s out in the community or something like that. I mean, that stuff still works and it’s gonna work, and, and there’s that. I, I don’t, I don’t think all, well, I think every decision anyone makes has some element of emotion in it, and I think hiring an attorney is, you know, off the charts.
So, there’s that. I think there, there’s something, it’s funny, we talked about asking a question. I, I posed a question, what impact will this new law have on whatever? And it kicked back and said, I can’t answer that. So, I think we’re still in the right about what, right? About whom, right, about when. But the why and the how aren’t there [00:17:00] yet.
Um, and that, those are, those are the determinant factors in any decision, right? So, yeah. Okay. Let me, uh,
Conrad Saam: let me pull from the audience here. This is from Ashley. Um, from a legal writing perspective, what do you think are the chances that AI could accurately pull and apply applicable law statutes and case laws, terminology for the same concepts, and changes between states and even localities?
It seems like AI would have to get a lot further to accurately source legal content. What do you guys?
John Reed: Well, considering I spent three years being taught to say it depends. I mean, that’s the lawyer’s answer for everything until, until I pose a particular question to, Chad g p t and it comes back with, it depends.
I’m not going to trust it. Um, as a matter of fact, ethically, I’d be very uncomfortable if a prospective client would read something and. Oh yes, [00:18:00] that’s exactly right. I’m going to, I’m going to do it this way without just, just taking it as gospel. It’s, it’s dangerous, Allen,
Allen Watson: you know, and it’s, well, I mean, I think Ashley is, is, is pulling up some good points because if we even have something, even something more than a little bit deeper than a surface level post that we want to make for a law firm.
Um, we. I would spend more time trying to get the correct answer out of chat G B T than I would be doing it myself and putting the page together. Because if I’d have to check everything it said just for accuracy. Whereas if I’m doing the research and I write it down, I know it’s accurate because I just did the research.
Right. Right. So, you know, this is, I. I can always, I mean, I can get quicker with it. I’m sure. I’m sure it will get better as time goes on. I just, it’s not there and I would not be comfortable doing something more than a, you know, most common injuries that occur in a car accident page. Uh, right, because [00:19:00] it’s, again, yeah, it’s ethical Question again, more ethics to this,
John Reed: but let, let me ask you this. I mean, we’ve, we’ve been talking, I think someone in generalities. It’s an evergreen content tool to be. It’s not yet a thought leadership tool. Right. That would be my, my, I would submit that proposition for discussion at that point. This point.
Allen Watson: Yeah. Um, I just must laugh at, uh, the question in the chat.
I’ll post,
Conrad Saam: we’re all because we, we brought this up at the beginning and we, we should have, we meant to kind of humorously address it at the beginning. Dan, you are not qualified to be on this panel because although you are a middle-aged white dude, you are not as bad as me, Allen and John. So, this is,
Allen Watson: I’ll, I’ll just cover it up now.
We’re here. I’ll, I’ll join you. We’re.
John, now it’s John. Sorry, y’all. Um,
Conrad Saam: this is a strange, uh, [00:20:00] white bald men talk about chat. G p t. Um,
Allen Watson: we got to, we got to, maybe we’ll expand the panel out next time and do the bit more vetting.
John Reed: What’s the thing? Grass doesn’t grow where something happens.
Conrad Saam: Uh oh, I don’t know. I’m sure chat EPT could answer that for us.
Okay. But Dan did have a question. I want to, I want to post every. Two questions. First, can you type in, uh, what do the best insert legal practice area firms in Seattle and chat? We’ll list 10 firms one to 10. How did we get to the top of that list? That is a great question. I have not run that.
Allen Watson: Um, I haven’t, but it’s going to pull from Google rankings, which is, it’ll we’re back.
Conrad Saam: I wonder, I wonder what it would pull from you. You, I’m John, and you have this open. You’re running it right now? Yeah. All right. Figure that out and we’ll, we’ll come back to this question. Um, next que, and this is more of a comment, D for Kowski, patients are using Google to diagnose themselves and bring it to their doctors.
Right now, that is one of the most annoying things for doctors to deal with. The [00:21:00] self-diagnosed, uh, you know, Google says, I have blah, blah, blah. And I think it’s an interesting metaphor where that does not work for most doctors. Right. Um, it, it, it’s, it, it’s, it’s a pandemic. And you guys got in, in legal too, right?
Um, you know, I, I’ve got this, I’ve got that. What, what’s your take on kind of that, the o does this help over-inform or inaccurately inform the prospective customer?
Allen Watson: That’s John because he’s the attorney. So John punted it. Yeah. Um,
John Reed: I, I may have a contrary view here on this one. I, uh, I like to assume the intelligence of the public and, um, and so that’s why I’ve always hated condescending content. Okay. You know that that, that where you’re the holier than thou [00:22:00] lawyer. Yeah. You know, don’t think that anyone understand it. As a matter of fact, legal ethics are written very paternally.
You know, like we must protect the public against us lawyers, right? Yep. Um, so, so I don’t have a problem with educating the client. Clients aren’t difficult because they have information. Clients are difficult because they have wrong expectations. Yeah. And that’s, you know, that’s, that’s not a content issue.
So, I see it a little bit differently. Okay. Would you like me to answer the question by the way, of what comes up on the search?
Conrad Saam: Yeah. Yeah. What comes up when, when you search for what did, what did you look for? And then share the results and, ideally where they came from.
John Reed: Uh, question, what are the best personal injury law firms in Seattle?
Uh, there are many personal injury law firms in Seattle that may be able to assist you, blah, blah, blah. Number one. Hardwick and Pendergast. All right. Number two, Phillips Law Firm. Number three, max Meyer Law, [00:23:00] P L L C. For Craig Swap and Associates, it’s important to keep in mind, da, da, da, da, da. But hold up four names.
Conrad Saam: That’s fascinating. That is fascinating. Uh, again, I’m glad you asked that question. It’s not something I’d ever thought through, but, you know, nor did I, does AI-driven content start replacing the directories. Right. Um, fascinating. Okay. Uh, Romano has another question, Michael. Michael always wins the number of the maximum number of questions per quarter, uh, that I’d give on webinars.
So, uh, you’re still well ahead, Michael. Uh, won’t the real power of the software be set up properly? The software could teach, search, consult, take search, consult data or AdWords data into account to constantly and automatically rewrite content that ranks, okay. That’s an SEO question. Um, I have, I have a bias on the answer on this, but can, can, could you let me rephrase this to both of you?
Could you hook [00:24:00] chat g p t into a search console data or a data feed coming out of Google to constantly write and then optimize for ranking?
Allen Watson: So, what happens then after a year where it’s coming back on itself? I like it, I feel like progress stops then. Like that’s, that’s my thinking of it. I mean, that’s just the, my initial reaction to that is it will automatically rewrite content that ranks, and then eventually it’s going to pull its own ranking content.
So then where are we at? So, I don’t know, I don’t, you know, there’s no human input. W would we, does it take over? Does it start to think, uh, I don’t know.
Conrad Saam: My, take on that from an SEO perspective is there are so many other variables beyond the content that actually impact rankings, that it would be difficult to do that.
I don’t know that it’s impossible, but I was thinking about it, and I don’t know if either of you two has thought about this. Um, one of my questions for you guys was, can you see [00:25:00] a chat G p t written? So, Google doesn’t like it from an SEO perspective. Okay, so No, no. Absolute no., but what if you had no index landing pages for advertising that you were using chat t p t to generate content that is going to maximize a conversion rate off of an ad destination page or landing page?
Right. Can you guys see that happening? Because that does not fall foul of Google’s guidelines and you know this, or, or do we find that when you run that test? The human, human side of it always outperforms because it’s just a thinly rewritten Wikipedia piece.
John Reed: Uh, I will say that, uh, I went to law school to avoid all things math and science related, so I rely on the fine, fine folks at Mockingbird Marketing for all SEO questions.
Allen Watson: You know, I mean, yes, the answer is, John answered that perfectly. So, this is why I write your content, Conrad. Uh, you do the SEOs.
Conrad Saam: All right. [00:26:00] All right. Interesting. So, so my take is if you can avoid the SEO side of this, right, the SEO downside, and it’s a very, it’s not, that’s not a small downside. Um, there may be places outside of it, you know, so one of the things, and John, you’re the lawyer here, so I’ll post this to you.
Do lawyers start writing briefs with this? Do like what, how does this take over the, you know, I live in the marketing world and then I stop once someone’s starting to a client. How does this change or does this change what’s happening? Uh, for the rest of, you know, I’m so focused on SEO, what happens to the rest of the world, right?
And that the lawyer lives in where, where content is, is written on the regular.
John Reed: Yeah. I, I think, um, there’s too much professional. Um, not only because the work product has to be your own, but it’s also your own thought. It’s, it’s, it’s the vanity and the ego involved with that too. Right? Um, but if, particularly when we’re talking about [00:27:00] litigation, if you have a tech-savvy judge or just a judge that really pays attention to the written word, And the quality of your work somehow turns that judge offer gets you a reprimand in court.
That’s it. It’s never going to happen. And so, right. I think there’ll be attorneys that just say, I’m not going to take the risk. I, I’ve been doing it fine for all these years. Right. And I’ve got people that do it, and I hear all of the, you know, the SEO concerns and the, um, you. Google faecal roster problems.
You get you, you know, if you’re going to have duplicate content and stuff like that, I’m just not going to take the risk. Right.
Allen Watson: We don’t know where this is going to go legislatively either. Um, I mean, lawmakers are always a decade behind on everything for the most part. Maybe getting a little quicker now, but, um, when we get into privacy issues and legal issues and legislate, what are the courts going to say about this?
That when [00:28:00] lawsuits come up, what. The law’s going to do. Do we want to start putting all our time and energy into replacing writers and perfecting this to have it all get smacked down at some point? It’s the same thing with the algorithm with Google detecting this. I don’t know if I want to start doing it, I would be, I mean, I would be terrified to start handing over to clients.
AI-generated. To have their site destroyed six months later because Google has gone. No. Right. You know, and that I’m not going to do it. Uh, that’s why we’re going to have to do some serious training with our writers about why maybe that shouldn’t happen. So well,
Conrad Saam: okay. So that, that’s a great segue into where I want to go, and we can wrap up on this.
You said to train your writers. What, what’s the future? How are you guys individually looking at this thing? Someone, someone mentioned it’s a, it’s a content assistant, right? An interesting perspective., how are you guys looking at this thing impacting the way you deliver the product, to clients? Or is the answer [00:29:00] we’re going to wait and see if this explodes, right?
John Reed: Yeah, I think we’re, we’re, we’re at the beginning of this process. Uh, I’ll give you some thoughts though. Yeah. Um, Hey, if I’m Stu. About where to come in on, you know, uh, a post or, or I’ve got thoughts about how I want to make it a thought leadership piece, but I could use some basic material. I think it’s great.
Right? I appreciate Allen’s information about using it more technically for H two s and, and things like that. Um, so I, I, I would and will tell me. You know, use it as a noodling tool, a brainstorming tool, or a writer’s block tool. Right. Um, uh, but do not cut and paste. Um, uh, we can’t take that risk.
Right? And, and, and we get paid to [00:30:00] find the voice, the tone, the personality of the firm if it’s a practice page. But if it’s the. As a blog post and, I, I, this doesn’t do this yet, so
Allen Watson: Okay. Must be a tool. It’ll have to be a tool because I can’t tell them not to use it because it does a lot of good things and I’m going to use it because, you know, when I run plagiarism checkers, sometimes it comes back with myself from something I wrote two years ago.
Um, because I. You know, this, or, you know, last week, last week was hell on, on the team because we had so many topics on the exact, so many pages on the exact same topic, just different cities. So, when that happens a lot, that’s fine. That’s where your nuance, this is where the nuance as a writer comes in that we always talk about.
Uh, yeah. It’s going to be hard for you to write five truck accident pages for this area, in Washington. Uh, In one week [00:31:00] because Right. You must be careful and, but if I ask it to generate H two s for me, uh, and say, okay, now I need more, now I need more. If that can really help, it can really break that monotony.
And I really, I think it, this is going to be a helpful tool that’s just, you know, we’re not there to have it Right pages.
Conrad Saam: Okay. Anything else you guys want to talk through? Is anything else on your mind? And if anyone else, has any other questions, please throw them in, but anything you guys want to add.
Allen Watson: I’m good on mine. I mean, I just, I must go update my post now because I must, uh, you know, it must, it can, it can do links, you know. It can, can tell you if you ask it to give you reputable sources, it will. Right. So, this is just, we’re all learning this as we go. That’s why it’s so fascinating everybody that’s attending this now as on the same exact page that we are, you know, we’re, we’re figuring this out.
Conrad Saam: Do you have any insight on how it, you, you said reputable sources, and I’ve noticed when I’ve asked it [00:32:00] to pull citations, it’ll, it’ll frequently, it almost always hits Wikipedia, right? So, my kids and their teachers have disagreements over whether Wikipedia is a reputable source. But like, do, either of you have any insight on how it determines reputable sources?
Like, I mean, that’s a, that I, I, I automatically default to links because I’m an SEO by, by training. Yeah. Do you have a different perspective on that? You know, is it, is it running trust checks or something like that as a proxy, for what reputable sources mean? Because there’s a lot of crap on the internet and it could be pulling from, here’s the thing that, the real challenge for me is exactly what you got into here.
There’s so much bad crap on the internet. How does it ascertain that? Like, I’ll use Wikipedia again as an example. The stuff on Wikipedia is pretty accurate by and large. Right? Um, how does it?
Allen Watson: You know, when I’ve, I asked to write that 500-word page, um, yeah, it, it popped up, you know, N H [00:33:00] T S A C D C, University of Utah, and it gave me the link so I can go verify that.
Um, if it popped up with Wikipedia, I’d have to, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t use it. Um, but I’m not, there are some things I’m not going to use. I’m one of them, I’m not going to have it. Say Nolo. It did. It’s been pulling up a lot of fine law or Nolo stuff and you know, obviously, I’m not using that. You know, all that’s a good starting point too, which also I also, I’ll look at Wikipedia for something.
They have, they, they source them, they add citations in there. Maybe it’s pulling from that. Um, but, um, yeah, I don’t know. Uh, and I think it’s learning from us. It’s going get better and you know, it’s going to learn what we want it to do. That’s why we got to stay. Interesting.
John Reed: So, counter, I’ll tell you while animal talking, I typed in discuss legal marketing referencing John Reed of Rain bdm.
Okay. So, it introduces me as the founder of Rain b dm, a digital marketing agency. We’re not, some of the services that RAIN offers to legal clients include a search [00:34:00] engine. Optimization website design development. We don’t. Um, so I, I’d love to be flattered, you know, but it’s wrong. And it just, it, it proves, it proves, it proves the supposition, you know,
Conrad Saam: it proves exactly what Allen saying. It, writes wrong information in very, with, with, with a level of believability.
John Reed: Oh, no, I sound great. I mean, I’m quite accomplished.
Conrad Saam: Yeah. Yeah. Hair equivalent of us all. Uh, great hair right now. Um, all right. Well thank you, thank both of you for joining. Um, you two were the first pe uh, when, the first time I saw this at, we were at a friend’s house where actually we were watching the Michigan game and we, we got very side-tracked on, on this thing.
And you two were the first people I thought of. Like, I can’t wait to hear what you guys are thinking about this. We have another question. Oh, thank David. You’re, you’re more than welcome. Um, yeah, and I’ll, I’ll pass that on. The con comment was thoughtful conversation. Jens, thank you so much. Yeah. Thank, thank both of you, [00:35:00] um, for your insight on this.

Location: Zoom

Date: December 16, 2022

Time: 11:00 am - 12:00 am PDT

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