When it comes to AI, the fear of missing out is palpable. As generative AI tools like ChatGPT shattered tech adoption records in 2023, digital agencies were quick to jump on board. Yet, many agencies are only beginning to explore the vast potential AI offers.
While content generation is an incredibly powerful use case, it has quickly become table stakes.
Our recent survey of 200 agency owners revealed that in 2024, three of the top 5 areas of AI investment focused on content, specifically in content strategy (40%), content editing (29%), and content writing (26%).
To be true leaders, agencies must go beyond leveraging AI solely for content creation tasks. Below, I outline five effective strategies agencies can use to leverage AI in their web-building processes – from client discovery to content population to ongoing client site management.
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1. Accelerate the client discovery process
The first step to building a high-performing client website is gathering all of the business information needed to create a website that meets the client’s goals and effectively funnels their target user through the journey from website visitor to customer. At this stage, it’s all about collecting the right information, and quickly translating it into a comprehensive web strategy.
AI can significantly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of the client discovery process. For example, agencies can lean on tools like ChatGPT to transcribe client discovery sessions, analyze the transcript, and create a custom chat for each client.
This chat becomes a tailored "dossier" for each client, encompassing all of the necessary background to plan a website's structure, SEO, content, and more. Later, this same chat can also serve to generate recommendations and create personalized content on an ongoing basis—even well after the website launches.
2. Speed up site population
Waiting for clients to add content to their new website can significantly slow down the web-building process. Once the website design and development are complete, clients and stakeholders may have trouble visualizing a site that’s still full of blank spaces and lorem ipsum. This can prolong the review and approval process and even delay the website launch.
Leveraging AI for efficient site population goes beyond mere content creation. It provides a strategic advantage to overcome common obstacles agencies face. Many of the best website builders now have AI-powered content generation tools within their platforms. That makes it easy to generate relevant copy, so agencies can present clients with a fully-formed site framework swiftly, facilitating faster review and approval processes.
3. Implement SEO best practices
Leveraging AI for SEO is another area where agencies can save time while producing faster and better results for their clients. One of the main ways we’re seeing agencies use AI for SEO is to generate metadata.
Of course, human oversight is essential when using any AI tool, and SEO metadata generation is no exception.
You can certainly use a tool like ChatGPT to generate SEO metadata and copy/paste it into the appropriate field. However, most website builders now offer AI-powered SEO tools that analyze the content of the page and use integrated prompts to generate contextual, keyword-optimized metadata–including titles, headlines, descriptions, and image alt text–with the click of a button. Some platforms even offer the ability to generate all of this metadata for entire sites at once.
However, it’s important to note that Large Language Models (LLMs) are imprecise when it comes to generating results within a certain number of characters or words. So you’ll likely still need to tweak the results here and there to fit the latest recommended character limits. Of course, human oversight is essential when using any AI tool, and SEO metadata generation is no exception.
If you are looking for AI tools, check out our list of the best AI website builders.
4. Upsell additional service offerings
For agencies that aren’t already offering SEO implementation or content population services, AI can make it possible to add these offerings to their rate cards with the resources they already have. This doesn’t mean AI is doing everything. AI is just a tool – a very powerful tool – but it’s not an SEO or content expert.
Your team will still need to check what is being produced and revise as needed to make sure the results align with your overall marketing strategy and your client’s goals. But AI can accelerate these traditionally time-consuming processes so that you can offer these services without straining your resources.
5. Streamline client site management
Finally, AI is an agency’s valued assistant throughout the entire client lifecycle, even after a site is launched.
For example, by harnessing the power of custom GPTs along with their SEO and web-building tools, agencies can speed up time-consuming ongoing tasks like researching keywords, gathering data for reporting, and much more. This allows agencies to focus their time on high-value, revenue-generating activities like fostering deeper client relationships and providing a comprehensive marketing strategy AI can not replicate.
Leveraging AI for website building: Summary
As AI continues to evolve, there continue to be new and exciting opportunities for agencies to enhance their web building processes.
By moving beyond content and exploring the full range of AI capabilities, agencies can offer more value, drive greater efficiency, and stay competitive. The key to success lies in embracing these technologies, experimenting with new tools, and continuously learning to harness the power of AI in every aspect of the web building process.
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