Tag: digital marketing

  • Is Writing Career Dead? Why AI Hasn’t Killed the Pen (Yet)

    Is Writing Career Dead? Why AI Hasn’t Killed the Pen (Yet)

    You’ve probably heard the buzz: “AI is taking over writing careers!” But is that claim really true? I don’t buy it for a second. In my opinion, anyone who dismisses writing as a viable career path in the age of AI simply has a superficial understanding of what writing truly is, and what a writer actually does.

    woman in white long sleeve shirt using macbook pro
    Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com

    Writing isn’t just about stringing words together. It’s about crafting factual information and presenting it in a way that’s incredibly believable. The goal? To inform, persuade, and entertain your audience. And that, my friends, is something far more nuanced than what a machine can currently replicate.

    It’s easy to see why some might feel AI has replaced writing, especially given how it shows up in their daily lives. However, for those of us who have dedicated ourselves to the craft of writing professionally, we view it through a different lens—one that reveals a vast landscape of exciting opportunities.

    In this article, I will sharing with you my thoughts on why writing is still a great career to pursue full time.

    The Foundation in Writing is Training

    When you pursue writing as a serious academic discipline, you’re not just learning to string words together; you’re undergoing a rigorous training in critical thinking and communication. A solid foundation in writing equips you with the indispensable skills of in-depth research and robust message support.

    For instance, if your subject is as complex as climate change, your training dictates that you don’t just state facts. Instead, you’re taught to consult authoritative sources, like leading experts in meteorological departments, to lend credibility and weight to your arguments.

    Furthermore, you learn the art of presenting compelling evidence—be it through photographic documentation of environmental shifts or video footage illustrating their tangible impacts—to unequivocally back up your claims. This meticulous process demands significant investment of your time, resources, and intellectual effort to meticulously gather, analyze, and synthesize information.

    Crucially, this intricate interplay of diligent research, informed consultation, and compelling evidentiary presentation is fundamentally a human endeavor. No AI, no matter how advanced, can replicate the nuanced judgment, the empathetic understanding, or the on-the-ground investigative work required to genuinely gather, verify, and meaningfully interpret such diverse forms of evidence.

    It is the human element, with its capacity for critical inquiry and authentic engagement, that truly builds a strong and credible written work.

    Writing Needs Dedication And Commitment

    While the notion that AI allows for passive, lightning-fast content generation holds true to a certain extent, achieving truly effective writing demands a level of dedication that no algorithm can replicate. For those leveraging writing for business purposes, this often translates to a significant time commitment, bordering on full immersion.

    Despite the advancements in AI, if writing isn’t your primary professional focus, or if you’re managing multiple facets of a business, you’ll inevitably encounter a point where engaging a professional writer becomes not just beneficial, but essential. Consider the diverse content needs of a comprehensive marketing strategy: regular blog posts, engaging video scripts, persuasive sales letters, and compelling website copy.

    Each of these requires a nuanced understanding of audience, brand voice, and strategic objectives that goes beyond automated generation. This is where the true value of a dedicated writing professional shines.

    By entrusting your content creation to someone whose career is solely focused on the craft, you free up your valuable time and energy to concentrate on other critical business operations. Rather than viewing AI as a complete replacement for human effort, consider it a powerful tool for refinement—a means to polish, optimize, and enhance the content born from dedicated human thought and expertise.

    AI Enriches And Speeds Up Writing Process

    Far from replacing the writer, Artificial Intelligence stands as a powerful ally, significantly enriching and accelerating the writing process. Gone are the days when meticulous manual editing was the only path to polished prose.

    AI tools can now swiftly rewrite and restructure sentences and paragraphs, offering alternative phrasings and improved flow, while also catching and correcting grammatical errors with remarkable precision. Beyond mere technical correction, AI can even assist in broadening and deepening your content, suggesting related ideas, offering factual snippets (which still require human verification!), or helping to outline complex topics.

    However, it’s crucial to understand that these capabilities enhance, rather than replace, human input. Your initial ideas, your unique voice, your specific research, and your ultimate strategic goals remain the indispensable core of any written piece.

    AI functions as a sophisticated assistant, taking your raw material and refining it, making the process of crafting compelling content far more efficient and less laborious. Ultimately, AI is here to make writing more accessible and productive, allowing writers to focus their creative energy on the most impactful aspects of their work.

    AI: A Powerful Ally for Confident Communication

    or a vast number of individuals globally, English is not their native tongue, often presenting a significant hurdle to confident written communication. This is precisely where AI truly shines as an invaluable tool.

    With its capabilities in grammatical correction and sophisticated sentence restructuring, AI empowers non-native speakers to present their ideas with a level of polish and clarity that was once a considerable struggle.

    The anxiety of misspellings, incorrect verb tenses, or awkward phrasing, which historically bogged down the writing process for many, is now largely mitigated.

    Unlike earlier times when one had to painstakingly self-edit or rely heavily on human proofreaders, AI makes the entire process of achieving grammatically correct and coherent sentences remarkably easy.

    This technological assistance not only speeds up the drafting and refining stages but, more importantly, instills a newfound confidence, ensuring that the message is conveyed effectively and professionally, regardless of the writer’s linguistic background.

    Writing: A New Frontier for Diverse Expertise

    The landscape of writing has dramatically shifted, shedding its former image as an exclusive domain for a select few. Today, a career in writing has blossomed into a new-found opportunity, accessible to individuals from virtually any academic or professional background.

    This democratization of writing means that your specialized knowledge, once confined to a particular field, can now be leveraged to build a thriving writing career. For instance, someone with a deep understanding of theology might specialize in creating compelling religious content, from insightful blog posts to comprehensive devotional guides.

    Similarly, a medical professional can transition into medical writing, translating complex scientific data into accessible articles for patients, healthcare providers, or pharmaceutical companies.

    The possibilities are truly expansive: a former engineer could become a technical writer, simplifying complex manuals; an environmental scientist could specialize in sustainability reporting; or a financial expert could excel in fintech content creation.

    It’s now entirely feasible to undergo specialized training and emerge as a highly sought-after professional writer within a niche field, demonstrating that writing is no longer just an art form, but a versatile skill that empowers experts across all disciplines to effectively communicate their invaluable knowledge to a wider audience.

    Conclusion

    In conclusion, while some perceive AI as a replacement for human writing, a deeper understanding reveals its role as a powerful enhancement and a catalyst for new opportunities.

    A strong foundation in writing remains paramount; it’s a rigorous training that equips individuals with essential research, critical thinking, and structured communication skills—abilities that no AI can fully replicate, as they demand human judgment, time, and resources.

    Furthermore, effective writing, particularly in a business context, necessitates unwavering dedication and commitment. Despite AI’s ability to generate content quickly, the nuance, strategic intent, and continuous refinement required for truly impactful communication still call for significant human investment, often necessitating the expertise of professional writers for diverse content needs.

    However, AI is far from an adversary; it’s an invaluable tool that enriches and speeds up the writing process. From streamlining grammatical corrections and sentence restructuring to suggesting content enhancements, AI makes writing more efficient and accessible, especially for non-native English speakers, boosting confidence and polish.

    Ultimately, this evolving landscape has transformed writing into a newfound opportunity for individuals from all disciplines. No longer confined to a select few, specialized expertise across fields like medicine or religion can now be leveraged into thriving writing careers, proving that with human insight, dedication, and AI’s assistive capabilities, the future of writing is more expansive and exciting than ever before.

    And that is it from me here. Do you think writing is dead?

  • 5 Video Production Skills That Will Make You Money Online in Kenya Today

    The demand for video services online today is huge. More and more companies are looking for competent video producers to work on their video projects.

    Watch video – 5 Skills to Make You Money Online Today

    Anyone who is committed can succeed making money online producing videos for individuals and businesses.

    In this day and era, you can learn any skill related to video production online for free on YouTube.

    Arts and Design category leads with 77% in representation by freelancers compared to other categories. This is according to Freelance Forward Economist Report 2021. This means there is a huge demand for Arts and Design skills compared to others.

    Upwork

    Getting Started

    So how does the video producer decide which skills to employ in a given project?

    Its mainly based on the script provided to them by the client. Largely, video producers, editors, animators and motion graphics designers are paid to work on projects that are meant for use commercially.

    The end determines the means. How best will the message be communicated? This question will be answered based on the assets the client has and proposes to be used in producing the video. From here the skills needed will come out automatically.

    On this blogpost, I will be sharing with you Top 5 video production skills that can make you money online in Kenya and are self thought.

    List of top 5 Categories in Video production that will make you money online.

    1. Screencast Video Production
    2. Motion graphics and infographics animations
    3. Production of 2D Animation And Whiteboard Explainer videos
    4. 3D animation
    5. Video Editing

    1. Screencast Video Production

    Screencast video production is a little hyped category in video production but has a lot of demand in the tech space. The potential of growth with this category of video production is high. Screencast video production is basically recording computer/tablet/phone screens of a software or SaaS application in action showing users how to use the product or service.

    Application of screencast video production knowledge can be used in many areas in video production.

    Screencast videos are the ones you find posted on most of the giant website help pages showing users how to do certain tasks on the platform.

    While this can be done by anyone, most of the product owners prefer to have the work done by someone else professionally.

    This is where they employ the skills of a screencast video producer, freelancer or a production agency. Screencast video production is more than recording the computer or software screens.

    There is a learning phase where you study how the software or application works before doing the actual work.

    To do screencast videos, you need to have access to a professional screen recording and editing software like Camtasia studio.

    Potential Earnings Per Month

    This skill has potential of earning you a minimum of $1000 to $5000 a month as a freelancer. It requires a lot of patience and commitment at the beginning before you break through.

    2. Motion Graphics and Infographics Animation

    black and white round analog wall clock
    Photo by RODNAE Productions on Pexels.com

    Motion graphics has many different definitions. I will define it using my own words. Its basically animation of text, graphic designs, videos and images to communicate a message in the most entertaining way.

    Kinetic typography is a good example of a motion graphic videos.

    Infographics animation on the other hand is more less the same. The difference is that with infographics, your are adding motion to existing informational graphics or data. e.g case studies.

    Depending on your experience, you can use basically any professional software. To be on the safe side, I recommend learning how to use Adobe after effects. With the software, you are not limited in what you can create.

    Motion graphics skill has demand all over. Once you have built a name around it, your earning potential will be huge.

    Potential Earnings Per Month: One video of 2 Mins can make you $300-1000. If you do let’s say 5 videos a month, you are good.

    3. Production of 2D Animation and Whiteboard Explainer Videos

    2D animations and whiteboard explainer videos are two different things but share a common ground. Vector graphics and illustrations are used to produce them. For 2D, its more of custom designs and animations. e.g Tom and Jerry or the The Pink Panter.

    On the other hand, whiteboard explainer videos are produced using pre-designed templates that comes with the video production software you purchase. You just only drag and drop the elements you need in the video based on the script you have.

    2D animation projects pays well if the assignment at hand entails working on a TV show or a movie.

    Potential Earnings on 2D Animation

    One can earn up to $100k to work on a long form movie animation that may take almost a year to produce.

    On the other hand, whiteboard explainer videos created using premade illustrations and templates don’t pay much but is highly on demand.

    Earning Potential Doing Whiteboard Explainers

    On average one gets paid a minimum of $100 to create a 1 minute whiteboard explainer video. You only need to produce 10 Minutes of animation to make $1000.

    Software’s like Animaker, Vyond and Powtoon are popular for use in creating whiteboard explainer videos.

    4. 3D Animations

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    Photo by ThisIsEngineering on Pexels.com

    3D animation is one of the most demanding skill compared to other categories in video production. That’s why many video producers don’t like it much. In order to model a very smooth and good quality 3D animation video, you need a computer with high specs, time and a lot of RAM to render your animations.

    That’s why it may cost up to $3000 to develop a 1 Minute high end 3D Animation.

    If you have the right equipment’s and software to work on 3D animations, the potential to earn good money as an independent professional is high online.

    Earning potential

    $500-3000 per minute of a 3D animation.

    5. Video Editing

    With many individuals and businesses embracing Youtube as a way of marketing their businesses, there is a constant and growing demand for video editing services. Business minded individuals are looking for video editors to work on their YouTube content.

    This means if you are a good video editor, you have the potential to earn good money editing videos.
    The secret behind succeeding as a video editor is looking for many long term clients.

    Earning Potential

    If you charge $20/hour to edit a video and a client hires you to work for 10 hours a week, you make $200/week. In a month, you make $800 from one client.

    If you are able to get clients who collectively pays you for 40 hours a week and offers to assign you work for a long term, you make good money. In a week you will be making $800 and $2400 a month.

    Conclusion

    Earning potential of any creative in the video production industry depends majorly on their aggressiveness, how well they communicate, their creativity and negotiation skills. If one is able to negotiate for a good pay, they will earn good money at the end.

    And that is it from me here.

    What other category of skill in video production can a creative make money with online?

    Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

    And if you are looking for professional video production services, Techtube Video Studio is ready to sort you out. You can request a quote for Free on their site here.

    Until next time, bye bye and take care.

    Follow me on twitter @cheptiony