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Last year we highlighted that AI users published 42% more content than non-AI users. This year, the speed<\/em> of content creation is one of the clear highlights.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Among marketers using AI, the biggest increases over last year were for more specialized tasks.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Using AI for data analysis rose from 28% to 60%, image creation from 19% to 43%, and keyword clustering from 23% to 45%.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Interestingly, in last year’s data, these were some of the least popular uses of AI.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Again, growth here could be a mix of improved models and outputs, more people sharing their workflows, AI use becoming habitual, and similar factors.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Among respondents who use AI, 83% use Claude, 76% use ChatGPT, and 58% use Gemini.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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They were followed by Claude Cowork (42%), Claude Code (37%), and Codex (13%).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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It was almost a year ago that Claude introduced SKILL.md<\/code> files, allowing users to create reproducible processes easily.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
While I acknowledge I may be in a marketing “bubble” at times, it seemed to coincide with a clear shift towards using the platform over the likes of ChatGPT. 68% of survey respondents who use AI say they use skill files, with 55% creating their own.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Though, of course, things can swiftly change in this era of models one-upping each other.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The 2025 survey asked which tool respondents used to create content, while this year’s question allowed multiple selections, so the figures aren’t a direct market-share comparison.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Some people also wrote in tools that were already options, which were added to the total counts.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Two-thirds (66%) of marketers trust AI-generated content only if a human reviews it first. Just 2.7% trust it with no review at all.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Among marketers who use AI, distrust is rare: just 6% say they generally distrust it, compared with 57% of those who don’t use AI at all.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Across all respondents, 69% say they’re publishing a larger share of AI content than a year ago. Among AI users, the figure rises to almost three-quarters (74%).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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It’s important to note that growth in AI-assisted content doesn’t mean more unedited writing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Among respondents who answered that none of their published content is pure AI, more than half (58%) still noted their share has grown.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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56% of AI users say human-written content is better quality than their AI content, and 23% say it’s “way better”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Interestingly, a lot of the quality perspective depends on who you ask.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Almost half (43%) of founders and business owners say their AI content beats human writing, compared to just 17% of junior and mid-level marketers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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29% of marketers using AI now ask AI to check the quality of their AI-generated content, up from 14% last year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Respondents were encouraged to select all options that apply, so the answers can add up to more than 100%.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The most common way to check outputs is manual self-checking. This year, even fewer respondents said they don’t check results at all.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Almost half of those using AI say it hasn’t saved them any money on writers or freelancers, and 26% don’t know whether it has.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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A clear explanation is that only 28% of AI users work with outside writers. The rest create content in-house, or write it themselves.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Among those who reported saving money, the typical savings are $1,001-$2,000 a month.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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78% of marketers using AI don’t tell website visitors they’ve used AI to help create their content. 22% openly disclose it, up from 16% in our 2025 survey.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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A lot of this likely depends on what people count as ‘AI content.’<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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If you’re getting feedback on stats or the structure of an article, that’s something totally different to having AI write most (if not all) of the words on the page.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Interestingly, though, those publishing the most pure AI content weren’t any more likely to disclose it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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7% of marketers using AI say more than 75% of the content they publish is pure AI, without any editing or additional input. That’s up from 4% in 2025.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n