How I Use AI to Grow 1M+ Followers in 1 Year

Contrary to hype narratives, I do NOT use AI to automate ALL content creation

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This is the smart way to use AI to grow your audience as a social media content creator.

I use AI as a tool to augment my content creation process, not replace myself. There's a lot of misinformation exaggerating how AI can fully automate content - this is POSSIBLE if you are already an intermediate/advanced content creator, with a deep understanding of hooks and repeatable viral formats.

But it's NOT for beginners, as every AI automation still takes significant tweaking and regular human oversight.

Even viral AI-generated content typically has a person behind the scenes in charge of creative direction, editing, and adapting strategy based on performance.

I personally like to use AI to do stuff I find tedious, so I can focus on making original content and teaching people, which is what I enjoy.

Here’s the typical content creation process:

BTW I whipped up this interactive diagram in Claude Artifacts:

https://claude.ai/public/artifacts/5f084366-232b-4661-8ed5-64c7ead7fc34

Pretty much every creator, agency, influencer, etc. follows some variation of this process.

But for a long time, it was all MANUAL.

And as a result - completely OVERWHELMING.

When I first started making content, I heard a stat that a significant percentage of SUCCESSFUL creators/influencers burn out after roughly 5 years making content. It’s easy to see why…

Every course/guru tells you to:

• Keep up with trends

• Rise above noise

• Stay consistent

• Post 3x per day

• Also post everywhere

• Actually enjoy the process

Not trivial…

Instead of trying to automate AWAY each step…

I use AI to dig deeper, embrace the process, and be more productive in each step.

Here’s how:

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1. AI for Ideas

Instead of scrolling Tiktok for inspiration at 11pm, then accidentally going down a rabbit hole for 2 more hours, and destroying your sleep…

You can use AI to:

• surface news in your niche

• listen to Reddit for pain points

• turn meetings & voice notes into ideas

• tell you what’s going viral on social media

2. AI for Drafts

Writer's block is real and it's brutal.

But now, you can use AI to write your first drafts in YOUR voice:

• Generate 10 different hooks

• Write from multiple angles/perspectives

• Research relevant data and quotes to include

• Create visuals that match your brand

Make sure to train AI with your best content, so that it sounds more like you, less like generic AI slop.

3. AI for Editing

Whether it’s text, image, or video content - there are many ways to use AI for editing and polishing your drafts:

• Optimize captions and hashtags for each platform

• Clean up grammar and language

• Identifies weak spots/arguments

• Gives you a "viral score" prediction

• Flags anything problematic before you hit publish

4. AI for Publishing

This is probably the step I use AI the least.

But I’ll still mention that you can use AI to:

• Suggest optimal posting times

• Do the actual posting for you - e.g. you can hook up Claude Desktop + Twitter MCP to post tweets without logging into Twitter every time

5. AI for Repurposing

I love this use case.

It’s the original reason I built blotato for myself. I just wanted to repurpose my own content to grow on multiple channels without burning out or hiring a team.

Repurposing is all about getting more out of your existing content.

1 video becomes:

• Newsletter

• Social posts

• Quote graphics

• Short-form clips

This is a huge unlock for intermediate creators because you can grow on multiple channels, but with less pressure to constantly create new material.

6. AI for Analysis

Last, AI can help you connect the dots over time:

• Analyze engagement data

• Identify your winning hooks

• Suggest 10 new ideas based on what worked

The cycle continues forever - your wins feed directly into next week’s ideas. This one is my weak spot; I don’t leverage AI as much as I could here.

The Honest Truth

Content creation is freely accessible to everyone.

It literally costs $0 to pick up your phone and post, potentially reaching MILLIONS of people.

The amount of organic distribution FREELY available is insane!

But it’s really, really, really HARD to rise above all the noise.

And the amount of noise will continually increase, as AI makes it easier than ever to generate mid content.

My suggestion is to use AI to help you learn faster, be better. But don’t expect it to instantly automate away all the hard work, trial and error, the craftsmanship, long stretches of self-doubt.

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