Writer’s block is real and can affect many people across different industries. But the problem with this in recent times, much more than in earlier days, is that many businesses and brands depend on written content. Whether it’s email constructing, responses, coming up with catchy marketing copy, YouTube scripts, or even long-form content marketers, business people don’t have the luxury of hitting pause.
At times like this tools like ChatGPT can be of much value. But ChatGPT is not the only tool available now. There are so many ChatGPT alternatives that you can try out to streamline your copy content creation needs.
In this blog, we hope to cover some of the best ChatGPT alternatives to try in 2024.
But before we begin let’s run through some important info about using ChatGPT as well as some general notes before we talk about the ChatGPT alternatives.
ChatGPT is the first name that pops into anyone’s mind when you talk about generative AI tools.
ChatGPT offers 4 plans including the free plan. The paid plans are the Plus plan at $20/month, the Team plan at $25/per user, billed annually or $30/per user, billed monthly, and an Enterprise plan with custom pricing.
There’s so much to know about ChatGPT and so much to achieve using it. But since we’re covering ChatGPT alternatives let’s skip to the pros and cons of ChatGPT and proceed to those alternatives.
Before we begin with the comparison let’s look at a general comparison of these tools from a birds-eye-view.
All these ChatGPT alternatives are a great way to get your content marketing work done. While their strengths differ they primarily do what ChatGPT does.
It also helps that these ChatGPT alternatives offer these awesome content generation features for free, thus the allure of them.
Even the pricing is similar with slight variations in the package offerings. And with that, let’s explore the top ChatGPT alternatives in this next segment.
As we explore these ChatGPT alternatives, it’s only fair that we put them through the same litmus test. We will use the same prompt to generate content for all these ChatGPT alternatives so that we can come to a reasonable conclusion.
The prompt will be:
“Create a social media calendar for the cake shop brand Slice along with marketing copy for 10 different social media ads. Keep the tone classy”.
Let’s start with the first one.
Gemini, previously known as Bard is one of the ultimate ChatGPT alternatives.
It is solely meant for generating text content so it doesn’t come with extra features.
Gemini pricing for paid plans starts from $20/month and offers a trial.
Let’s put the tool to the test.
Allow us to break down the pros and cons of the generation.
Firstly, there were 3 different drafts to choose from.
In one of the drafts, the weekly schedule came in a chart format categorized by day, platform, theme, marketing copy, and idea for video or image as you can see. This we thought was a step up from ChatGPT’s usual bulletpoint structure.
Because Gemini is powered by Google, there was the option to export the entire schedule to a Google sheet, which is super useful. Gemini helped cut down some Excel copy-pasting action.
We also got some useful content on the platforms we should target as well as content pillars.
Also, the marketing copy for the 10 ads was diverse and well-crafted and they could really be used with little to no editing required. The 10 also came with relevant hashtags to use which we thought was a great addition.
We also noticed that there was a useful feature in Gemini for free where you could select the text and edit it. There were multiple options too.
Other general pros include conversation history, the ability to convert results into Gmail messages, the ability to share conversation links and free extensions, and the ability to input images.
In terms of cons, we don’t have much to say. If we were to point out one thing it would be the limited duration of the social media schedule. Maybe because we didn’t specify in the prompt the duration, the calendar was only for the first week.
You also need to have a Google account to be able to use Gemini but in this day and age who doesn’t?
So all in all, it’s one of the best ChatGPT alternatives on the market.
Moving on to the next alternative.
Copilot, formerly known as Bing Chat is an AI chatbot powered by Microsoft. It is one of the top ChatGPT alternatives to consider because it has some specific use cases. Copilot pricing starts from $20/month and offers a trial.
Let’s test it out.
Let’s talk about the pros and cons.
The pros of Copilot are much different from the previous tool.
Instead of a consistent schedule, Copilot pulled special days throughout the month of June relevant to the niche our brand Slice belongs to. While the approach is different than what ChatGPT or Gemini would generate, upon expanding these ideas they could have some value.
The marketing copy was brief and concise. It also recommended the sort of image that would work best. It’s a good place to get fresh ideas, if you will, instead of the exact copy.
One other pro we came across is that it offered website links to relevant pages where we could do more research on the topic.
But the best part we liked about Copilot was the graphic design inspiration. While there’s definitely room for improvement, the social media graphics could be useful to use as references when designing.
You also don’t need to log in to Microsoft to use the tool.
Other general pros include the ability to integrate with other Microsoft 365 apps and the extra Copilot GPT features, Designer for image generation, Vacation Planner, Cooking Assistant, and Fitness Trainer. These extra free features make it one of the top ChatGPT alternatives.
One of the cons we must point out is that there wasn’t much copy that you could just use, as-is. Copilot is more of a starting point that needs expanding and it doesn’t offer polished ready-made content for use.
And, Copilot does not store your chat history.
But conclusively, it renders itself as a great starting point for ideation and inspiration.
Let’s go ahead to the next alternative.
Claude is another AI chatbot and is one of the best ChatGPT alternatives to try out because of their similarity in terms of features. Claude AI pricing starts at $20/month but does not offer a trial.
Let’s test it.
We noticed a pro even before inputting the prompt. With Claude you can upload supporting docs, etc to provide context to the kind of content you need.
Unlike the previous 2 tools, Claude intuitively combined the commands in our prompt and created one guide for a duration of 10 days. We personally thought it was a smart take on it.
Thus, Claude provided a clear social media calendar for 10 days and included a heading, ad copy, and relevant hashtags.
It even relates the possibility of further expanding on the content.
Maybe because we didn’t specify, Claude did not provide ideas for images for the ads like the previous tools.
Also, it offers limited uses in the free plan unlike ChatGPT and some of these alternatives. You have to wait for the limit to reset every day. And there aren’t templates to choose from and other additional features beyond textual content.
But overall, it’s one of the best ChatGPT alternatives owing to their similarity.
Moving on to the next one.
Mistral AI’s Le Chat chatbot is a great ChatGPT alternative offering almost the same features down to the interface. Mistral AI’s services are offered on a pay-as-you-go basis. Click here for info.
Time to test it.
Let’s check out the pros and cons of the generated content.
Just like Claude, Mistral responded to the prompt more holistically. The content was a social media content schedule for 10 days with 10 different ad ideas along with a heading, ad body copy, and relevant hashtags.
The content was ok, and some ideas differed from those we previously generated. You can also share your chat via a link.
Other general pros include a chat history and the option to choose between 4 models, Large, Next, Small, and Codestral.
The content was brief, with no explanation of how it should be presented. Mistral didn’t provide any ideas for images beyond the copy.
Some of the ad ideas were too presumptuous. For example, the first ad idea assumes that the shop hasn’t opened yet.
Regardless, it’s still one of the known good ChatGPT alternatives, paving its way in the industry.
Moving ahead to the next tool on this ChatGPT alternatives list.
Perplexity is one of the ChatGPT alternatives to look out for. It has a similar interface and looks almost like you’re working with ChatGPT. Perplexity, much like most of these ChatGPT alternatives starts from $20/month.
Let’s check its capabilities.
Perplexity took a whole different route to the prompt we gave.
It generated the content for a monthly schedule covering important holidays for each month and creating a marketing idea based on that particular day. The content included the marketing copy along with relevant hashtags.
We also liked that Perplexity listed important questions surrounding our prompt, business, and niche for us to explore so that we can go through similar important content.
One other thing we love about Perplexity is that it cites its sources. This helps you keep your research going and also keeps you from just copy-pasting content off of these AI tools.
And to add on top of all of this they provide you references to videos relevant to the prompt you gave and graphic design inspiration for social media ads.
Other general pros include the template question available to start a chat conversation, and a threads feature to collaborate with others along with shareable links of the chat.
While we appreciate the monthly schedule, we were disappointed that it created content for the first 4 months of 2024 which have already passed. We think the word “calendar” threw the AI off showcasing how specific you need to be with your prompts when using this tool.
Another con we saw is that it doesn’t support image uploads like ChatGPT in the free plan.
With that let’s wrap things up.
Whether you stick with ChatGPT or go for one of these other ChatGPT alternatives make sure to educate yourself on the art of writing prompts. Some of the game is all in the prompts.
And use these tools to shorten the time you spend coming up with tedious marketing copy and other content. According to Hubspot’s 2023 State of AI report, marketers who use generative AI for content creation save more than 3 hours per piece. It’s time for you to start saving time like your colleagues in the industry.
Finally, always practice responsible AI practices so that you make proper use of these tools.
