Wesley McQuillen
There's been so much buzz for the past year about AI tools and how you can use them — some projections have been accurate, some have been a tad hyperbolic, and some have been completely wrong. I decided to look back through the hundreds of AI tools that launched in the last year to assemble this short list of four of the best free and easy AI tools that really live up to the hype and are useful for most small businesses — that you may not already know, that is.
1. Turboscribe
If you’re producing video content for your business, Turboscribe (turboscribe.ai) is a lifesaver. This AI tool can transcribe any YouTube video quickly and accurately. Think about all the ways you can use those transcriptions: closed captions for better accessibility, boosting your SEO, or turning video content into blog posts or bulleted lists for social media infographics. With Turboscribe, you can easily repurpose your videos without manually transcribing them or trying to scrape the caption file off YouTube.
2. Pictory
Got a long webinar or product demo? Long recorded Zooms just sitting in a folder that could make great clips if you had time to edit them? Pictory (pictory.ai) can help. It takes your lengthy videos and breaks them down into the most interesting clips. Imagine being able to share the best moments from your content across social media channels fast. Pictory does the tedious work of finding the most significant moments and clipping those highlights in all formats, so you can focus on engaging with your customers. Plus, it’s perfect for creating teaser clips that drive traffic to your full-length videos.
3. InVideo
What if all you have is an idea for a video? No article or script or audio or b-roll, just a prompt? InVideo (invideo.io) can shockingly start with just a prompt and generate all the needed elements to create a video that looks surprisingly good — with script generation, stock footage, AI voiceovers, generated captions, everything. I wouldn't rely on this one to create long form videos, but if you want to generate shorter ones under 5 minutes based on only an idea, this is a cool tool to use.
4. HeadshotPro
If you're a small business with limited budget to do a team photoshoot, HeadshotPro (headshotpro.com) is an interesting solution. This tool can create professional-looking headshots for your entire team, all with matching backgrounds and styles. Just upload your team’s photos, and HeadshotPro standardizes everything to give you a cohesive set of headshots. It’s an easy and cost-effective way to ensure your team looks polished on your website and marketing materials, and great for remote teams who might find it challenging to coordinate an in-person photoshoot. And when new people come in, you can make sure their background and lighting matches, versus what usually happens with personnel changes, where half of the pictures match and the others are all a little "off" because they weren't part of the original shoot.
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Wesley McQuillen is principal at ALTER Strategies, a 7 ADDY-award-winning senior marketing executive with a focus on tech-forward alternative marketing strategies for the hard-to-advertise.
