For many legal marketing teams, the hardest part of content is not editing. It is starting.
You have the raw material. A case update. Seminar notes. Bullet points from a barrister. A practice head who has dictated three strong paragraphs. What you often do not have is time to shape it into something structured, readable, and ready to circulate.
This is where AI support is genuinely useful.
Used properly, AI can help you move from blank page to workable first draft quickly. Used carelessly, it can introduce tone issues, overstatements, or subtle inaccuracies that create more work later.
The difference lies in how you brief it and how you review what it produces.
This post looks at how legal marketing teams can use AI to support drafting, while keeping control of voice, accuracy, and implication.
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Why the blank page is the real bottleneck
Legal content rarely fails because there is nothing to say. It stalls because:
- Contributors are busy.
- Notes arrive in uneven formats.
- Marketing teams are balancing multiple deadlines.
- Drafting requires mental space that is often in short supply.
AI is particularly good at one thing: turning fragments into structure.
It can:
- Suggest an outline.
- Expand bullet points into paragraphs.
- Propose headings that make content easier to scan.
- Reorder information logically.
None of this replaces judgment. It reduces friction. When used as a drafting assistant, AI removes the inertia that slows content down.
Start with structure, not sentences
One of the safest and most effective ways to use AI is to ask it for structure before prose.
For example, instead of asking:
“Write a 1,000-word article on recent developments in shareholder disputes.”
You might ask:
“Based on these bullet points, suggest a clear outline for a client-facing article aimed at instructing solicitors. Keep tone professional and measured. Do not introduce new claims.”
The difference is important.
An outline:
- Is easier to review.
- Surfaces potential overreach early.
- Keeps you in control of direction.
Once the structure is approved, you can ask AI to expand specific sections, one at a time. This layered approach significantly reduces risk.
How to brief AI properly in a legal context
Most disappointing AI output can be traced back to vague instructions. In legal marketing, a strong brief should include four elements:
1. Audience
Be specific.
Is this aimed at:
- Instructing solicitors?
- General counsel?
- Existing lay clients?
- Professional intermediaries?
AI adjusts tone based on audience cues. Without them, it defaults to generic marketing language.
2. Context
State clearly:
- Chambers or law firm.
- UK market, if relevant.
- Type of work involved.
- Whether this is informational, promotional, or educational.
This reduces the likelihood of tone drift.
3. Constraints
This is where many teams miss an opportunity. Explicitly tell the AI tool you are using what not to do, if you don’t, this is where the hallucinations can start to appear.
For example:
- Do not imply outcomes.
- Do not exaggerate experience.
- Do not introduce new facts.
- Keep tone measured and professional.
- Avoid promotional language.
Constraints narrow the output in helpful ways.
4. Purpose
Clarify what the piece is meant to achieve. Is it:
- Raising awareness?
- Supporting SEO?
- Following up from an event?
- Explaining a development?
AI can structure content more effectively when it understands the intended function.
Protecting tone of voice
One of the most common concerns about AI drafting is that it will flatten tone or make content sound generic. That concern is justified if AI is left to default settings.
Legal audiences respond best to writing that is clear, measured, and precise. You can improve AI output significantly by coaching it towards that style. For example, by specifying that the writing should be:
- Clear rather than clever.
- Confident rather than promotional.
- Precise rather than expansive.
- Calm rather than enthusiastic.
To maintain that voice, it helps to include guidance such as:
“Write in a tone suitable for a chambers website. Avoid hype. Keep language clear and professional.”
You can also paste in an example paragraph from your existing website and ask AI to mirror its tone. In most cases, a short, representative excerpt is enough to anchor the style.
It is usually best to choose example text that matches the type of content you are drafting. For instance, if you are working on a practice area page, use existing practice area copy as the reference. If you are drafting a blog post, use a paragraph from a recent article. This helps AI stay within the right register, since tone often varies slightly between web pages, profiles, and editorial content.
Providing more than one excerpt can be useful, particularly if you are defining tone across different formats. The key is to choose examples that are consistent in voice and reflect your current standard. Too much mixed material can blur the signal and produce output that feels averaged or generic.
Tone control comes less from volume and more from clarity. A strong example paragraph, combined with explicit constraints about what to avoid, is usually the most reliable approach.
Where overstatement tends to creep in
When AI expands short notes into full paragraphs, it often fills gaps with confident phrasing.
For example, a bullet point that says:
- Advises on fraud disputes.
May become:
“Members of the team have extensive experience advising on complex fraud disputes and regularly secure successful outcomes for clients.”
The additional wording is not necessarily malicious. It is pattern completion.
Your role as editor is to check for:
- Implied frequency, such as “regularly”.
- Implied scale, such as “extensive” or “complex”.
- Outcome language.
- Comparative positioning.
Often, the safest edit is small. Returning to:
“Members advise on fraud disputes at different stages of proceedings.”
is typically more defensible and easier to approve internally.
Using AI to expand, not invent
A helpful rule in legal drafting is this:
AI can expand on what you know. It should not invent what you do not.
If you have:
- Clear bullet points.
- Approved website copy.
- Structured seminar notes.
AI can help turn them into coherent prose.
If you do not have enough substance to support a claim, AI should not be used to “fill in” credibility.
The output may look polished, but it will be harder to defend.
A practical drafting workflow
Here is a simple way to integrate AI into content production without disrupting standards.
Step one: gather approved inputs
Start with:
- Bullet points from the contributor.
- Existing related website copy.
- Notes from a seminar or update.
- Any internal constraints.
Do not start from nothing if you can avoid it.
Step two: generate an outline
Ask AI to:
- Suggest a logical structure.
- Propose headings.
- Highlight where examples might sit.
Review (sense check and edit) the outline before moving on.
Step three: expand section by section
Rather than generating the entire article at once, work through one section at a time.
This:
- Makes review easier.
- Reduces compounding tone drift.
- Keeps content aligned to the outline.
Step four: human edit with intent
Editing is not just proofreading. Review for:
- Accuracy.
- Implication.
- Tone consistency.
- Alignment with existing pages.
- Unnecessary adjectives.
In legal marketing, tightening is usually an improvement.
Step five: final sense-check
Before publishing, ask:
- Would this pass internal scrutiny without explanation?
- Is anything implied that we cannot evidence?
- Does it still sound like us?
If the answer is yes, AI has done its job properly.
When not to use AI for drafting
AI drafting is not always appropriate. It is best avoided where:
1. Confidential detail is involved
This is about information that should not be shared with external systems, even for drafting purposes. Examples include:
- Drafting a case study that includes:
- Client names not already public
- Settlement figures
- Internal strategy discussions
- Advice given in conference
- Preparing website copy about a matter that is ongoing and not publicly reported.
- Reworking a draft that contains:
- Extracts from pleadings
- Internal email correspondence
- Detailed factual timelines
- Drafting content based on notes from a client meeting where confidential issues were discussed.
In these situations, the risk is not tone. It is data exposure. Even if the output would never be published verbatim, the input itself is inappropriate to share.
2. The subject matter is highly sensitive
Here, the issue is not confidentiality, but context and scrutiny. Examples include:
- Commentary on a live, high-profile judicial review.
- Drafting website copy relating to allegations of fraud, misconduct, or regulatory breach.
- Writing about politically sensitive public law matters.
- Publishing content linked to ongoing criminal proceedings.
- Drafting material relating to discrimination, harassment, or safeguarding issues.
Even if all facts are public, the topic requires careful judgment around tone and framing. AI may default to technically correct but insufficiently nuanced language. In these cases, human judgment should lead the drafting process.
3. The content requires deep legal interpretation
AI is not a lawyer. It predicts language. It does not interpret law with professional responsibility. Examples include:
- Writing a technical analysis of a new Supreme Court decision.
- Explaining the implications of regulatory reform for a specific sector.
- Drafting commentary that compares competing judicial approaches.
- Producing guidance that could be read as legal advice.
In these situations, subtle interpretation matters. Even small shifts in wording can misrepresent the legal position. AI may help later with structure or clarity once the substance is confirmed, but it should not be relied on to generate the core analysis.
4. There is significant reputational exposure
This refers to content where the stakes are high, even if no confidential data is involved. Examples include:
- Updating a practice area page following a controversial case.
- Drafting a public response to criticism or media coverage.
- Writing a statement about professional conduct or regulatory findings.
- Creating promotional copy that makes comparative or “leading” claims.
- Drafting a profile for a very senior silk or partner, where positioning is delicate.
In these situations, wording is not just about clarity. It signals positioning, hierarchy, and brand identity. Small tonal shifts can have an outsized impact. AI may produce something fluent, but not necessarily something strategically calibrated.
Why drafting support builds confidence
Teams that use AI for first drafts often find that:
- They publish more consistently.
- They spend more time refining than wrestling with structure.
- Contributors respond better to something concrete than to a blank page.
- Approval becomes easier because language has already been shaped carefully.
The key is that AI does not remove editorial judgment. It shifts it to where it adds the most value: from struggling to start, to refining what matters.
The bottom line
AI can move legal marketing teams from blank page to workable draft quickly. It cannot decide what should be said, how far a claim should go, or what level of nuance is required. Those remain human responsibilities.
When AI is used to support structure and clarity, rather than to shortcut expertise, it becomes a practical drafting assistant. In legal marketing, that is often exactly what is needed.
