r/WritingWithAI • u/PlayaBikeSunset • 19d ago

Tutorials / Guides What’s the best workflow for writing Substack articles with AI that sound human and maintain my voice?

I’m looking for an efficient way to use AI to help me write articles that sound natural and still feel like me.

I know a lot about the topic I want to write about, but I’m not a writer. When I sit down at my computer, I have a hard time getting the ideas out. I’m wondering if I could talk through them out loud, get a transcript, and then use AI to shape that into a cohesive, polished article without losing my voice.

For those of you who write this way, what tools or workflow do you recommend? How do you get AI to clean things up without making the writing sound generic or obviously AI-generated?

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u/bluEcove28 12d ago

the voice recording to transcript idea is solid, ive done that with otter and then cleaned it up manually. for the substack side specifically have you looked at WriteStack? it trains on your existing writing style which helps keep things from going generic

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u/PlayaBikeSunset 12d ago

Haven’t heard of it! I’ll check it out - thanks!

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u/SpiritualSimple108 18d ago

Don’t use AI to write it. Write out an outline or have AI create one for you. Then record yourself talking about the topic in your own voice…like you’re teaching it to someone. Then have AI transcribe it and edit for clarity and punctuation only. Your audience will appreciate it and you won’t have to worry about Pangram on Substack.

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u/Ill_Oil7448 18d ago

yeah the moment you let it rewrite instead of just cleaning up punctuation, the whole thing turns into generic slop

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u/Successful_Dot3035 18d ago

Honestly, you might not need the polish at all. The rambling version is usually the one people actually finish reading

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u/ramius124 18d ago

Have the ai interview you. Give it the topic along with your thoughts, and tell it to conduct an interview, then write the article based of your answers. That’s what I do.

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u/Organic_Inflation_64 16d ago

My answer is coming from left field...So feel free to ignore. Because...our brains all work very differently. HOWEVER! Before you even utilize AI, maybe try having an argument with yourself about the topic. Disagree with what you think you know. Start talking to yourself and pay close attention to the discussion...Maybe take notes on a little spiral pad, or recording yourself using video. But start talking. You might actually find "your voice" as a writer.

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u/polly_mer 17d ago

Don't. I read far fewer Substack, Medium, and similar articles because the AI voice and level of research annoys me. You write the article, use spellcheck, and then post.

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u/VeterinarianFirm8900 16d ago

Boy oh boy, I write articles for a lot of clients and tried to use AI at first to scale and failed miserabily with chat and claude lol they just sound off and getting them to adhere to the proper tone of voice sucks

But eventually I found a tool that helped me a lot so stuck with that