Losing clients to AI, and how to gain them back, with Suzanne Bowness
Grammar Girl: For Writers and Language Lovers.
Mignon Fogarty, Inc.
4.5 • 2.9K Ratings
🗓️ 9 April 2026
⏱️ 12 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
1175. In this bonus segment, which originally aired last October for Grammarpaloozians, we look at how AI is disrupting the freelance writing industry with author Suzanne Bowness. She shares her strategy for experimenting with different AI tools and the importance of being "conversant" in them for clients. We also look at the challenge of losing clients to AI but gaining new ones who were dissatisfied with the machine-generated text.
Find Suzanne on her website, Codeword Communications.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Today is a real treat for anyone who's ever done freelance work or if you're a writer wondering about using AI in your work. |
| 0:07.7 | My guest from last October, Suzanne Bonesse has made a living freelancing while rolling with the changes. |
| 0:14.3 | I think you'll love our discussion. |
| 0:29.3 | Greetings, Grammar-Paloosians. We are here today with Suzanne Bones, author of the fabulous book, The Feisty Freelancer. |
| 0:35.5 | Suzanne has a PhD in English and teaches writing and freelancing at Humber College in Toronto, |
| 0:39.3 | and the book captures the lessons she's learned from a 20-plus-year career as a freelancer. In the main episode, we talked about finding good clients, how to pitch |
| 0:45.1 | them, and more, and now we're going to talk about AI. So, Suzanne, welcome to the Gramer Paloosa |
| 0:51.7 | segment. Thank you so much. Yeah, so you said in July that you used your slow time, wisely scheduled using your slow time to learn new tools, and that AI was the thing you decided to learn about this year. |
| 1:04.0 | So, you know, what are you seeing from clients and in your work when it comes to AI? |
| 1:09.7 | So I was actually terrified to write the final chapter |
| 1:12.2 | in the book about AI because it was published, you know, finished up a year ago as books go. |
| 1:18.3 | And I was like, oh my gosh, so many things will have changed by that time. And they have. And so I find |
| 1:25.7 | I'm always trying to update my knowledge and my learning and that |
| 1:28.6 | kind of thing. So I did do an experiment this summer where I downloaded five AI tools and just to |
| 1:34.0 | see how they work to see, you know, be careful to know more about them such that if my clients |
| 1:40.7 | are using them, I can be conversant in them. And they all have, you know, |
| 1:44.8 | more similar than different. So it's a case of like if you learn one, you can learn the others more |
| 1:50.9 | easily. As I've heard from clients, I've learned to, and I think my advice would be to not |
| 1:57.0 | assume anything about a client's position on AI, because some are using it, I think all are using it, but some will say they're using it and share that. |
| 2:06.2 | And then others are saying they're staying away, but possibly are using it. |
| 2:09.7 | But everyone's experimenting. |
| 2:11.2 | So join in the experimentation. |
... |
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