I’ve been watching the craze over AI writing tools, primarily Conversion.ai and it’s Jarvis, with some interest in recent weeks.
Like most people, an affiliate marketer is how it came to my attention.
And then another marketer jumped on it, and then another, and so on.
And whenever you see that happening, then you know that the affiliate is program is a good one.
That’s also when it’s a good time to question the product quality, but anyways, let’s dig into this a bit deeper.
What’s The Big Fucking Deal?
One of these days, I’ll cleanse my inbox of some of these marketers, but you gotta admit the headlines promoting this tool (software?) have been entertaining.
- The cheat codes for your online business
- The fastest way to publish blog posts that rank
- Newest favorite blogging tool
- You won’t BELIEVE what this robot can do
- I Used a Robot To Write This Email
- This AI stuff is getting out of control (the half-hearted attempt?)
- Blog content, ads & emails on autopilot
You get the idea.
People acting like Jesus himself is back.
Then Surfer announced they have an integration with Conversion.ai and you’d think someone from Google was giving out ranking secrets the way people have been acting over it.
So now all the results on page one (at least temporarily) will have the exact same content written by a robot.
The reason that this whole thing has been so interesting to me is that I’ve been in this industry a long time – and I’ve seen this before.
Maybe you have too?
Does this blast from the past look familiar?
Then at some point after these old school spinners we ended up with WordAI entering the market and people were shitting their pants over it as well.
Yet, here were are, several weeks past the start of the hype for Conversion.ai and I’ve been waiting to see if anyone is going to call it for what it is.
And waiting….
Finally.
The only difference between the new stuff and the old stuff is that you no longer have to enter in things like {cheap|inexpensive|low cost|good deal} to spin your content.
This is 100% not the “cheat code” or the “fastest” way to write articles that rank.
Yes, I Tried It
Now, before you call me a hypocrite, you should know that I only took the trial run of Conversion.ai because I don’t like to shit on products/tools/services without having personally tested them out.
So, I signed up for a trial via someone’s affiliate link and got the free 10,000 credits of “content” to take it for a test drive.
You’ll notice that it didn’t take me long to test things out.
I tried the much heralded long form content option.
It’s rubbish.
Is it better than the article spinners that I was using a decade ago? Yes, but that’s not saying much.
You might even be able to rank this shit content that it creates.
Let’s say that you can rank it – then what?
- No one wants to buy a site with that “content”
- How long will it actually stay ranked when it results in poor user experience?
The worst thing I’ve seen to come from this so far is that some people are using it to submit samples for freelance writing gigs….like it’s not obvious that it’s AI-written.
I obviously cancelled my account after this little test drive.
There is one really nice thing about this being the current ‘shiny new object’ that people are obsessed with – those of us who don’t use it are going to see an advantage over those that do.
People don’t return to websites to read AI-written content.
It’s just like with the old school article spinners – they were never a long term play and just a means to a (temporary) end.
Though, I do have to say that Conversion.ai is much more user friendly than the old school spinners.
Final Thoughts
If you’ve been sitting on the sidelines marinating in your own FOMO, then I hope this helps cure you of that.
And remember, there’s one really good reason for all those marketers to be shoving this down your throat.
Recurring 30% commission each month – for lifetime.
And you have to spend at least $109/month to get access to the long form writing assistant.
That’s almost $33 every single month for every single chump they get to sign up for this article spinner. Don’t end up a chump.
The reality for you and me is that there aren’t any real shortcuts to success…unless you end up with a large following where you can promote shit like this (and not feel guilty about it).
The most successful people I know in this industry don’t take shortcuts – they just focus on the basics.
Hey, I’m Shawna. I make a living working from my laptop in places like London, Sydney, Dubai, Rome, Oslo, Bangkok, Las Vegas, Barcelona, and Amsterdam. I share how I do some of that on this website.
I run sites that earn over $100K/month and you are one of the few bloggers I actually read on a regular basis. Most individuals are just complete garbage, but I love your irreverent and down-to-earth approach. I appreciate that you uncover all this shit. Keep up the great work. Thanks again!
hey, happy to know I didn’t get lumped in with the “complete garbage” crowd 🙂
Finally! Somebody has called these whole AI content tools out for what they truly are, glorified article spinners!
I never understand why some in this niche website sphere who work so hard building their reputations with great content are so eager to destroy it by peddling worthless crap for the sake of some fly by night software and the piddly affiliate commissions they may generate.
But then again, I’m in affiliate marketing, need I say more …
haha, yeah, it’s a bit mind boggling. One of the marketers promoting this garbage followed up an email about this with a warning to people to watch out for ‘greedy gurus’ and that gave me a chuckle.
thank you for the information and no BS and you are on savage mode always
or maybe I’m just cranky? 😉
You mentioned Surfer integration with Conversion.ai, do you know how is that integration being used by Surfer?
I’ve been a paying customer of Surfer for a couple of months and so far I regard their tools as genuine assistance for SEO writing, but if they’re partnering with black hat dudes, I may have to confront them seriously (on their Facebook group, I mean).
As always, reading your posts is a relief for me, because I see that our concerns are similar, only that yours have an answer 🙂
There’s a whole webinar on it at https://surferseo.com/blog/surfer-conversion-ai-integration/ (but I didn’t watch it). I don’t know that I’d consider Conversion.ai black hat in the same way as those old school article spinners. I think I’d more consider it just lazy…and maybe a bit stupid? I think it has no place when you’re trying to build a real site, but if someone has set out to build a junk site and see how far it takes them, then it’s a good option 🙂
Yes. It’s a fun experiment. I would not rely on any software to write full articles on any site I care about.
I think the problem is, that it is hyped to do exactly this.
It’s only a tool – that helps to get you going. Nothing more.
If you treat it like this, it has its uses.
You definitely need to proof read everything. It comes up with lots of „alternative facts“ 😉
I set up a site where I use only what conversion.ai produces. I fix the facts, that’s about it …
Let’s see how far this goes
well that should be a fun experiment!
I love the GIF! With all the Google algo updates pushing us towards producing high-quality sites, you’d think people are smarter these days to stay away from stuff like this, eh?
Major LOL seeing big names promoting it in my inbox.
Nailed it Shawna! These ‘tools’ are simply being marketed towards the ClickFunnels-esque crowd which only continues to grow. I only run with Ahrefs and Surfer, keeping it clean and grinding it out. Just as you said: “The most successful people I know in this industry don’t take shortcuts – they just focus on the basics.”
I like that you actually tested it before writing this review but, honestly, in this specific case I don’t think anyone would’ve judged you if you didn’t.
Anyone that’s been in this space long enough would know that automatic content creation software doesn’t really work…the best we got is outsourced writing agencies (that hire native English speakers/writers).
It’s entertaining that article spinners are attempting to make a comeback though!
Devin
WebsiteDesignCapeTown.com
Saw mentions of the tool too on a Facebook group – and it seems like people are divided on the usefulness of these AI writing tools.
Some have embraced them hard.
Some have taken the ‘wait and see’ attitude.
And then there is that small subset that don’t want to upset how they have been running their content business (old school write-for-self or hire-capable-writers).
Am keeping a close eye on the events that’ll unfold over the next few months – waiting to go through posts of people detailing their wins and losses.