Hello and welcome to another edition of AI versus Marshy.

This newsletter tracks what’s happening in AI and applies a practical filter for our readers.

But don’t take my word for it - here’s what one of our readers said:

“It keeps me up to date with what’s going on in AI, without having to do the heavy searching myself.”

This week we cover:

• Using AI to reverse engineer content trends (h/t Starter Story)
• Figma is coming after Powerpoint - with some backpedalling
• Sprint 3 of TheLeadMagnet.biz

Lots to tuck into this week, so let’s make an Olympic competitor and dive into it.

-Marshy

Using AI to reverse engineer content trends

Via Starter Story.

I did a presentation for Global Sisters earlier in the year teaching women seeking new employment pathways how to use AI to learn more about content.

A copy of the presentation can viewed here.

The main thrust of the presentation was to identify pieces of content you think are good, keep a file of them, and use AI to extract feedback about how to create this sort of content yourself:

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A fancy term for this approach is called reverse engineering.

Uncovering how something works by working backwards.

It’s no surprise that this works very well with AI too.

I’m a member of Starter Story (link above) a community of makers, solopreneurs, and aspiring startup founders who share a lot of creative energy and knowledge sharing.

It’s founded by Pat Walls who shared a video in the community that he was happy for me to share.

Here’s the Loom.

Basically Pat went and looked at a random most popular video on TikTok, grabbed the transcript, comments, and some stills - and then asked ChatGPT to unpack why this video went viral.

The answers add value.

The answers might seem obvious - but when added together create something more valuable.

For this video it suggested:

• a strong hook
• simplicity and accessible to a broad audience
• Step-by-step instructions
• engagement by involving the audience in the process
• an element of surprise
• a call-to-action inviting you to follow more

The comments were helpful too:

• Mixed reactions - being polarising is helpful
• It’s practical - something anyone can learn

Look at the last piece of content you posted online - does it have ALL of these?

Probably not.

Pat then went on to ask how to apply these learnings to his business.

Nearly everyone I coach tells me posting content is FRUSTRATING. They CAN’T DO IT, and I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO SAY.

My pushback to this is consistency solves everything and now tools like the above make it even easier to learn these things even faster with the right mindset.

Thanks for letting me share it Pat 🙏

Figma starting to get AI right (with lessons)

Via Nic Hodges.

If you haven’t hear of Figma - it’s like a Google Document but for design.

Meaning a designer can mock up a visual, and then other designers can add to it or change it, or clients can add comments about what they do and don’t like.

Unlike Google Docs, Figma regularly ships updates and is starting to become a formidable company in its own right (Adobe failed to get past regulatory constraints in its acquisition bid).

I really liked Nic’s point about why their release makes sense:

“One thing Figma has realised is the importance of highly focused points in workflow where AI can make life better in a reliable way (vs. “let’s build AI that writes and produces entire videos”).”

Think of a “workflow” like a process to get something done.

Imagine “buying a gift for Mum”.

I don’t need AI to do every step of this process (and I would hate it).

But I could use AI to help me brainstorm an idea, or help me find the right words to say on a gift card, or find a rare second-hand piece of craft I know she’ll like.

AI works best as a companion in certain parts of a process - not replacing the whole process.

This isn’t easy for big companies.

There’s a bigger story unfolding for Figma regarding how it trains its models.

Its AI generator tool looks like it copies existing apps in the way it builds things - creating a lookalike of Apple’s weather app.

The big issue is copyright - as a layman looking at this, the tools seem to work significantly better when trained on copyrighted content.

Some get around this by combing the open web, Google gets around this by combing YouTube, and I’m sure all of them are training on some level of illegal material in the truest sense of the word.

It’s not clear how illegal this is (it sounds like very), but it’s unclear how to enforce this (near impossible).

I don’t see a solution to this arriving anytime soon - but rest assured tech companies will keep pushing the limits - like Google breaching it’s own climate target because AI requires a lot of power to run.

Sprint 3 - TheLeadMagnet.biz

For those of you new to this project - I’m building a standalone productised service business with AI tools. I believe it can be done, and I’ve committed to weekly sprints to make this reality (and hopefully teach others how to do it down the road).

Here’s some early numbers:

• 296 visitors to date
• 4 interested parties
• 0 formal signups through the software

Setting up the Facebook Ads campaign has been fun - there’s been a lot of changes since I jumped on the tools, and wanted to set things up manually to see what was going to happen and how - I can always add the new features later.

My campaign is going well?

Here’s the numbers:

An average CTR of 4.4% is far higher than what I’m used to seeing.

Funnily enough - a video I recorded post-basketball is performing the best.

There’s a lot of issues to solve for.

I can’t currently can’t track visits to my #applynow section (the way Carrd works), key events are very hard to capture through an iFrame to an Airtable form, and I’ve got no sign-ups yet for a (currently) free offer! 🤣

But I know these are solvable over time and I know I can keep chipping away at this and refining the process.

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That’s it for this week.

Earlier in the week I ticked off some non-urgent but important tasks off my list.

I created a Start Here page for my personal website - so if someone visits they can get help depending on what they’re looking for.

I also added a Media section that includes some of my recent speaking engagements.

Check them out and feel free to reply with any comments or questions if you feel like a chat :)

-Marshy 💪