IMIT Solutions: Technology Services
Integrating AI into your workflows.
IMIT Solutions: Technology Services
Integrating AI into your workflows.
AI Generated Reviews are Bad for Your Business
Kyle Souza, owner and founder of IMIT Solutions here with a personal note…
I was scrolling through my news feed the other day and was stopped by this ad. It not just saddened me, it offended me. Wedged in between archeology and Android articles was a headline that caught my attention and infuriated me. Take a look:
What I took away from this ad is that they use AI to generate reviews for your business on Google.
I’m not here to bash a specific company, so I’ve obfuscated the advertisement some. What I really want to do here is talk about the principle behind why this is so upsetting to me.
Reviews are the Internet Version of Word-of-Mouth
They help us decide where to eat, which repair company to trust, or what software to invest in. When we can’t ask a friend or colleague, we rely on the endorsement and warnings of others who were so impressed, dissatisfied, or meh-fully inclined to share their experiences with businesses online. I’ve heard that for every person that complains there are two who didn’t and that people are five times more likely to leave a negative review than they are a positive one. I’ve also heard that 68.4% of statistics are made up on the spot… All jokes aside, the fact is that people are way more likely to complain than they are to compliment a business online. But companies need good reviews; good reviews don’t just boost visibility — they build credibility. A business earns those five stars through hard work and quality service, and customers give them in good faith, knowing their input could help someone else.
But here’s the catch: Reviews only work when they are real!
When a company uses a GPT to generate reviews instead of receiving them, it’s crossing a line. It’s not just a marketing shortcut, it’s a deception. It misleads the public and drowns out the honest voices of actual customers with synthetic praise. Imagine choosing a contractor because of glowing reviews, only to realize later that none of them were written by people who’d actually worked with them. It’s not just dishonest, this kind of practice chips away at the very foundation of online trust. If AI-generated reviews become the norm, how can we tell which businesses truly deliver value and which ones are just good at gaming the system? It punishes the honest and rewards the manipulative.
I’m a big fan of artificial intelligence, I use it daily to streamline processes, automate tedious work, and find insights faster. But AI should not replace integrity. There’s a big difference between using AI to analyze reviews and using it to fabricate them.
So, to anyone thinking about using a service like this: Please don’t! Invest that energy into creating experiences worth talking about. Ask real customers for their feedback. Build a reputation that’s earned, not a facade. And I hope Google is able to get a handle on this kind of thing. They already have rules about not doing it, and it is even illegal to do, but there has to be more than just rules against something, businesses need to not participate. Once trust is lost, it’s nearly impossible to get back.
P.S. – Maybe I’m overreacting and that isn’t exactly what this specific ad was advertising, but if not, I think their ad is misleading and they are, at best, operating in a moral and legal grey area.