AI Tools I Actually Use and the Ones I Dropped

In this episode of Imperfect Marketing, I’m pulling back the curtain on how I’ve actually been using AI in my day-to-day marketing work—beyond the hype, beyond the shiny tools. I share what’s in my current tech stack, what didn’t live up to expectations, and what genuinely made me more efficient (and what didn’t). 

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by the constant stream of new AI tools, this episode will help you cut through the noise and focus on what actually matters.

The Reality of Today’s AI Landscape

•  New AI tools are launching constantly—sometimes faster than we can evaluate them 
•  It’s easy to get distracted by “shiny object syndrome” 
•  You don’t need every tool—you need the right tool for the job 
•  The goal isn’t to use AI everywhere, but to use it where it truly helps 

What’s in My Current AI Stack

I break down the tools I’m consistently using and why:

• Claude: My main workhorse for writing, strategy, and even presentations 
• Perplexity: Go-to for research, comparisons, and step-by-step answers 
• ChatGPT: Primarily for building and sharing custom GPTs with clients 
• NotebookLM: Powerful for handling large amounts of context and research 
• Built-in AI (Loom, Riverside): Helpful for content production workflows 

Surprising AI Tools Worth Exploring

Some tools exceeded expectations:

• Branding 5: A strong positioning tool that helps clarify messaging 
• Vocable AI: Useful for generating social content ideas (especially for clients) 
• NanoBanana Pro: Solid for image generation 
• Claude for presentations: Surprisingly powerful—even rivaling tools like Gamma 

What Didn’t Work (or Didn’t Stick)

Not every tool is a win—and that’s okay:

• AI assistants that lacked context or usefulness 
• Asana AI: Underwhelming (possibly due to limited input/context) 
• Ubooks: Poor experience for nonfiction writing 
• Gamma.app: Still useful, but possibly being replaced by Claude 
• Microsoft Copilot: More of a habit issue than a tool issue 

Key insight: Sometimes it’s not the tool—it’s fit, timing, or how you’re using it.

How to Actually Use AI Effectively

•  Test tools on real work, not demo projects 
•  Compare tools against each other to find the best fit 
•  Give tools a fair shot—but don’t force them into your workflow 
•  The best tools become invisible—they just work

AI Isn’t Replacing You—It’s Enhancing You

•  AI won’t replace thinking—it enhances it 
•  Use AI for: 
  •  Brainstorming 
  •  Strategy pressure-testing 
  •  “Shadow boxing” ideas to find gaps 
•  Your expertise and judgment still matter more than ever 

Practical Advice to Get Started

If you’re feeling stuck or overwhelmed:

•  Pick one task that drains you each week 
•  Test one AI tool on that task 
•  Don’t try five tools at once 
•  Give yourself permission to drop what doesn’t work 

Key Takeaways

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Transcript

Welcome And The AI Flood

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Hi, I'm Kendrick Corman. If you're a coach, consultant, or marketer, you know marketing is far from a perfect science. And that's why this show is called Imperfect Marketing. Join me and my guests as we explore how to grow your business with marketing tips and, of course, lessons learned along the way. Hello and welcome back to another episode of Imperfect Marketing. I'm your host, Kendra Corman. Today we're going to talk about how I tested AI on my marketing and what stuck, and a little bit about what didn't. AI tools are coming out, it feels like every day. I do a lot on AppSumo, if you're not familiar with it. It gives you some bootstrap creators that are building apps and programs and some just really cool things that you can buy at discounted prices to try it out. Hopefully it lasts, is the key, right? But things are coming out on an almost minute-by-minute basis, it feels like. It's overwhelming. Some people are running to the shininiest object. Some people are sticking with the core tools and not leaving Chat GPT or Gemini or Claude, whatever their go-to favorite is. So today I'm going to talk a little bit about what I'm actually using, what flopped, and what surprised me. So let's go ahead and take a look at what's in my regular rotation. And when it comes to my regular rotation, Claude is my main workhorse. I talk about him all the time. He is my BFF, he is my best friend writer, writing strategy thinking partner, and now presentations. So one of the really cool things about Claude that I accidentally stumbled upon was that he can do presentations. And it was actually pretty cool. And the presentations are almost as good, if not better, than what I can get in gamma, which we'll talk about gamma in a second. But perplexity, love it for step-by-step how-tos. How do I? How do I do that? What is this versus this? Right. Gives me sources for everything. Love it, love it, love it. ChatGPT, sadly enough, I don't use it that much for as much as I should, but I do use it a lot to create custom GPTs to share with clients. In Claude, I can't share the projects the same way I share custom GPTs in Chat GPT. So I do use that when I need things that are uh forward-facing, um, client-facing, open to others, that type of thing. Notebook LM. I know I'm and I've been anti-Google for a long time on the whole AI thing because they felt that we weren't ready for it. And it was too much power to give us. And it is a lot of power to give us. But notebook LM is pretty cool. All right. It the context that you can give it, the information, the videos, the translate, just the amount of context that it can take and absorb is just unbelievable. And I love it. Um, I'm working on my doctorate right now, and I am collecting research um in preparation a little bit for my dissertation. And that is all part of it. So again, each of these tools have different strengths and weaknesses, right? Um, I was recently asked by someone about perplexity. If they do perplexity pro and they have access to all these models, do they really need these separate models? And the answer is no. But you don't get access to custom GPTs, Claude projects, the GPT store, and all those different things. So if you're using things natively within that AI system, you're still going to want to keep them, unfortunately. The thing though that I think is important to note is you don't need one tool, right? Yes, I use Claude for 90% of a lot of what I do, but that's because it fits what I do. You need the right tool for the right job. And I think that keeping that in mind is really important and figuring out how to do it without going broke is another one. So let's talk a little bit about some tools that surprised me. So this was a Ab Sumo purchase. It's called branding five, the number five. And it is a positioning tool that asks the right questions. I love it, right? The output actually has your content in it. It can supplement with AI if you don't know the answer. But if you know who your target audience is, if you know your values, if you know your brand archetype, if you know your vision and mission and things like that, it will actually do a really, really good job of summarizing it and putting it together and giving you a great picture of your organization and how it goes. Vocable AI, I've been using. Um, that's pretty good for some ideas on social posts. Um, I haven't, I know and understand my strategy. And so it's sometimes a lot easier for me not to use it, but to create campaigns for clients, it's actually pretty cool. And then I can use Claude Projects to rewrite what it comes up with me uh for me there. I love my built-in projects, Loom, Riverside. They all have AI built in. Um, those are all great. Um, a couple other systems I've been using Nana Banana Pro, Gamma.app. Again, I think Claude is going to be taking over my gamma.app, unfortunately. I can't edit as easily. So I'll point that out. I cannot edit a Claude presentation as easily as I can a gamma presentation. But I really like the looks of it. I even gave it screenshots the other day and said, put this in the presentation after it outlined the presentation with me. This goes on slide two, this one goes on slide four, and this one goes on slide six. And it inserted the screenshots. So cool. So I loved it. Yeah, Nana Banana Pro for images. So all of these different AI systems that I'm using all have different purposes and different things that they'll do for me. The thing to keep in mind is that the AI tools shouldn't and don't replace your thinking. They ask questions, so it's still your content, just faster. You're more efficient and effective, right? It doesn't need you. I was I was watching a guy uh that I follow on in the AI space on TikTok, and he was saying that basically all the jobs are going away in the knowledge industry or knowledge economy and yes and no, right? But one of the things that he did say that was going to be going away faster than other places are the jobs that coordinate between departments. That's where AI is going to take apart a place. So when you're thinking, right, when you're adding knowledge, when you're creating knowledge, when you're leveraging your expertise and really thinking and letting AI help you, that's not going away. So let's move on now to what flopped or just didn't stick, right? Um, I had several AI assistants. They were terrible. Asana's AI, I'm not a huge fan. It could be user error, to be honest with you. Um, I just I don't, maybe I don't give it enough context or well, I know I don't give it enough context, but it's supposed to be able to make subtasks and task descriptions off of what I give it. I don't really give it a lot, I guess. So it doesn't give me a very good output. Um, I tried a tool called UBooks, which is supposed to help you write nonfiction books. That was a hot mess. That was horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible. Went back into Claude, wrote the book that I wanted to write, and much, much better. Like I said, gamma.app might be on the chopping block because of Claude's ability to build presentations. Copilot from Microsoft. I do like it. I like how it's integrated. I like the safety and security of the Microsoft licensing. I don't think it's a tool problem for me, though. It's a habit problem. So let's be honest about that. It's a habit issue. I'm going to Claude not to uh not to copilot to really do some of the things that I think it should help me be able to do. One thing I want to point out though is not every failure that I've had with AI tools is the tools' fault. Probably a lot of times. Sometimes it's fit, sometimes it's timing, sometimes it's just me, right? And I just I don't wanna. So um something to keep in mind as you're going through different AI tools. A couple things I've learned while testing AI tools. Test them on real stuff, not demo projects, right? Um, it gives you a much better result. I also like to test them against each other. That's fantastic. Um, I recommend giving the tool a fair shot, but don't force it. If it's not working, don't worry about it. The best tools are gonna disappear in your workflow. And that's okay, right? You're not even gonna think about them. For writing is obvious because that's what the chat GPTs of the world started with. But AI for thinking and strategy where things get interesting, having it poke holes and ideas, pressure test your strategy is just, I think one of my friends called it shadow boxing, right? He's an attorney. Shadow box with the AI to find out are there any holes or any things that you that you didn't come up with or or mention? So this is all fine and dandy, right? But what should you do with all this? I I'd pick one task that drains you every week. You know there's one, right? That when you've done it, you're like, I need to go for a walk, I need to like clear my head, I need to go out for drinks and happy hour afterwards. Test an AI tool on it. See if it can help take that drain off of you. Do not try five tools at once, try one, okay? Because that's a big key. Unless you're already using one and you're like, something needs to be able to be better because I don't use it for this, and you want to try it against each other. That's always fun. I like pitting Chat GPT and Claude against each other sometimes. And then give yourself permission to drop what's not working. If Claude doesn't work for you or ChatGPT doesn't work for you, that's okay. You don't have to use the same tools as everybody else. Because the goal isn't to use AI everywhere, it's to use it where it actually helps. So I hope that this gave you some insight. Let me go ahead and give you a little bit of a summary again of where I'm at. I gotta look at my notes here. So love Claude. He is my main workforce. I pay$100 a month for him. I am looking into Claude Code. Um, and I have not been brave enough yet on Claude co-work, but it is on the list. I do love perplexity for research and how-tos, chat GPT, again, to share those custom GPTs, usually that I build in a project with Claude. Out to clients, notebook LM for larger projects with a lot more context. Branding five, a little surprise there on the positioning. I would say it's definitely highly niche and very specific for marketing agencies. I don't know if I would invest if I was just a single person. Vocable AI, been pretty happy with that one. Bloom Riverside, uh, Nana Banana Pro, Gamma.app, all the things. So fantastic. Just a list of those good ones. The not so good ones, again, Asana's AI. Again, I think it's user error, UBooks, horrible experience, gamma.app, Microsoft's Copilot. Again, I think that one's a habit issue for me. But overall, that's my tech stack. And that's a little bit of an insight and a whirlwind as to what I'm using, how I'm using, and why I'm using it now. Thank you so much for tuning in. Have a great rest of your day.