BlockShift

AI Enhancement

After a page is converted, BlockShift can use AI to push it closer to the original design. It’s optional and needs your own Anthropic (Claude) API key. The conversion works fine without it, so think of this as a finishing tool.

There’s one important thing to know up front: you can run it as many times as you like. The first pass does a general clean-up. After that, you can keep refining, telling it exactly what to fix each time, until the page looks right. Each run takes fresh screenshots, so it always works from the page’s current state.

How it works, briefly

When you run a pass, BlockShift captures a screenshot of the original Elementor page and one of the converted page, then sends both images (along with the page’s content) to Claude. The model compares the two and returns adjustments to the layout and styling, which BlockShift applies to the converted page. In effect it looks at the “before” and “after” the way a person would, and closes the gaps.

Because the screenshots are taken from your live pages by an outside service, the pages have to be reachable from the public internet. That’s the one requirement people trip over, so it has its own checklist below.

Before you run it: make your pages reachable

BlockShift runs a quick pre-flight check before every AI pass and stops with a clear reason if something would block it. You’ll save time by getting these right first:

  1. Publish the converted page. A draft or pending page can’t be captured. The page needs to be published.
  2. Remove any password on the page. Password-protected pages can’t be loaded by the screenshot service.
  3. Turn off maintenance / coming-soon mode. If the whole site shows a maintenance screen (a .maintenance file, the WP_MAINTENANCE_MODE setting, or a coming-soon plugin), the service only sees that screen. Disable it while you run the pass.
  4. Use a public site, not local. Local addresses can’t be reached from the outside: localhost, 127.0.0.1, private IPs like 192.168.x.x or 10.x.x.x, and dev domains ending in .local, .test, .internal, .invalid, or .example. If you’re developing on your own machine (for example XAMPP), run AI Enhancement on a live or staging site instead.
  5. Don’t hide the page behind a login or HTTP password. If the page returns an error or a login wall (any HTTP status of 400 or higher), the service can’t see it. Check that a logged-out visitor can open the page in a normal browser.

A couple of quieter ones worth checking if a run fails:

  • Valid HTTPS. The checks verify SSL, so a broken or self-signed certificate can get in the way.
  • Outbound internet from your server. Your host must allow the server to make outgoing requests to Anthropic and to the screenshot service. Some locked-down hosts block this by default.

The quickest sanity test: open the converted page in a private/incognito window while logged out. If you can see it there, the screenshot service almost certainly can too.

Set up your API key

  1. Create an account at the Anthropic Console.
  2. Add billing and generate an API key.
  3. Paste it into BlockShift → Settings and save. See Settings.

Anthropic bills your own account for what you use, based on how many pages you run and how large they are.

Running it, step by step

  1. Convert at least one page in the Conversion Wizard.
  2. Make sure that page meets the reachability checklist above (published, public, no password).
  3. Open BlockShift → AI Enhancement. You’ll see your converted pages, each with its source page and when it was last enhanced.
  4. To do a single page, use its Enhance with AI action. To do several, tick them and use Bulk Enhance with AI. A short pre-flight check runs first and gives you a rough idea of how many API calls the run will make.
  5. Wait for the pass to finish (it runs in the background). When it’s done, open the page in the block editor, or view it on the front end, to see the result.

It works on regular pages and on converted header and footer template parts.

Running it again to get it right

One pass often isn’t the end of it, and that’s expected. If a section still isn’t quite right, run it again. On a page’s enhancement view you can add a focus instruction, a short note in plain language telling the AI what to concentrate on, for example:

  • “The hero heading should be larger and centred.”
  • “Tighten the spacing between the pricing cards.”
  • “Match the button colour to the original.”

Each refine pass takes new screenshots of the current page, applies your instruction, and updates the page. Repeat as many times as you need. There’s no limit beyond your own Anthropic usage.

What gets sent, and where

Only when you start a pass, and only for the pages you chose:

DataDestinationWhy
Public URL of the page + device flagProgressus screenshot serviceTo capture before/after screenshots
Converted content, prompts, screenshot URLs, your API keyAnthropic (Claude)To compare designs and suggest fixes

Nothing is sent if no key is configured. Full detail is on the External Services & Privacy page.

When it’s worth it

The AI pass earns its keep on complex layouts where the automatic conversion is close but not exact. Simple pages usually convert well enough to fix by hand in a minute, so there’s no need to spend on them. Results depend on how complicated a page is, so always look over the outcome before publishing.

See also: After Conversion and Troubleshooting.