I hear you. I haven't paid for any bots or joined any groups but there are a few like @followforupvotes that will just randomly upvote their followers. I think I follow 3 like that. And there are bots that follow the photography, steemstem, and music tags.

About this thing they call "quality," I have read a description (going by memory) that says something like 500 words, 3 or more photos, and reference links. Also, you should attribute photos correctly. Those are all things that a bot can find from the post's metadata before a human even looks at your post.