Making Ad Videos Without Burning Out: What Actually Helped My Workflow

Leveraging AI to Conquer the "First 10 Minutes" of Ad Production

As someone who creates advertising and marketing videos for a living, I’ve learned that the hardest part isn’t creativity. It’s consistency.
When you’re expected to deliver fresh video content every week—sometimes every day—the process can quietly become exhausting. Briefs get shorter. Timelines get tighter. And suddenly, you’re spending more time assembling videos than thinking about what message they should carry.
This article isn’t about shortcuts or “growth hacks.” It’s about what actually helped me stay productive without lowering my standards, specifically by tackling the initial friction in the creative process.

The Real Bottleneck in Ad Video Production: The Starting Line

For a long time, I assumed editing was my biggest time sink. It wasn’t.
The real problem was starting.
Every ad video begins with dozens of small, often overlooked decisions:

• How long should the hook be?
• Should it feel polished or raw?
• Does this work better as a talking-head style or a screen-based demo?

Individually, these decisions are small. Together, they create significant friction. On average, I noticed I was spending 30–40 minutes just getting to a “first usable version” of a video – a basic structure that I could then build upon.
According to Wyzowl’s Video Marketing Statistics 2024, 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, but lack of time remains the top challenge for creators working on them.

That statistic felt uncomfortably familiar. It highlighted that my personal bottleneck wasn't unique, but a widespread industry challenge.

Why I Started Exploring AI-Assisted UGC Formats (for Rapid Prototyping)

I didn’t start exploring AI tools because I wanted automation for its own sake. I started because I wanted momentum. My goal was to move past that initial decision paralysis and get to a tangible draft faster.
User-generated content (UGC)–style ads work well precisely because they don’t feel overproduced. They rely on pacing, clarity, and relatability more than cinematic polish. This inherent flexibility made them a natural fit for experimenting with new, faster production methods.
This is where the concept of an AI UGC Video Generator became interesting to me—not as a replacement for creative judgment, but as a way to reduce setup time and generate rapid prototypes.
The key shift was mental:
I stopped asking, “Can this tool make the final video?”
and started asking, “Can it help me reach a draft faster, so I can focus on refinement?”

What Worked (and What Didn’t) with AI-Assisted Drafts

In practice, the results were mixed—but undeniably useful for specific parts of my workflow.
What worked for me:

• Rapid structure generation: Quickly getting a rough sequence (e.g., hook → problem → payoff) to establish a foundational timeline.
• Pacing exploration: Testing multiple pacing styles without rebuilding entire timelines from scratch.
• Variant ideation: Exploring creative variations I wouldn’t normally try under tight time pressure, offering new perspectives.

What didn’t work (and required human intervention):

• Genericity: Raw generated scenes sometimes felt too formulaic or generic, lacking a unique brand voice.
• Emotional nuance: Outputs often struggled with subtle emotional cues or highly specific tones required for effective advertising.
• Homogenization risk: Over-reliance on a single generator could make all my outputs feel similar, stifling differentiation.

That matched my experience closely. AI excels at boilerplate; human creativity refines it into something impactful.

A Concrete Example From My Own Workflow

On a recent campaign, I needed five short ad variations for social platforms within a tight deadline. Normally, crafting even initial drafts for these would consume most of a day.
This time, I experimented with an AI UGC Video Generator approach:

1. Drafting with AI: I leveraged the tool to generate initial concept drafts based on my core messaging.
2. Human Curation: From the numerous outputs, I rigorously curated and selected only two structures that genuinely felt authentic and promising.
3. Manual Refinement: I then manually rewrote the scripts to inject my client's unique voice and adjusted the pacing by hand, integrating human-specific timing and emphasis.

End result:

• Time spent on initial drafting dropped by roughly 35%, freeing up critical hours.
• Final videos still felt distinctly “human” and resonated with the target audience.
• Crucially, I had more energy and mental space to refine messaging and strategic angles, rather than rushing through basic edits.

As a side note, one of the many tools I briefly explored for these initial drafts, among others, was Nextify.ai. My goal was primarily to compare different AI-assisted workflows and understand their capabilities for rapid prototyping, rather than committing to a single solution.

Small Pitfalls Worth Noting for AI-Assisted Workflows

This AI-assisted approach isn’t risk-free. Here are a few things I learned the hard way that are crucial for anyone adopting similar methods:

• Always rewrite generated scripts in your own/brand’s voice: AI provides text; you provide tone and authenticity.
• Avoid using the same structure repeatedly: Diversify your prompts and approaches to prevent repetitive content.
• Treat outputs as drafts, not final assets: They are starting points, not polished products. The Content Marketing Institute emphasizes that trust and authenticity are core to effective marketing content—especially in video. Skipping the human refinement step will show in the final product and can undermine audience trust.

Final Thoughts: AI as a Catalyst for Creative Sustainability

AI didn’t make me a better marketer in terms of fundamental strategy or creative vision. Instead, it made my process lighter and more sustainable.
By reducing the friction at the beginning of each project, I could spend more quality time where it truly mattered: refining ideas, testing messages, understanding audience response, and injecting that crucial human touch. That balance is what keeps creative work engaging and prevents burnout in the long run.
If you’re working in ad video production and feeling stuck at the starting line more often than you’d like, it may be worth examining how you begin—and how AI tools, when used judiciously as drafting assistants, can help you gain momentum.