Profitable growth in a post-identifier world | UGC & video ad creative production to drive ROAS & scale

I help mobile app companies–including gaming companies like Applovin, East Side Games, Jam City and Scopely, and apps like Bumble, Lingokids, Mojo and FitMind(among others) –acquire new users and achieve profitable, scalable growth in a Generative-AI world.

Offering both managed user acquisition services and done-for-you creative production for teams running their own ads, our clients have continued to not only grow after Apple’s privacy changes, and many have seen their ROAS improve by an avg. of 20-40%.

The secret to our clients’ success is the combination of our deep expertise from having produced 10k+ ads and managed over $100M in ad spend, and our ability to rapidly produce UGC and video ads at volume that can be used to dial in exactly what works, and discard what does not.

📹 HOW WE DO IT📹 

Leveraging a combination of both human and AI creators, we’re able to rapidly produce UGC & video ads that are based on rock solid strategy and research. By testing 50+ (or more) variants a month even at small budgets with our signature rapid testing and iteration process, we’re able to rapidly isolate key elements of winning UGC. This is essential, with our data showing that the tiniest changes can lead to outsized performance.

💻AI VIDEO YOU ASK?💻

Yes, AI video. Now not just AI video, we use both human and AI creators. With the advent of AI we’ve been able to rapidly scale and test in a way we could not before. While many in the industry worry that AI 
Creative appears robotic and doesn't invoke emotion, we’ve found it depends on the inputs you give and the strategy behind your ads. 

📈 RESULTS CREATED📈 

-70% ROAS uplift and 69% CPI improvement for Adventure Communist, an idle-clicking game.

-Tested 100+ creatives for Games2Win, drove 350K+ installs, and 100% increase in ROAS.

-Unlocked month on month growth for hampr, a hyperlocal laundry app while improving cost per purchaser by 55%.

🏎GET STARTED🏎

Reach out here on LinkedIn to get a free consultation on leverage AI-fueled creative production to supercharge your growth.

Email us at: hi@rocketshiphq.com

Shamanth M. Rao

🧠 This is the breakthrough that made AI headshot generation possible

📍 We often think of AI progress as magic - but it’s really a story of simple extrapolation.

I spoke to Rohan Khadatkar, Head of Marketing at InstaHeadshots, on Intelligent Artifice, about how one key technological leap unlocked the entire category of realistic AI headshots.

Here’s how he explained it 👇

ChatGPT made “text to text” easy to grasp.

You type a prompt (text input) and get an intelligent text output. 💬➡️💬

Now, extend that same logic - 
🖼️ text → image
🎵 text → music
🎙️ text → voice

That’s where the next wave of AI breakthroughs began.

In the text-to-image world, the first big leap came when researchers built models that could take a text description - say “a red apple on a table” - and generate a photo-realistic image that looked like a real apple. 🍎

The next leap - the one that made AI headshot generation possible - was even bigger.

It was the ability to take just 8-10 images of a person and train a model to learn their identity. 🧩

Once that became possible, tools could generate realistic portraits that looked like the same person - across different poses, styles, and lighting.

That was the foundation on which the 2023 headshot generation revolution was built. 🚀

From a few sample photos → to a full digital identity.

A tiny dataset - a massive leap.

🎧 Full conversation with Rohan Khadatkar on Intelligent Artifice:
https://lnkd.in/dKSbwGJG

🚀 20-40% ROAS increase for mobile apps in 60 days | AI-fueled UGC & video ad creative production 📹 | 3x Exits | $100m+ ad spend | Meta, Google, TikTok partner

📬 I analyzed 70 ads for Fyxer AI ($17mm ARR AI app)

52% of their ads focus on this BIG emotional trigger….

Relief from overwhelm:

→ Inbox zero before 9am
→ "Drowning in emails?"
→ How I sleep knowing my emails are drafted and organized.

Which probably means... it's working. 

But there's more going on behind the scenes - so I ran it through my Sherlock Holmes Investigator Agent. 

It analyzed every single frame and conducted semantic analysis across the entire ad library - and then I checked it against what I was seeing manually. 

This is how their ads break down:

📝 𝗡𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗙𝗹𝗼𝘄
↳ Problem → AI solution → transformation
↳ Storytelling showing time saved and productivity gained

💢 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺s
↳ Endless unread emails draining focus
↳ Feeling buried in work emails
↳ Losing hours to inbox triage

⏳ 𝗨𝗿𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆
↳ "Experience inbox zero by 9am"
↳ "Start your free trial"
↳ "Overdue replies"

📈 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆
↳ "Start your free trial, no card required"
↳ User testimonials and trust markers

🌸 𝗔𝘀𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀
↳ Get to inbox zero by 9am.
↳ Calm mornings and nights.
↳ Get more done without opening another tab

In our full breakdown, I share insights from the ad analysis our system ran, including:

✅ Effortless productivity: "Inbox Zero in minutes, not hours"
✅ Liberation from overload: "Reclaim your time from endless emails"
✅ Smart automation: "Your AI that manages replies while you focus on real work"

Full Notion analysis is here: https://lnkd.in/dsZ7S86c

And if you want me to analyze your competitors ad libraries and see what angles we can find... drop me a DM / email: shamanth@rocketshiphq.com

Happy to run a few for free.

𝗜 𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗹𝘆𝘇𝗲𝗱 𝟱𝟬+ 𝗕𝗮𝗯𝗯𝗲𝗹 𝗮𝗱𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲-𝗯𝘆-𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲 with AI. Every subscription app founder going into Q5/Q1 should internalize these 5 learnings.

When I ran them through 𝗕𝗿𝘂𝘁𝗲𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗰𝗲 𝗔𝗜 frame-by-frame, I found 5 psychology patterns that drive their wins.

𝟭. 𝗔𝘁𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗲𝘁𝗶𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝗪𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗩𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗱 𝗔𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗲𝘀 
↳ "Switching from my old language app felt like going from a rustmobile to a Ferrari" 
↳ They reference 'gamified apps' without naming competitors.

𝟮. 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝗰𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗲 𝗧𝗶𝗺𝗲𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘀 
↳ "Have real conversations in three weeks" 
↳ Not "learn fast" 
↳ Not "fluent soon"
Three weeks feels achievable but ambitious.

They show it across formats. 
↳Suspense hooks. 
↳Interactive ads. 
↳ Before/after split screens with date labels.

𝟯. 𝗛𝗮𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗢𝗻𝗲 𝗖𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗮𝗹 
↳ "Built by 200+ language experts" 
↳ They repeat this across every ad format 
↳ Travel testimonials, creator POV, competitor contrasts

Repetition compounds trust.

𝟰. 𝗘𝗺𝗽𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗶𝘇𝗲 𝗘𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀 
↳ "You only need 10 minutes a day"
↳ Morning coffee rituals
↳ Freelancer on the go 
↳ Pre-work routines

They show real people fitting lessons into everyday life.
Removes excuses before they form.

𝟱. 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗲 𝗣𝘀𝘆𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘆 

↳ "The pronunciation is too good" 
↳ Frame benefits as complaints
↳ "I regret learning too fast"
Every ‘complaint’ is actually a flex.

It subverts expectations. Makes benefits more memorable.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗶𝗴𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗻:
Show them what life looks like after switching. Make the contrast impossible to ignore.

That's why these ads work longer and power Babbel's creative engine that has driven 18 million subscribers.

Want the full breakdown with actual examples you can apply?

Drop "𝗕𝗔𝗕𝗕𝗘𝗟" in the comments 👇

I'll send you the complete analysis.

Sovran

Creative is king. We’re building modular performance video software to enable growth marketers to run video ad experiments without slow, costly, and error-prone manual work. 

I’ve been a growth marketer and creative strategist at Calm and Cash app. I’ve briefed over 4,473 performance video ads.

As marketers, we all know to constantly be testing hooks, messages, ad types, copywriting frameworks, and visual concepts.

Most video ads created don’t follow the proven structure of hook → body → call to action. 

If you don’t know how to structure a performance video ad, then you don’t know what to change to improve its performance.

Sovran lets you mix-and-match your hook, body, audio, and call to action clips to find the optimal video ad variations. Each variation comes with its unique naming convention so you don’t lose track of learnings.

“I am so happy that we use the Sovran platform. It took our designers an hour to create one variation. Now even creative managers can do it, and just for 10-15 minutes, we have 2-3 resizes. So it’s 4 times faster with Sovran.” - Viktoriia Niemaia, Creative Marketing Team Lead, GeoZilla 

“I created a bunch of variations last week and a handful have outperformed the control significantly. Saving tons of time!” - Nabeel Ismail, Paid Social Director, Factor

Book a meeting with me directly at https://calendly.com/mansonchen/30

Send me an email directly at: manson@sovran.ai

Founder

Parabolica

Before we came onboard, ROAS averaged 0.60 the last 3 weeks of April.


Unsustainable.


Their ad account was plagued by the usual:

- Too many active ads per ad set at their daily budget
- Running unprofitable products
- Too many audience types
- No testing campaign


What we did:

+ Reactivated historically good products
+ Consolidated the account structure
+ Paused historically bad products
+ Reactivated strong ads

Rocket science? No.
Simple media-buying fundamentals.

The result?:

1️⃣ ROAS increased 155%, from 0.58 to 1.48.
2️⃣ Spend increased 90%, from $5,838.67 to $11,134.45.
3️⃣ They can refocus on making the world a happier and healthier place.

Cash App

Led performance creative strategy team at Cash App
Data-driven creative concepting and iteration on paid social, UAC, mobile programmatic

Growth Marketing Lead, Creative Strategy

Calm

Paid Social Growth & Performance Creative Strategy

FB/IG iOS, Android, Web
International (ES, DE, FR, PT, KR, JP)

Growth Marketing

Smartly.io

Clients included - Uber, DoorDash, StubHub, Fabletics

Pod Lead - Managed Services

We are on a mission to make online advertising easy, efficient, and enjoyable across all major platforms. Easy as in automated, efficient as in constantly driving performance, and enjoyable through the best user experience and service in the market. We do this by combining creative automation, ad operations, and outstanding customer service to help brands scale their results – not headcount.

Great people choose us and stay with us because they like our company culture and how we tackle challenges of huge scale at speed. Learn more about how we work at smartly.io/culturehandbook.

Accomplishments
Scale Pinterest paid social operations for TechStyle brands to ~$1MM/mo
Drive product development of Smartly's nascent Pinterest ad buying platform 
Developed custom script to streamline Pinterest ad optimization workflow 
Management of Facebook branding/direct response strategies across accounts including Uber, DoorDash, and StubHub

Sr. Customer Success Manager, Managed Services

Dstillery

- Manage and nurture largest west coast customers through day to day communication and programmatic display expertise
- Partner with Account Executives and nurtured spend on key accounts by 5x YoY and 40% QoQ respectively
- Present quarterly business reviews to top west coast customers 
- Collect customer feedback and work with Product team to prioritize new features
- Provide best practice and use cases for internal and external end users on new platform features

Customer Success Manager

Brand Networks

- Develop, execute and optimize $500K+ monthly budget advertising initiatives for Realtor.com, LiveNation, New York Times, Marriott, Starwood
- Provide media planning, strategy, analysis, and post-buy reviews
- Maintain trusting relationships with clientele and ensuring satisfaction to keep Brand Networks top of mind for new business
- Collaborate cross-functionally (Customer Success and Professional Services) on plan execution including ad development and selection

Manager, Media Services

Applied Analytix

- Develop and maintain IBM Cognos TM1 databases (developed Sony Playstation’s Supply Chain Model, Portola Pharmaceuticals’ Finance/Forecasting Model)
- Lead training classes for clients (1-5 people) on how to use IBM Cognos TM1 software
- Program custom scripts using the built-in ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) tool, ‘Turbo Integrator’, to move data from SQL databases into TM1
- Build custom, automated, Excel reports using TM1 as the backend database (P&L, Net Income, Headcount, Balance Sheet, etc)
- Wrote user-friendly documentation detailing how different components interact within the TM1 database

Database Implementation Consultant

Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce

Business Administration Intern

Founder, Sovran.ai | Make winning video ads 4x faster by remixing your clips without a big team. Automating modular video ads.

✔︎ What does Sovran do?

Creative is king. Sovran is a self-serve platform that enables you to scale multivariate video ad tests without compromising on quality.

✔︎  How does it help?

Our software allows you to upload video building blocks to combine into variations to increase creative production, testing speed, and efficient scale.

✔︎  What users are saying

“I am so happy that we use the Sovran platform. It took our designers an hour to create one variation. Now even creative managers can do it, and just for 10-15 minutes, we have 2-3 resizes. So it’s 4 times faster with Sovran.” - Viktoriia Niemaia, Creative Marketing Team Lead, GeoZilla

“I created a bunch of variations last week and a handful have outperformed the control significantly. Saving tons of time!” - Nabeel Ismail, Paid Social Director, Factor

✔︎  Interested in learning more:

Book a meeting with me directly at https://calendly.com/mansonchen/30
Send me an email directly at: manson@sovran.ai

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