The Creative & UGC Guide

I have spent more than twelve years running creative for paid ads, and the single biggest change in that time is where the leverage sits. It used to live in targeting and bidding. Today the platforms handle most of that for you, and the creative is the part you still fully control. That is why I tell every team the same thing: your ads are your new targeting. The image, the first three seconds, the words a real person says on camera. That is what decides who sees you and whether they stop.

This guide is the version of that lesson I wish someone had handed me early on. It covers how I think about angles, how I write hooks, how I structure an ad, how I find and brief UGC creators, and how I build a testing system that reliably surfaces winners instead of guessing. Everything here is written for the US market and the platforms you actually buy on. Read it once end to end, then keep it open while you build your next batch.