ad-creative

Trigger phrases

Phrases that activate this skill when typed to Claude Code:

• write me some ads
• generate ad headlines
• RSA headlines
• ad copy variations
• iterate on this ad creative

What it does

ad-creative is a Claude Code skill from Corey Haines’s marketing-skills repo. It turns Claude into a performance creative strategist whose job is producing dozens of on-spec ad variations and iterating against real performance data. The skill activates when you mention “ad copy variations”, “generate headlines”, or “I need more ad variations”, and produces output validated against each platform’s character limits.

The output of a session is a structured set of headlines, descriptions, and primary text grouped by angle (pain point, outcome, social proof, contrarian, etc.) with character counts shown inline, plus a CSV-ready dump for direct upload to Google or Meta when you want bulk import.

When to use it

Reach for it when:

• You’re spinning up new RSAs and need 15 headlines that don’t all rhyme
• Your existing ads have 30 days of performance data and you want to iterate from winners
• You’re refreshing creative across multiple platforms and don’t want to re-derive specs

When not to reach for it:

• You haven’t written your value proposition yet — the skill amplifies clarity, it doesn’t generate it
• You want one perfect headline rather than thirty viable ones — this is a volume tool

Install

The skill is distributed via Corey Haines’s marketing-skills repo. Install via the repo’s recommended path — copy the ad-creative SKILL.md into your project’s .claude/skills/ad-creative/ directory, or use the repo’s plugin install if you’ve set it up.

Once installed, the skill activates on the trigger phrases above. The first time it runs, it will check for .agents/product-marketing-context.md (or .claude/product-marketing-context.md) — populating that file with your product context first dramatically improves output quality across all of Haines’s marketing skills.

What a session looks like

A typical session has three phases:

1. Angle definition. Claude pushes back if you ask for “30 headlines” before establishing 3–5 distinct angles — pain point, outcome, social proof, contrarian, identity, etc. Each angle becomes a generation lane.
2. Generation in waves. Wave 1: core angles, ~5 variations each. Wave 2: extensions on top angles. Wave 3: wild cards. Every line gets a character count and a flag if it’s over limit.
3. Iteration from data (optional). Paste in CTR/CVR data and the skill identifies winning patterns, generates new variations on those themes, and proposes which to retire.

The discipline that makes it work: angles before words, character counts inline, and the “RSA headlines must work in any combination” constraint enforced at output time.

Receipts

Honest reporting on what ad-creative produces and where it has limits:

Where it works well:

• Volume — the angle-first structure produces variety, not 30 paraphrases of the same line
• Spec validation prevents the “headline 11 is 32 chars, rejected by Google” round-trip
• Iteration mode actually uses your data instead of generating fresh from scratch

Where it backfires:

• On highly regulated verticals (finance, health) where claims need legal review the skill happily generates lines that need heavy editing
• It can lean on numbers (“3x faster”, “10,000+ teams”) even when you don’t have those numbers — review every claim before launch

Pattern that works: define your three strongest angles before invoking. The skill’s output quality tracks angle quality directly — vague angles in, vague headlines out.

Source and attribution

Originally written by Corey Haines. The canonical SKILL.md and any supporting files live in the ad-creative folder of his marketing-skills repository.

License: MIT. You can install, adapt, and redistribute the skill, with attribution preserved.

This page documents the skill from a practitioner’s perspective. For the formal spec and any updates, defer to the source repo.