Everyone's talking about AI generated UGC right now. And most of them are focused on the wrong thing.
The conversation keeps going back to AI avatars. Fake faces reading scripts, digital humans delivering your pitch on camera. The tools are getting better but here's the reality. You spend hours tweaking prompts, burning through tokens, adjusting lip sync, and the end result still looks off. People can tell. And in crypto, where trust is everything, "slightly off" is enough to kill your credibility.
But there's another side of AI UGC that most people are sleeping on. No face content. Slideshows, screen recordings, product walkthroughs, text overlay videos, POV clips. This is the format that's actually performing right now, and it's where AI genuinely shines.
The Problem with AI Avatars
Let's be direct. AI avatars are not the play for crypto TikTok.
The time and money you spend trying to get an AI avatar to look natural, sound natural, and not trigger the uncanny valley response is rarely worth it. You're spending hundreds of dollars in tokens per video, iterating five or six times to get something passable, and the end result still underperforms content from a real creator.
The ROI just doesn't make sense. For the cost of getting one AI avatar video to an acceptable standard, you could produce five to ten pieces of no face content that actually convert. The math is simple and it keeps pointing in the same direction.
On top of that, crypto audiences are some of the most sceptical on the internet. They've been burned by scams, rug pulls, and fake endorsements. When they see an AI generated face promoting a token or a platform, they don't engage. They scroll.
For the cost of one passable AI avatar video, you could produce 5 to 10 pieces of no face content that actually convert.
Why No Face AI Content Is the Real Opportunity
No face UGC removes the biggest problem with AI generated content, which is that it looks fake. When there's no AI generated human on screen, the audience doesn't have anything to trigger that instinctive distrust. Instead they're focused on the information, the visuals, and the hook.
The formats that are working right now include slideshows with strong hooks and text overlays, screen recordings of apps and platforms with AI voiceover, POV style clips showing product features or wallet interactions, and compilation style videos with data visualisations or charts. These are all formats where AI excels because it can produce variations at speed, handle the voiceover, generate captions, and optimise for different platforms automatically.
And the numbers back it up. Campaigns running no face AI content are seeing up to 47% higher click through rates compared to traditional branded creatives. Production costs drop to as low as $5 to $10 per video when you remove the need for human talent or avatar refinement. Some campaigns have seen CPMs as low as $2 to $3, which is significantly below the industry average for crypto. And because you can produce ten variations in the time it takes to get one avatar video right, you find your winning creative faster and scale it before the algorithm moves on.
The conversion side is strong too. UGC style ads consistently drive 29% more web conversions than traditional brand content. When you pair that with the speed and cost efficiency of AI produced no face content, the ROI gap between this approach and AI avatars becomes massive.
Why You Need Both AI Content and Real Creators
Here's what most people get wrong. They think it's either AI or creators. In reality the best performing campaigns use both, and each one makes the other work harder.
Real creators bring credibility. When a trusted crypto native creator talks about your project, that carries weight with their audience. It builds the kind of trust that no AI generated video can replicate, no matter how good the production is. That creator content becomes your high trust anchor.
AI generated no face content brings volume. It lets you test dozens of hooks, angles, and formats at a fraction of the cost. It keeps your content velocity high so the algorithm always has fresh material to push. And when one of those AI pieces takes off, it creates a wave of visibility that makes your creator content reach even further.
The two feed each other. Creator content builds trust and legitimacy. AI content builds volume and reach. Someone discovers your project through a no face slideshow, then sees a real creator endorsing you the next day, and suddenly you're everywhere. That's how you go from being another crypto project in the feed to being the project everyone's talking about.
Campaigns running a hybrid approach typically see 40 to 60% lower cost per acquisition compared to running either format alone. The sweet spot we've found is roughly 70% AI no face content for volume and testing, and 30% real creator content for trust and conversion.
What This Looks Like in Practice
To give you a real sense of the volume this approach produces, here's what a typical setup looks like. Five AI no face accounts posting two slideshows per day across TikTok and Instagram. Five real creators posting once per day across both platforms. All in for just under $10,000 per month.
| Content Type | Accounts | Posts Per Day | Platforms | Monthly Output |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AI No Face Slideshows | 5 | 2 per account | TikTok + Instagram | 600 |
| Real Creator Videos | 5 | 1 per creator | TikTok + Instagram | 300 |
| Total Content Output | 900 |
900 pieces of content per month across two platforms for under $10,000. That's the kind of volume that makes the algorithm work for you instead of against you.
But the real story is what happens to your costs over time. In month one, your CPMs are high because you're still learning the algorithm. You're figuring out what gets pushed, what gets ignored, and how the platform responds to your content. By month three, you already know what formats work, what hooks grab attention, what CTAs drive action, and which trending sounds actually move the needle for your niche. That's when your costs start dropping fast. By month six, you're reaching millions of people at a fraction of what you were paying at the start.
| Month | Content Output | Est. Reach | Avg CPM | Est. Monthly Cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 900 | 200K – 400K | $8 – $12 | ~$9,500 |
| 2 | 900 | 500K – 900K | $5 – $8 | ~$9,500 |
| 3 | 900 | 1M – 2M | $3 – $5 | ~$9,500 |
| 4 | 900 | 2M – 4M | $2 – $3.50 | ~$9,500 |
| 5 | 900 | 3.5M – 6M | $1.50 – $2.50 | ~$9,500 |
| 6 | 900 | 5M – 10M+ | $0.80 – $1.50 | ~$9,500 |
Same budget every month. Same content volume. But your reach grows exponentially and your CPMs drop by up to 85% from month one to month six.
This is why consistency matters more than anything on TikTok. The algorithm rewards accounts that show up every day with fresh content. The AI no face videos keep that engine running while the creator content provides the trust signals that actually convert viewers into users. Both formats running across TikTok and Instagram simultaneously means you're building presence on two platforms without doubling your production effort.
The Bottom Line
Stop spending your budget trying to make AI avatars look human. Lean into no face formats where AI is genuinely the best tool for the job. Pair it with real creators who bring trust and credibility. Scale the volume, test relentlessly, and let the algorithm reward you for showing up consistently.
That's how you get the speed and cost benefits of AI without sacrificing the trust that makes crypto marketing actually work.
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