— Door 04 · For the founder
12–15 hours a week.
A full-time presence.
The honest question behind a retainer: how does a part-time contract hold a brand's whole content presence through a relaunch? The answer isn't "work faster." It's an AI-assisted production workflow that absorbs the routine half — resizing, variants, captions, tagging, scheduling, reporting — so the hours you're paying for go to the half only a human can do: taste, the founder relationship, and knowing what's actually on-brand.
— The split
What the AI does · what stays human
This is the whole pitch. AI is leverage on the mechanical work. It is never the taste, and never the voice with your customers.
AI accelerates · the routine half
Production at volume
- Resize once → every format. One hero becomes feed, Story, Reel cover, Pin, email banner in minutes.
- Caption & EDM variants. Three caption options, A/B subject lines — I pick and polish, never ship raw.
- Asset tagging & library. Auto-named, organised, versioned so nothing is ever lost or duplicated.
- First-draft scheduling. Calendar drafted from the pillars; I approve and adjust.
- Weekly report assembly. Metrics pulled and summarised so analysis starts, not stalls.
- Repurposing. A TikTok becomes a Reel becomes a Pin becomes a LinkedIn post.
Human keeps · the half that matters
Taste & relationship
- Brand taste. Is this DOF? The final yes/no on every piece is mine, against your world.
- The founder relationship. Working directly with you, reading the room, protecting the voice.
- Editorial direction. What story we tell this month, and why — strategy isn't automatable.
- Community voice. Real replies to real customers in DOF's tone — never a bot in the DMs.
- Art direction. Framing the shoot, choosing the edit, the eye for what's elevated.
- Judgement. When to break the calendar, when to stay quiet, when something's off.
— Where the hours go
A 13-hour week, honestly budgeted
Roughly how a typical retainer week splits. AI compresses production, which buys back hours for strategy, the founder and community — the work that actually compounds.
Production & editingAI-assisted · the compressed bit
~4h
Publishing & communityscheduling · comments · DMs
~3h
Strategy & founderplanning · art direction · sync
~3h
Shopify & emailsite sync · Klaviyo flows
~2h
Reporting & influencerweekly loop · partnerships
~1h
The trade: without an AI workflow, production alone would eat most of a 13-hour week. Compressing it is what makes room for the founder relationship and strategy a relaunch actually needs.
— The stack
Real tools, already running
Nothing speculative — this is the stack I work in daily, mapped to your brief's toolkit.
— The honest line
I'm not selling you a robot that runs your Instagram. AI handles the mechanical half so the human half gets all of me. A footwear house built on Italian craftsmanship and limited runs can't be voiced by automation — and I wouldn't try. The taste, the founder relationship, the replies to your customers: that's the work, and it stays human.
What the AI workflow buys you is simple: a 12–15 hour retainer that produces and performs like far more — through a relaunch, without dropping the brand's standard.
Honest note: Hour splits and percentages are illustrative planning assumptions for a typical retainer week, not a fixed commitment — the real mix flexes with the relaunch calendar. The tools listed are ones I genuinely use; "Klaviyo-ready" means a fast ramp from comparable email platforms, not years of Klaviyo. This is concept work for my application, not official DOF Studios material.