We use AI wrong. It’s meant to let you do less boring work and spend more time for what truly matters (your craft, family, and life).

👋 Welcome back to Content to Commas, your weekly playbook for turning content into authority, consistency, and growth.

I spent the first 3 months of 2025 feeling like I had multiple full-time jobs.

Director of Content & Creative at Kickstarter. Growing my creator business. Launching this newsletter. Speaking at colleges. Consulting calls. All while being a newlywed trying not to be a terrible husband.

Even now, I feel like I can't let myself get too tired or overwhelmed running a few businesses.

That's when I discovered ways to be more productive, and I've only improved since then.

Now, I feel like I've reached a new level of getting things done.

This issue is about using AI to build the life you want, not just a bigger to-do list.

📌 In this issue:

Let’s get to work.

— Brandon Smithwrick

_{FROM OUR FRIENDS @ TYPEFORM}

AI isn’t a trend, It’s already part of how marketing work gets done.

According to Typeform’s latest research, 95% of marketers are using AI at work, yet nearly half admit they’ve published AI-assisted content without disclosing it. Not because they’re trying to hide anything, but because the rules around “what’s acceptable” are still unclear.

At the same time, the fear is real.

One in three marketers say they’ve lost a job or know someone who has due to AI, even as 60% say they feel hopeful about what it can unlock.

That tension is exactly what Typeform’s Get Real survey is trying to capture.

I was a part of this survey and excited that the full results are finally out. If you want to see how people are using AI 

AI still seems scary … I get it. But the data shows, tells a different story.

You already have a ton of work to do. Life will never get easier, no matter how much you lie to yourself about "slowing down next quarter."

So the question isn't how to do more.

It's how to do less of what you don't want to do so you can spend more time with the people you love, doing the things you love, without making a dramatic shift to your lifestyle.

That's how I'm using AI.

If AI isn't giving you time back, you're using it wrong.

I’m still just has busy but I'm not spent anymore. I built a system that eases my life while growing my business and adding more commas to the bank account in the process.

Here's the stack that made it possible 👇

6 tools that give you your time back.

Email is necessary for business but it's also a time vacuum.

Fyxer connects to your Gmail, sorts everything into folders (respond, FYI, awaiting reply), and drafts a reply to every email you need to answer in your tone of voice.

So whenever I’m answering messages, I already have a drafted reply saving me hours a day.

It also handles taking notes, scheduling, but for me the email sorting & drafting is the biggest lifesaver.

Try it for 7 days + $25 loaded to your account with code ‘brandon-smithwrick-2eb’

I hate the bots that join Zoom calls with a passion. The black box. The "recording" banner. It's awkward.

Granola runs in the background. No one knows it's there. After every call, I have meeting notes, action items, and next steps waiting for me.

People think I'm just hyperorganized … I’m not. It’s my systems.

I then click export to Notion and have all my notes in there.

I got this newsletter their first month 100% off (that means free) but just for new users.

I was a ChatGPT loyalist. Then I tried Claude Cowork for a month and quit ChatGPT last month.

This is the first AI that feels like cloning yourself and not using a chatbot.

I told Claude to scan my downloads folder, find anything that says "contract," "agreement," or "brief," and organize it in my Google Drive by year, quarter, brand, and campaign.

Done. My entire client history is now organized in my Google Drive.

I've also had it…

This is the first thing that feels like I'm multiplying myself, not just asking questions faster.

You're $20/month (same as ChatGPT Pro) but you're getting an assistant, not a chatbot.

I've tried dictation shortcuts before but it never stuck because it only worked in some apps or just translated so poorly that I had to rewrite everything.

Wispr Flow works everywhere. Text messages. Emails. Newsletters. Every single app.

I'm answering comments faster. Replying to emails faster. Writing newsletters faster. All because I'm talking instead of typing.

I got you one month free.

I used to spend hours building pitch decks for speaking gigs or proposals for brands.

Gamma changed that completely for my day to day.

You give it a prompt. It builds an entire presentation. Professional design, on brand colors, layouts that don't look like default templates. You can tweak slides, rearrange sections, or export it and move on.

I've used it for client pitches, media kits, and internal presentations at Kickstarter. What used to take me half a day now takes 30 minutes.

If you're building decks or one-pagers more than once a month, this tool pays for itself immediately.

I'm not using all five tools at once. I'm using the right tool for the right job.

Fyxer handles email. Granola handles meetings. Claude handles the work I'd never get to. Wispr handles speed. Gamma handles presentations.

I think the “all-in-one” thing is great, but I like tools that get one thing truly right, versus having to settle.

Together, they've given me back 10+ hours a week.

Not to do more work. To spend more time with my wife. To take a walk without my phone buzzing. To write this newsletter without feeling like I'm stealing time from something else.

AI should give you your life back. If it's not doing that, you're using it wrong.

Pick one tool. Try it for 7 days.

Don't try to overhaul your whole stack at once. Pick the biggest pain point. Solve it. Then move to the next one.

Each week, I share tips on branding, monetization, growth, and useful tools that you might have missed. You can catch up in just a few minutes.

These posts did numbers for a reason. Worth a reread.

The stack I keep coming back to in my own business.

The gear I actually use to capture clean, usable content without overthinking it.