Dr. Addy Olubamiji has built businesses around something people can't easily replicate: her experience.
With a PhD in engineering and a career that took her from Nigeria to Finland, Canada, and the United States, Addy turned her experiences navigating international education and career growth into Pathfinder Consulting. What began with career coaching has expanded into study abroad programs and, more recently, consulting for professionals interested in acquiring businesses and leaving corporate careers.
As a founder-led business, however, growth depends heavily on Addy herself.
"People trust me as an authority," she said. "When I talk, they listen."
With three content creators supporting her, the team needed a way to keep Addy at the center of its content without requiring her to step into a studio constantly.
HeyGen gave them one.
Keeping the founder in the content without constantly filming
Before HeyGen, Addy regularly filmed herself or booked professional studio sessions to batch content.
Once a month, that could mean securing a studio, arranging lighting, hiring someone to film her, traveling into the city, and spending hours recording. But her team discovered something important about their audience: highly produced videos weren't necessarily what made people listen.
"They don't even mind if I tie my hair. Just tell us something," Addy said. "Whether I'm at the gym or I'm just taking a walk and I'm talking, they'll still listen."
The value was Addy’s perspective, not the production.
With HeyGen, her team can turn those ideas into talking-head videos without requiring her to film each one. They create a script, choose an avatar, generate the video, and add supporting visuals when necessary.
"We needed something that can still help convey the ideas without me having to sit down and record every day," Addy said.
Cutting founder time spent on content by 80%
That shift has dramatically reduced the amount of time Addy’s week is consumed by content production.
Before HeyGen, she set aside Tuesdays and Thursdays for recording. Between developing scripts, filming, making corrections, and getting everything right, she estimates she could spend at least 10 hours a week on the process.
Now, her own involvement takes no more than two hours per week.
"The time it takes me to record content per week, HeyGen has reduced it drastically by at least 80%," Addy said.
Much of those two hours isn't spent recording. Instead, Addy reviews scripts and decides quickly what she does or doesn't want included.
That also means ideas no longer have to wait until the next filming day.
"If the idea pops up in my mind and I want to tell them right now, I just go pick one of the avatars," she said. "I don't have to say, oh, it's midnight. I don't have my makeup on or anything like that. It's been a lifesaver."
Eliminating thousands in traditional production costs
The savings extend beyond Addy’s time.
Professional filming previously meant paying roughly $1,500 for studio production, plus another $800 to $900 to film her, along with transportation and other expenses.
"HeyGen took it away," Addy said.
That changes the economics of maintaining a founder-led content engine. Instead of organizing an expensive shoot every time the team needs more polished video, they can produce it internally and reserve Addy’s time for the content where her live delivery matters most.
Her team has learned to distinguish between the two options.
For highly energetic motivational content, Addy may still record herself because her delivery is part of the message. For educational videos, explanations, and other talking-head content, her avatar can carry the idea.
"We've had a lot of viral moments with HeyGen," Addy said.
Getting ideas out while they're still relevant
For Addy, AI video isn't about replacing everything she records. It's about removing the production barriers between having something valuable to say and getting that message in front of her audience.
That matters across a business covering careers, international education, entrepreneurship, and business acquisition, where timely ideas can quickly become useful content.
"HeyGen allows us to get the message out there as it's hot," Addy said.
Her audience has also become increasingly comfortable with AI-generated content. Some viewers recognize that a video uses AI, but Addy says others in the comments often push the conversation back toward what matters: the information itself.
"Focus on the message," she recalled viewers telling each other. "Is that all you got from the post? That this is AI? You didn't see those points?"
For a founder whose expertise is central to her businesses, that's exactly the point. HeyGen gives Addy and her team another way to package what she knows and share it without making her schedule the bottleneck.
Her advice to other founders is simple.
"You don't have all the time in the world," Addy said. "If you have a message to get out, you're shy, you're always second-guessing yourself, or you feel you need multiple recordings before it works, HeyGen will allow you to go past that. Use it."
