Giving good context · for marketers
Giving good context in marketing
A model knows a lot about marketing in general and nothing about your brand. It has not read your positioning document, your last three campaigns, or the customer interviews that explain why people buy. Without that material it writes for a generic company.
Giving good context means handing over the material a new hire would need before writing anything: voice guidelines, examples of approved copy, audience facts, product facts, and the claims legal has cleared. It also means leaving out material that would mislead.
Where it comes up
Copy in the brand voice
Before asking for copy, paste two or three approved pieces that represent the voice well, plus the short list of words the brand never uses. Examples teach voice faster than adjectives do.
Messaging for a specific segment
Give the model the segment’s actual language from interviews or support tickets, with anything identifying removed. Copy built on customers’ own words lands better than copy built on assumptions.
A competitive comparison page
Provide the verified facts about each product, with dates. Without them the model fills gaps from old or wrong training data, and errors on a comparison page carry real risk.
What it looks like at each band
E1 · Foundational
Gives the topic and maybe a sentence about the brand. Output sounds generic and needs heavy editing to sound like the company. Does not yet see that the missing material is the cause.
E2 · Proficient
Includes voice guidelines, an example of approved copy, and the key product facts. Output is recognizably on-brand. Knows to paste the source material in rather than describe it from memory.
E3 · Distinguished
Chooses context deliberately for each task. Leaves out old positioning that would confuse the model, marks which facts are confirmed, and says what the model should not assume. Keeps a working document of voice and product facts ready to paste.
E4 · Exceptional
Builds and maintains the shared context the whole team uses: a voice guide written for AI, cleared claims, segment profiles, and current product facts. Notices when that material goes stale and updates it before it causes errors.
Common mistakes
Describing the voice instead of showing it
"Friendly but professional" fits almost every brand. Two real examples of approved copy carry far more information.
Pasting everything
An entire brand book plus three old campaigns buries the parts that matter. Choose the material that bears on this task.
Trusting the model’s product knowledge
The model may know an outdated version of your product or a competitor’s. Supply current facts every time the copy makes a claim.
A worked example
Homepage hero copy for a payroll product aimed at restaurant owners.
Write homepage hero copy for our payroll software for restaurants. Our brand is friendly and simple.
The model has no facts about the product, the owners, or what makes this product different. It will produce interchangeable copy about "saving time" and "focusing on what matters".
Write a homepage headline and a 25-word subheadline. Audience: owners of one to three restaurants who run payroll themselves on Sunday nights. From our interviews, their words are "tip splits", "I’m scared of getting it wrong", and "my accountant fixes it later". Product facts: it calculates tip pooling automatically and files payroll taxes. Here are two headlines we have used and liked: [examples]. Do not mention AI, and do not promise specific savings.
The model now has the audience’s own words, two confirmed product facts, approved examples of voice, and two limits. The copy can be specific because the context is.
The full study guide for this skill, for every role, is Giving good context. The other five skills for marketers are on the AI skills for marketers page. A one-page summary is in the AI context checklist.
See where you stand
The free check grades giving good context and the other five skills in about fifteen minutes. Nobody sees the grade but you.
Then build the skills and prove it. The three steps for marketers list the courses and templates that fit the work.