Getting Started with Claude - Beyond the Chat Box
Most people I talk to about Claude use it the same way. Paste a question, get an answer, move on. It works, but it's barely scratching the surface. I keep getting asked how I get so much out of it, so I figured I'd write down the process I actually follow.
This isn't about building a full website or anything complex. It's about getting Claude to work with you instead of just for you.
Start with something real
Don't open Claude and ask it to "write me a blog post about leadership." That's how you get content that sounds like every other AI-generated post on LinkedIn. Instead, give it something to work with.
I start with the subject matter. An article I've read, a thread from a forum, notes from a conversation, even a voice memo transcript. The more context Claude has, the less it falls back on generic filler.
A prompt like "write a LinkedIn post about this article" with the article pasted in will get you a first draft that's already more specific than starting from nothing.
Make it sound like you
The first draft will sound like Claude. That's fine, it's a first draft. The real work is in the iteration.
Read through it and start pushing back. Tell Claude what to change and why. Things like:
- "I wouldn't use the word 'innovative', swap it for something more specific"
- "This reads like a press release, make it more conversational"
- "I use shorter sentences than this"
- "Drop the exclamation marks, I don't write like that"
Each correction teaches Claude something about how you communicate. After a few rounds, the output starts to sound less like AI and more like you.
Extract your tone of voice
Once you've got a piece of writing you're happy with, ask Claude to extract your tone of voice from it. Get it to describe how you write. Sentence length, vocabulary, structure, what you avoid.
This is the part most people skip, and it's probably the most valuable step. You end up with a reference document that captures how you actually communicate. Things like whether you use colons or semicolons, whether you lean on specific verbs, whether you quantify things or keep it vague.
Use that as a reference for everything you write after. Each new piece gets easier because Claude isn't starting from zero. It's starting from you.
Build up context over time
Claude doesn't remember your previous conversations by default. But you can fix that.
If you're using Claude Pro, you can save your tone of voice document and key preferences as project knowledge. Every new conversation in that project starts with that context already loaded.
If you're using Claude Code, the terminal-based version, it has a built-in memory system. I use a CLAUDE.md file in every project that acts as institutional memory. A plain markdown doc that tells Claude how the project works, what conventions to follow, and what to avoid. Each conversation picks up where the last one left off.
The pattern is the same either way. Stop treating each conversation as a blank slate.
The compound effect
The first post took me a while. Lots of back and forth, lots of corrections. The second one was noticeably faster. By the third or fourth, I was mostly just providing the subject matter and making minor tweaks.
That's the real payoff. Not any single conversation, but the fact that Claude gets better at being your writing partner the more you invest in teaching it. The same applies to code, documentation, planning. Anything where your specific style and preferences matter.
Where to go from here
If you're just getting started:
- Pick one real thing to write about. Not a test, something you'd actually publish.
- Give Claude the raw material. Articles, notes, whatever context you have.
- Iterate on the output. Push back on anything that doesn't sound like you.
- Extract your tone of voice. Save it somewhere you can reuse it.
- Use it as a starting point next time. The gap between first draft and final version gets smaller every time.
That's it. No special tools required, no complex setup. Just a conversation with a bit more intention behind it.