If you’ve spent any time on social media lately, you’ve probably seen posts that go something like: “Use these 5 proven prompts to 10x your content output!”
And hey, I get it. It’s tempting. You copy and paste, drop it into Claude or ChatGPT, and… you get a response. But here’s the thing — so does everyone else who saw that same post.
That’s the problem with using generic prompts without any context about who you are.
Why Generic AI Prompts Produce Generic Content
When you drop a prompt into an AI tool without giving it any background on you, your brand, or your tone, the tool does what it’s designed to do — it searches the web and generates a response based on whatever it finds. And since the parameters are the same for everyone using that same prompt, you’re going to end up with content that looks a lot like what everyone else is producing.
So how do you fix this? You educate your tools first.
Step 1: Train Your AI Tools on Your Brand
Whether you’re using Claude or ChatGPT, both platforms let you create projects where you can upload files and information about your business. This is your secret weapon.
Think about what you already have:
- Your website’s About page
- Product or service descriptions
- Previous content you’ve written that sounds like you
- Your brand voice guidelines (even informal ones)
Upload all of it. The more context you give the tool, the more it has to work with — and the more your output is going to start sounding like your brand instead of a generic AI response.
When you do use those prompts you find online, include instructions to prioritize your uploaded brand information alongside any web search results. That combination is where the magic happens.
Step 2: Never Let AI Have the Final Say
This is a rule I come back to over and over again: don’t ever let AI have the final say.
You’ll get a solid draft — faster than you ever could have written it yourself — but it’s still just a draft. Read through it. Make it sound more like you. Adjust the tone, tweak the phrasing, add your personality.
And then here’s the extra step most people skip: upload those final, edited versions back into your tool. Share the URL to your published blog post and ask the tool to read it. Send back the final version of that social media caption you edited.
Why? Because you’re training the tool. The more you feed it your final, polished work, the better it gets at understanding your voice. Over time, you’ll spend less and less time editing because the first drafts will get closer and closer to what you actually want.
Step 3: Start With Your Own Ideas
Here’s another way to make sure your AI content sounds original: start with your original thoughts.
There are a few ways to do this depending on how you think:
If you’re a writer: Sit down and journal or brainstorm first. You’ve got something on paper that came from your brain — that’s your starting point.
If you’re a talker: Use the voice memo app on your phone. When an idea hits on a walk or while you’re cleaning, just hit record. You don’t have to stop everything — just capture the thought.
If you’re a video person: Turn on a camera and talk it out. This is actually one of my favorite methods because one video can generate a ton of content.
Once you’ve got your raw thoughts — written, recorded, or filmed — you can transcribe them and hand them off to AI. If you’re a Mac user, Apple Notes now has a transcription feature for audio files (desktop only). Tools like Descript are also fantastic for transcription and editing, especially if you’re creating video or podcast content.
When AI has your ideas and your words as the starting point, the output is going to sound a whole lot more like you.
Turn on Your History
One more thing: make sure your history is turned on in whatever tool you’re using. Both Claude and ChatGPT have settings to enable conversation history within a project. When history is on, your tool can reference what you’ve worked on before, remember your preferences, and continue building on the foundation you’ve created.
Over time, this means less editing, better first drafts, and content that genuinely sounds like it came from you.
The Bottom Line
Using AI for content creation is a game-changer for solopreneurs — but only if you’re using it strategically. The goal isn’t to let AI do all the work. The goal is to use AI to speed up your process while making sure your voice and brand identity stay front and center.
Start by uploading your brand info, create from your own ideas whenever you can, always review and edit, and feed your final work back into your tools. It takes a little time upfront, but the payoff is huge.
Ready to talk about your AI content workflow? Come join the conversation over in the Thrive Solopreneur Collective community. We’re diving deeper into all of this — and I’d love to hear what’s working (and what isn’t) for you.
👉 Join us at community.thrivesoloco.com