intake

name

intake

description

Guided interview that captures user intent for a design generation run. Triggers on "/intake", "/intake [brand]", "let's brief a page", "interview me on this", "set up a new landing page", "I want to make an infographic", or any "what should this look like" planning conversation that precedes /design. Outputs a structured intake.json record at brands/<slug>/intake.json that /design and /refine read on the next run.

/intake — Guided Interview

Part of Claude UI Workflow. Sits between brand ingestion (B3–B5) and /design. The brand answers "what does it look like?". Intake answers "what are we making, for whom, and why?".

Schema: Claude-UI-Workflow/brands/INTAKE-SCHEMA.md (machine contract). PRD section: §6 "Interview and ask questions (guided intake)".

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When this skill applies

Route here when the operator says any of:

• /intake, /intake <brand-slug>
• "interview me on this", "let's brief a page", "ask me the questions"
• "I want to make an infographic / landing page / ad / lifestyle image"
• "set up a new landing page for ", "what do we want to say?"
• Any "before I generate" planning conversation

Do not route here when the operator says /design directly with a prose description — that path stays as the existing free-text behaviour (/design checks for intake.json and falls back to the prose if missing).

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What this skill does

1. Resolve target brand (existing slug under Claude-UI-Workflow/brands/, or adhoc-<date>-<short-name> for one-off runs).
2. Ask 6 questions in order. One at a time. Wait for the answer before moving on.
3. Write brands/<slug>/intake.json against the schema.
4. Print the path + a one-line "Now run /design <slug>" pointer.

The interview is conversational, not a form. If the operator gives a complete answer covering several questions in one reply, advance through them — don't re-ask.

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The 6 questions

Ask in this order. Skip a question only if the answer is already obvious from the conversation context — never invent answers.

1. Output type

"What are you making? Pick one — landing page, infographic, lifestyle image, or static ad creative."

Map the reply to the output_type enum (landing / infographic / lifestyle / ad). If the operator names something else (e.g. "social card"), pick the closest enum and note the original term in vibe.tone or constraints.

2. Audience

"Who is this for? One sentence — role + market."

Then a follow-up if not covered:

"What's the friction this offer relieves for them?"

Maps to audience.who and audience.pain. audience.context is optional — only ask if the operator seems to want to add detail.

3. Offer

"What are you offering them, and why does it matter? Plain name first, then the one-sentence value prop."

Maps to offer.what + offer.value_prop. Probe for offer.price and offer.format only if relevant (paid offers, events, software).

4. Primary CTA

"What's the single action you want them to take? Give me the button label and where it goes."

Maps to cta.primary.label + cta.primary.url. URL can be a hash anchor (#book) for in-page jumps.

"Any secondary action? (Optional — e.g. 'See agenda', 'Read FAQ'.)"

5. Vibe

"Three to four adjectives for how this should feel."

Common picks: premium, minimal, bold, playful, authoritative, friendly, technical, energetic. the operator will often answer with two or three — that's fine, ≥2 is enough.

"Any voice / tone notes for the copy?" (optional)

6. Constraints

"Anything this page MUST include — sections, guarantees, trust signals?"

"Anything this page MUST avoid?"

Maps to constraints.must_include + constraints.must_avoid. constraints.trust_signals and constraints.length_hint only if the operator offers them.

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Skip path (free-text bypass)

If the operator invokes /intake --skip "<brief>" or says "I already know what I want, here's the brief…", skip the interview:

1. Take the verbatim brief, save it to free_text_brief.
2. Best-effort populate the structured fields by parsing the brief — output type, audience, offer, CTA, vibe, constraints.
3. Mark every field's source as free-text rather than intake-skill.
4. Print a "review the structured fields, run /intake <slug> if anything is wrong" hint.

The skip path always still writes intake.json — never ephemeral. The free-text brief is preserved verbatim as the fallback.

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Output contract

Single file written: Claude-UI-Workflow/brands/<slug>/intake.json.

Shape per brands/INTAKE-SCHEMA.md. Required fields:

• brand, version, generated_at, source
• output_type
• audience.who
• offer.what, offer.value_prop
• cta.primary.label, cta.primary.url
• vibe.adjectives (≥2)

Optional fields are omitted, not nulled — match the convention in tokens.json and ingestion-confidence.md.

If the brand folder does not exist yet (one-off / adhoc), create it with just the intake.json file. The user can promote it to a full brand later by running /ingest-url or /ingest-doc.

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After-write pointer

Print, verbatim, on success:

✓ wrote brands/<slug>/intake.json
  Required fields: <count>/<count> populated
  Optional fields: <count> populated, <count> skipped

  Next: /design <slug>     — produce the design brief from intake + tokens
        /refine <url>      — audit an existing page (intake also informs refinement)

If brands/<slug>/tokens.json is missing, add a warning line:

  ⚠ No tokens.json yet for <slug>. /design will use generic CSV recommendations.
    Consider: /ingest-url <url> --slug <slug>     (or ingest-doc / refine-from-screenshot)

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How /design consumes this

When /design <slug> runs and brands/<slug>/intake.json exists:

1. Read intake.json first.
2. Use output_type to pick which design-db CSVs to weight (landing → landing.csv; infographic → images.csv + charts.csv; ad → landing.csv + interaction-design.csv heavily; lifestyle → images.csv).
3. Use audience.who + audience.pain to drive copy direction.
4. Use offer.what + offer.value_prop as the page's core message.
5. Use cta.primary + cta.secondary to anchor the CTA strategy.
6. Use vibe.adjectives to pick from styles.csv and weight polish-details.csv.
7. Use constraints.must_include to force-include sections; constraints.must_avoid to add per-run anti-patterns to Section 6.

Section 8 of the design brief ("Next Step") references the intake source for traceability.

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Examples

Interview path

the operator: /intake sellersessions-derived
Claude: What are you making? (landing / infographic / lifestyle / ad)
the operator: landing page for SSL 2026
Claude: Who is this for? One sentence — role + market.
the operator: Amazon FBA sellers running £1M+/yr private-label brands
Claude: What's the friction this offer relieves for them?
the operator: Stuck on a revenue plateau, sick of recycled "FBA tips" content
Claude: What are you offering them, and why does it matter?
... [continues through the 6 questions]
Claude: ✓ wrote brands/sellersessions-derived/intake.json
        Required fields: 7/7 populated. Optional fields: 4 populated, 2 skipped.
        Next: /design sellersessions-derived

Skip path

the operator: /intake --skip "Landing page for SSL 2026, FBA sellers running £1M+, single-day event 9 May, primary CTA Book ticket /live-2026, premium and high-energy"
Claude: ✓ wrote brands/sellersessions-derived/intake.json (free-text source)
        Required fields: 6/7 populated. Audience.pain not detected from brief —
        consider running /intake sellersessions-derived to capture it.
        Next: /design sellersessions-derived

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Curriculum note

This skill is part of the Claude UI Workflow giveaway. Bias toward clarity over cleverness in question wording — the audience is non-designer founders. If the operator ever asks a question to be reworded, update this file directly.