Prompting best practices

A template is a standing desk assignment. Write it once, then let Jo run it against new source material all week. That is how a small team ships story forms they could not staff by hand: a Monday newsletter, a research brief, a new-hire note, a product launch.

This page is about the prompt. How to create the template, pick a model, and turn tools on is in Add a template.

Write it like a brief, not a chat

Name the form, the reader, the sources, and the finish line. Say what to leave out. Two runs with similar sources should come back in the same shape.

Include:

• The story form and who it is for
• Where the facts come from (attached files, CMS search, newswire, the web)
• What must appear (who, what, when, numbers, quotes)
• What to ignore (boilerplate, stock quotes, old news)
• Voice, length, and house rules
• The output fields, usually as XML tags

Put standing reference — house voice, taxonomies, example stories — in a knowledge block, not in every prompt.

Weak: “Write something about this press release.”

Strong: “Rewrite this announcement as a 400-word reported brief for trade readers. Lead with the news. Do not copy the company headline. Ignore boilerplate quotes.”

One form per template

Do not ask one template to be a newsletter, a news article, and a social post. Jo will guess. Editors will not know what they are reviewing.

Give each form its own name and description so Jo can pick it:

Name	When to use it
Weekly Newsletter	Roundup of this week’s published archive for the Monday send
Press Release Rewrite	A company announcement that should become a reported brief
New Research Article	A study or report with methods, numbers, and limits
New Product Announcement	A launch with specs, price, and availability
New Hire Announcement	An appointment with role, background, and effective date

If two templates look alike, the description should say when not to use them.

Turn on only the tools the form needs

Tools are how Jo leaves the attached files. Leave them off unless the assignment says to use them.

Form	Typical tools
Newsletter from your own archive	Search CMS (needs content fetching)
Press-release rewrite	Newswire Search if Jo must find the release; otherwise attached source is enough
New research	Web Search or URL Context to open the paper; stay with the attached PDF when you have it
Product or new-hire note	Usually no search. The announcement is the source

A rewrite that should stay inside the release should not have web search on. A newsletter that should only use your site should not have newswire search on.

Story forms that earn their keep

These are the assignments publishers often cannot staff every week. Each one is a product, not a one-off chat.

Weekly newsletter from the CMS

Use this when the archive already has the week’s stories and nobody has time to recap them.

Write this week's newsletter for trade readers.

Search the CMS for articles published in the last 7 days on our site.
Pick 5 to 7 items that a subscriber would need. Skip duplicates,
corrections, and evergreen explainers unless they are new this week.

For each item: one headline, two sentences on why it matters, and a link.
Open with a 50-word editor's note. Close with one sentence on what to
watch next week. Do not invent stories that are not in the archive.

Turn Search CMS on. If fetching is not connected, Jo cannot see the archive.

Press-release rewrite

Use this when companies send announcements and you want a brief, not a paste.

Rewrite the attached press release as a 350–450 word news brief.

Lead with the news in the first sentence. Name the company, the action,
and the date. Add one short paragraph of context a trade reader needs.
Use one quote only if it states a fact or a number. Drop marketing
language and “we are excited” lines.

Do not invent customers, revenue, or launch dates that are not in
the release. If a key fact is missing, say so in a short editor note
instead of filling the gap.

Pair this with an email alias so the desk can forward releases in. Those runs land in My Queue.

New research

Use this when a paper or analyst report should become a readable story, not a PDF dump.

Write a research brief from the attached study or report.

Open with the finding a trade reader can use. Then cover methods,
sample, and limits in plain language. Include the key numbers with
units. Distinguish the authors' claims from your summary.

Do not overclaim. If the paper is preliminary, animal-only, or
industry-funded, say that. Do not add findings from other papers
unless this template has web search on and you cite them.

New product announcement

Write a product-launch brief from the attached announcement.

Include product name, what it does, who it is for, price, and
availability. Call out one spec that is actually new. Skip feature
lists that repeat the brochure.

If price or ship date is missing, write "not disclosed" rather than
guessing. Keep it under 400 words.

Corporate announcement or new hire

Write a 200–300 word new-hire or appointment note.

Include the person's name, new title, start date, and the one or two
roles that explain why the hire matters. One quote is enough. Do not
write a biography. Do not invent prior employers or degrees that are
not in the source.

The same shape works for board appointments, plant openings, and funding rounds. Change the name and the must-have facts. Do not reuse a news-article template and hope Jo shortens it.

Keep the output in a fixed shape

Tell Jo which XML tags to wrap. Editors then see a headline, dek, and SEO fields instead of one blob.

After the brief, add a block like:

Wrap the fields:

<title>Headline that names the news</title>
<metadata_excerpt>One-sentence dek</metadata_excerpt>
<metadata_slug>url-slug</metadata_slug>

Then write the body. Do not repeat the headline in the body.

A newsletter that has to land in a fixed HTML frame belongs in an HTML template, not a Standard article with extra instructions.

Test it like a new product

1. Run the template on two real sources
2. Review both drafts in My Queue or Content Studio
3. Tighten the lines Jo missed — length, quotes, forbidden phrases
4. Only then attach it to a Discover feed or an email alias

Automatic runs will copy whatever the assignment actually produces. If the first two drafts wander, the tenth will too.

Common misses

• One template that “handles all company news”
• No audience, so Jo writes for a general reader
• Web search on a rewrite that should stay with the release
• House voice pasted into ten prompts instead of one knowledge block
• No XML tags, so the queue is a wall of body copy
• A Discover feed allowed to use every template on the team

When in doubt, make another template. A second form is cheaper than an editor unpicking a mixed draft.