What is Claude?

Claude by Anthropic is widely considered the most thoughtful AI assistant. It excels at reading and analysing long documents (up to 200,000 tokens), following nuanced instructions, and writing in a human, natural tone. It's the go-to for serious writing and analysis work.

Best prompting structure

Role
You are a [expert role] helping me with [goal]
Context
<context>[paste your document or background here]</context>
Task
Please [specific task]. Focus especially on [key aspect].
Format
Structure your response as: 1) [section] 2) [section]
// Example prompt
You are an experienced business analyst. <context>Here is our Q3 sales report: [paste report]</context>. Identify the top 3 growth opportunities and 2 risks. Be specific, cite numbers from the report, and present as an executive summary under 300 words.

How to use Claude — step by step

1

Go to claude.ai and create a free account

2

Use XML-style tags like <context> to separate background from task

3

Give Claude a word limit — it respects constraints well

4

For documents, upload the file directly via the attachment button

5

Use Projects to save instructions that apply to every conversation

Pro tips

→

Claude follows formatting instructions very precisely — use this to your advantage

→

For analysis, ask Claude to "think step by step" before giving a conclusion

→

Claude is the best for coding with explanation — it teaches as it writes

→

Use <document> tags when pasting long text — Claude handles them cleanly