Thank you to everyone who attended our London In Person Event today! Photo Gallery of the Day Most of what your company knows, scopes, pricing rules, job history, how you actually run a project, lives in people's heads or gets retyped into AI from scratch every time someone opens a new chat. A company brain fixes that. This session, recorded live at our in-person AI for Contractors event in London, showed contractors how to turn a single markdown file into a change order that Claude prices and drafts for signature the same day, instead of chasing free work after the fact. 🧠 What you'll learn: - How to break your company into divisions and turn each one into markdown files Claude can actually reference - A live example of a change order file, from trigger to price to signed approval - The three "doors" that control what an AI system can see, and how to lock them down - How to set up Claude projects so estimating, accounting, and marketing stay sandboxed - How the Claude-first extraction layer we built auto-sorts a 300-page drawing set into searchable titles The full recording is attached. Steal the change order file structure, swap in your own trigger and process, and you'll have your first working file by the end of the day. Presentation 📁 Resources mentioned: Claude: claude.ai Granola: granola.ai GitHub: github.com Want us to build this for you? Start with the End State Audit: scelta.ca/ai-for-contractors/audit

Problem: You ask Claude to build a proposal and your logo either doesn't show up, or shows up looking wrong. Solution: Using Claude Cowork, give it a dedicated folder to pull from. Claude reliably places your logo only when it has a specific folder to find it in. Create a folder called "logos," upload your logo there, and point Claude to it. Do the same with a saved proposal template, tell it "this is my standard proposal template, please follow this," and it'll fill in the job name, location, and estimate ID around your existing format. One member built a full proposal this way in about five minutes. Tool: Claude Cowork Try this: 1. Create a folder named "logos" and upload your logo file(s) to it 2. Point Claude Cowork to that folder when you ask it to build anything branded 3. Upload a proposal template to the same folder and tell Claude to follow it 4. Ask for a new proposal and check that the logo and format both land correctly. What's something branded you've asked AI to build that came back looking off? Drop it below.

Problem: A client sends you a link to the exact vanity or fixture they want. You're offering to source it as part of your pricing, but comparison shopping for a better price on that specific item takes time you don't have. Solution: Drop the product link straight into Claude chat and ask it to find the same item cheaper, or from a different retailer. You still charge your standard price to the client, you just source it for less. Tool: Claude Try this: 1. Next time a client sends a product link, paste it into Claude 2. Ask it to find the exact same item for less, across other retailers 3. Order from whichever source comes back cheapest 4. Keep the difference. Client pays the same, you keep more margin.  What's a product you're currently overpaying for because comparison shopping takes too long? Drop it below.

Problem: You ask Claude to build you an estimate template and it hands back something that looks polished: header, line items, markup, totals. But it doesn't know you're mostly service calls, that half your jobs are flat rate, or that after-hours pricing changes the whole number. So now you're patch working someone else's template to match how you actually price work. Solution: Give Claude the context before it builds anything. Instead of "build me an estimate template," tell it who you are and how your pricing actually works: your service mix, your flat rate calls, your after-hours rules. Then tell it exactly what you need out the other end, like one clean page a homeowner can approve, with the math kept separate so it's ready to export as a PDF. The difference is a generic sheet you'll spend a week reworking versus a template that already looks like your business. Tool: Claude Try this: 1. Before asking for a template, write out how your pricing actually works: service mix, flat rates, after-hours rules, anything that changes the number. 2. Tell Claude the exact outcome you want, down to the format: one page for the client, a separate math table for you. 3. Feed it three to five past estimates if you have them. Real examples beat a verbal description. 4. Once it's dialed in, save it. You'll build on it in the next step. What context are you leaving out when you prompt Claude for templates? Drop it in the comments.

Problem: You finally built an estimate template that matches how you price work. But every new estimate means re-explaining your business to Claude from scratch before it can fill anything in. Solution: Package the template and your process into a skill. Once you have a template you like, tell Claude how you'd feed it new job info going forward, whether that's a sales call transcript, a voice memo, or a photo of your notes. Ask it to build a skill that combines the template with that process and package it as a file you upload once. From then on, every estimate starts already knowing your pricing. You stop re-teaching Claude your business every time you open a new chat. Tool: Claude Try this: 1. Get your estimate template to a place you're happy with. 2. Tell Claude how you'd realistically feed it new job info: a transcript, a voice memo, a photo of notes. 3. Ask it to build a skill combining the template and that process, packaged as a file you can upload. 4. Upload it to your skills list and test it on your next real estimate. What's one thing you find yourself re-explaining to Claude over and over? Drop it in the comments.