Stop Feeding AI Crumbs and Give it a Feast Instead

This week we introduce James Archer as a guest author at 3G4AI. James is a strategic positioning consultant with nearly three decades in marketing—including 12 years running his own agency and 20+ years in C-suite roles—who now advises ambitious service-firm founders on carving out crystal-clear market positions. He helps leaders turn their businesses from commodity providers into the unquestioned choice for premium clients by aligning purpose, audience focus, and decisive brand stances. And he's an AI power user, too! Find out more at https://jamesarcher.co

Most business owners fire up ChatGPT, type a quick prompt, and get copy that could belong to any competitor. The AI spits out the same "We're your trusted experts" and "Our unparalleled quality" drivel for everyone.

The model isn't broken. It's starving.

AI can only work with what you give it. Feed it nothing specific about your business, and it'll serve up the same generic soup it ladles out for everyone else. But give it real detail about who you are, who you serve, and what makes you different? Now you're cooking.

My Early Discovery

I was the Chief Marketing Officer at a tech company not long after ChatGPT launched. While most of the team hadn't yet caught on, I immediately understood how useful this could be, even in those awkward early days.

I saw that it was giving me pretty generic responses, so I drafted "trainer" text that we could drop into prompts to give it a lot more specific detail about our company, and the effectiveness of the responses shot through the roof.

As the models evolved to handle more information, so did my approach. That original copy-paste block grew into something more substantial. Today, I build a comprehensive strategic document for every client I work with. They upload it to their AI sessions and watch their output transform from commodity content to something unmistakably theirs.

The Three Questions That Change Everything

After years of refining this approach, I've boiled it down to a simple framework. Your AI needs crystal-clear answers to three questions:

Who exactly is your audience? Not "small business owners." That's everyone and no one. Think "solo IP attorneys in Texas who've been practicing 10-15 years and want to transition from hourly billing to value-based pricing." See the difference?

What real problem keeps them up at night? Not "efficiency" or "growth." Real problems have teeth. Like "They're billing 60 hours a week but taking home less than a first-year associate at a big firm because they can't escape the hourly trap."

How do you solve it differently than everyone else? This is where most businesses stumble. They list features instead of explaining their unique approach. "We offer competitive prices and great service" could describe any company. But "We're the only IP firm that guarantees flat-fee patent prosecution with a refund if the USPTO issues a final rejection" - now that's specific.

Building Your Context Arsenal

Once you nail those three questions, you're ready to build what I call a Northstar Document. It's a 10-15 page file that consolidates your business details and strategy from multiple angles—your unique selling proposition, ideal customer profile, value proposition, customer personas, and more. It takes all those scattered strategic elements and combines them into a single document that gives AI systems complete context from every angle.

Beyond those three core answers, it includes your origin story (why you started this business), your brand personality, the specific words and phrases you use, the promises you make, and the proof that backs them up.

Want to create your own? Download the template here: https://jarcher.co/northstar-template/?utm_campaign=nsaiartwj

You can upload this document for individual prompts, or if you're using AI regularly, you can create custom configurations (what different platforms call GPTs, Gems, or similar features) that automatically include your context every time.

Voice Matters More Than You Think

Here's what most people miss: your brand voice isn't just about grammar rules. It's about capturing your whole personality and making AI sound like you instead of a robot.

Your context file should capture your brand's entire vibe. Are you the no-nonsense expert who cuts through the fluff? The warm advisor who makes complex things simple? The rebel who challenges industry norms? Do you crack jokes or stay serious? Do you tell stories or stick to bullet points? Are you the friend at the coffee shop or the expert on the stage?

One client described their brand as "the friend who tells you what you need to hear, not what you want to hear." Another wanted to sound like "the smartest person at the dinner party who can explain quantum physics without being a jerk about it." These aren't writing rules. They're personality traits that transform generic AI output into content that sounds unmistakably like your business.

Without this context, every AI writes in the same bland, helpful-but-forgettable voice. With it, your content suddenly has character, attitude, and a point of view that sets you apart.

The Price of Clarity

Here's the part nobody talks about. Creating real context means making hard choices. Most businesses want to serve everyone, solve every problem, be everything to everybody. That's exactly why their AI output stays generic.

Building a proper context file forces you to decide:

• Which clients you actually want (and which you'll turn away)

• What specific problem you're world-class at solving (and what you won't touch)

• How you're genuinely different (not just "better")

• What you sound like when you're being authentically you

These decisions hurt. I've watched CEOs squirm as we narrow their target market from "all small businesses" to "SaaS companies with 10-50 employees stuck between $1M and $5M ARR." But that discomfort is the price of clarity.

From Theory to Practice

Let me show you exactly how this works:

1. Answer the three questions until a fifth-grader could understand exactly who you help, what problem you solve, and how you're different.

2. Build your context file with those answers plus your voice guidelines, proof points, and the rest of your strategic clarity.

3. Upload it at the start of every AI session. Not paste—upload. Let the AI digest the whole document.

4. Give specific instructions that reference your context: "Write a LinkedIn post for burned-out IP attorneys showing how our flat-fee model gives them their evenings back. Use the voice and positioning from my uploaded context."

5. Edit lightly and ship. When AI knows your business this well, the output needs minimal cleanup.

Beyond Content Creation

Here's what most people miss: this isn't just about writing better marketing copy. When AI truly understands your business, it becomes a strategic thinking partner.

My clients use their context-loaded AI for decisions that matter:

• Hiring: "Based on our target market and unique approach, what are the top five skills our next account manager must have?"

• Strategic opportunities: "Score these three partnership opportunities based on alignment with our core mission and ideal client profile."

• Daily priorities: "Here's my task list for this week. Which items will actually move us toward our vision, and which are just noise?"

• Business development: "Does this prospective client fit our ideal profile? What specific pain points should we address in our proposal?"

Here's a humbling truth: AI armed with your principles can sometimes follow them better than you do. I once asked my AI about a potential client project. It basically told me to walk away—the client didn't match my ideal profile, the project would pull me off strategy, and the work wasn't aligned with my core offerings. I felt a little ashamed that I'd been ready to say yes anyway. But I was also amazed. The AI wasn't being smart. It was just following the principles I'd given it more faithfully than I (being only human) had in that moment.

One CEO told me he now runs every major decision through AI armed with his Northstar Document. Not because AI makes the decisions, but because it asks better questions when it knows where you're trying to go.

The Compound Effect

I've been refining this approach for two years now, and my clients consistently report transformative results. Yes, they talk about finally feeling like they're speaking in their own voice. Yes, their marketing gets better responses. But the real transformation happens when they realize AI can help them think strategically about their entire business.

The pattern is clear: businesses that feed their AI real, specific context get real, specific results. Those that don't stay stuck in generic land—not just in their content, but in their thinking.

Start Where You Are

You don't need a perfect strategic foundation to begin. Start by answering those three questions. Write them down. Make them specific enough that they'd mean nothing to your competitors but everything to your ideal clients.

Then feed your AI something more than crumbs. Give it the full meal—who you are, who you serve, what you do differently. Watch what happens when AI finally understands your business.

The generic disappears. What's left is unmistakably yours.

~ James Archer | Brand & Positioning Strategist | Web | LinkedIn | YouTube | Instagram | james@jamesarcher.co

Thanks, James! ~wj