# Cut research and drafting time in half: the Claude Project build Source: https://getstartedwithai.net/tutorials/claude-setup-solo-pro Site: Get Started With AI Tagline: Build AI automations that actually run your business. Audience: solo professionals, freelancers, consultants and AI implementers in training Contact: hello@getstartedwithai.co.uk This Markdown companion is generated from the prerendered page for AI crawlers. # Cut research and drafting time in half: the Claude Project build A 6,000 word proposal that takes a half-day in your usual stack drops to 90 minutes once Claude Pro is calibrated to your voice and one Project is loaded with the right twenty files. £16 a month, 60 minutes today, three ready-to-run workflows where Claude is the right tool over ChatGPT. The reason the saving lands: Sonnet 4.6 holds 200K tokens of context cleanly, so a 100-page client brief stays usable end to end and Artifacts produce the deliverable inside the chat as a downloadable .docx. By the close of the hour your account is configured, your voice is calibrated and one Project is live. ## Where Claude beats ChatGPT for client work - Long single inputs. Sonnet 4.6 holds a 200-page document without losing detail at the end. - Cleaner voice copy. Claude drafts pass as human writing more often without heavy editing. - Honest hedging. Claude pushes back on weak briefs and asks better follow-up questions. - Artifacts as deliverables. A Claude conversation produces a downloadable .docx, .pptx or .csv inline. ## What you need before you start - Claude Pro account at £16 a month annual or £20 monthly. - A short voice sample: a recent email, LinkedIn post or proposal section. - 60 minutes uninterrupted. ## Step 1: Set the global preferences (5 minutes) 1. Open Settings, Profile. Fill in the "What should Claude know about you?" field with your role, sector, typical clients and weekly work. 2. Set "How would you like Claude to respond?" with rules every conversation should follow: UK spelling, sentence length, formatting, level of detail, push-back permission. 3. Save. Preferences load on every chat unless you disable them per chat. ## Step 2: Calibrate Claude to your voice (15 minutes) Voice is where Claude beats most assistants. Five minutes of calibration produces drafts that read like you wrote them. 1. Find three pieces of your own writing: an email you sent, a LinkedIn post, a proposal paragraph. 2. Open a new chat. Paste all three under one heading: "These are three examples of my own writing. Read them and produce a voice profile." 3. Tell Claude to return the profile in this format: typical sentence length, words you use frequently, words you avoid, structural habits, level of formality, level of hedging. 4. Save the voice profile to global preferences under "How would you like Claude to respond" so every future chat reads it. Prefix any drafting request with "Use my voice profile" from now on. ## Step 3: Build your first Project (15 minutes) Projects in Claude work the same way as in ChatGPT, with a larger context window so you can upload a fuller library. 1. Click Projects in the sidebar, then Create Project. Name it after a real client or area of work. 2. In Project Knowledge, upload up to twenty files: latest brief, rate card, brand guide, two sample deliverables, recent meeting notes. 3. In the Custom Instructions field, paste a structured brief: who the client is, what the engagement covers, what good output looks like, what to never produce. 4. Test it. Open a new chat in the project and ask Claude to recap the engagement and the rules. The recap should match the brief. ## Step 4: Use Artifacts for deliverables (10 minutes) Artifacts are the standout Claude feature. Inside a chat, Claude builds a downloadable Word doc, PowerPoint, spreadsheet or interactive HTML widget. The artifact updates as you iterate, then exports to a real file. 1. Open a new chat. Paste a real client task: "Draft a one-page weekly status report for [Client] in their format." 2. Ask Claude to render the output as a downloadable .docx artifact. 3. Edit the draft inside the artifact pane until it matches the format you actually send. Claude updates the same file. 4. Click Download. The artifact lands as a real .docx ready to attach to the client email. ## Step 5: Three workflows to run this week (15 minutes) - Long brief to summary: paste a 30-page client brief and ask for the three implications, the two open questions and the one risk to surface in the kickoff call. - Proposal v0: brief Claude on a new piece of work and ask for a four-section proposal in your voice, exported as a .docx artifact. - Knowledge base draft: paste five recent client emails answering similar questions and ask Claude to merge them into a single FAQ document, exported as Markdown ready for Notion. ## What you ship A calibrated Claude Pro account that drafts in your voice. One live Project with twenty client files loaded. Three Artifacts produced as real .docx, .pptx or Markdown outputs ready to send. A 50 percent saving on the next long-form deliverable. ## What to build next Pair the setup with the Claude Projects vs ChatGPT Projects comparison so you can pick the right container per piece of work, and the WIRE Method one-pager for the next engagement worth a Project of its own. ## Related builds More tutorials in Core Assistants. Each one runs in 60 to 90 minutes and ships a finished asset. ### Replace 3 hours of admin a week: the 60-minute ChatGPT build 30 to 60 minutes. Solo Pro. [Open tutorial](/tutorials/chatgpt-setup-solo-professionals) ### Stop losing client context: organise every engagement in ChatGPT Projects 60 to 90 minutes. Solo Pro. [Open tutorial](/tutorials/chatgpt-projects-client-work) ### Turn one repeatable task into an assistant: build your first Custom GPT in 30 minutes 60 to 90 minutes. Solo Pro. [Open tutorial](/tutorials/build-first-custom-gpt) ### Pick the right project container: Claude Projects vs ChatGPT Projects in practice 60 to 90 minutes. Solo Pro. [Open tutorial](/tutorials/claude-projects-vs-chatgpt-projects) ## Questions people ask before they start ### Should I pay for both Claude Pro and ChatGPT Plus? Most solo professionals end up with both. The combined cost is £36 a month and the saving on a single long-form client task usually clears that in a week. If you must pick one, match it to your most common work. ChatGPT for short, varied tasks; Claude for long-form briefs and document-heavy deliverables. ### Is the Max plan worth it? Only if you hit the Pro usage cap regularly. Most solo professionals do not. Stick with Pro for the first three months and check the usage panel before upgrading. ### Can Claude work with my Google Drive? Yes. Claude has a Google Drive integration on Pro and above. Connect once, then reference files by name in any chat. Useful for projects where the source documents already live in Drive. ### Will my client data train the model? Anthropic does not use Pro chat data to train models by default. For regulated work, Team or Enterprise plans add admin controls and audit logs. Check the Trust and Compliance page before uploading anything sensitive. ### How do I sell a Claude setup as a paid engagement? £400 to £900 for a packaged setup, the same as the ChatGPT engagement: 30-minute audit, 60-minute configuration, 30-day check-in. The pitch lands fastest with legal, healthcare and professional services clients because of cleaner voice and stronger refusals on shaky claims.