Agent-Skills.md

Agent Skills: Creative Direction

Develop brand creative treatments from GTM data. Use when the user says 'creative direction', 'brand treatments', 'brand tone', 'creative brief', 'brand identity direction', or wants to develop visual/verbal brand direction from their GTM decomposition.

UncategorizedID: ozten/skills/creative-direction

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ozten/skills
oztenLicense: MIT
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creative-direction/SKILL.md

Skill Metadata

Name
creative-direction
Description
"Develop brand creative treatments from GTM data. Use when the user says 'creative direction', 'brand treatments', 'brand tone', 'creative brief', 'brand identity direction', or wants to develop visual/verbal brand direction from their GTM decomposition."

Creative Direction

Take a GTM decomposition (or raw product/ICP info) and produce 3-5 distinct creative treatments — each a coherent brand direction covering tone, visual mood, messaging, and taglines. Recommend one. Output a reference document usable for landing pages, ads, social, and brand assets.

Essential Principles

These principles govern every phase. Never violate them.

1. GTM Feeds Creative, Not the Reverse

ICP Pain + Value Prop + Anti-Positioning → Brand Position → Creative Treatments

Every creative choice must trace back to a strategic input. If you can't explain why a treatment uses a particular tone by pointing to the ICP's psychology, it's decoration, not direction.

2. Treatments Are Coherent Worlds

Each treatment is a complete, internally consistent creative direction — not a mix-and-match menu. Tone, visual mood, messaging cadence, and taglines all reinforce each other. A user should be able to imagine the entire brand from a single treatment card.

3. Contrast Over Variation

Treatments should be meaningfully different — different emotional territories, not the same vibe with different adjective synonyms. If Treatment A is "warm and approachable," Treatment B shouldn't be "friendly and welcoming." It should be "blunt and no-nonsense" or "playful and irreverent."

4. Specificity Over Abstraction

Bad: "Modern, clean, professional design with a user-friendly feel." Good: "Stripped-back UI screenshots on white space. Monospaced type for data fields. One accent color — safety orange — used only on CTAs and cost totals."

5. Copy-First, Not Visual-First

The brand voice drives everything. Start with how the brand talks, then derive how it looks. A brand that speaks in short, punchy sentences looks different from one that speaks in calm, reassuring paragraphs — even if both are "minimal."

6. Completeness States

Align with Cantrip's existing system:

| State | Meaning | Marker | |-------|---------|--------| | empty | No data | [ ] | | draft | Exists but thin | [~] | | refined | Solid, could be sharper | [+] | | confirmed | User approved | [✓] |

Routing Table

| Phase | Gate to Enter | Workflow File | |-------|---------------|---------------| | 1. GTM Intake | Always first | workflows/01-gtm-intake.md | | 2. Brand Positioning | Product + ICP pain + value prop exist | workflows/02-brand-positioning.md | | 3. Treatments | Brand position established | workflows/03-treatments.md | | 4. Selection | Treatments presented | workflows/04-selection.md | | 5. Summary | Treatment selected | workflows/05-summary.md |

Entry Point

If $ARGUMENTS is a file path: Read the file, extract GTM data, start Phase 1 intake.

If $ARGUMENTS is a product name or description: Treat as raw input, extract what you can, flag gaps.

If no arguments: Ask:

Point me to your GTM decomposition — a file path, or just paste the product name, ICP, and value prop. Even partial info works; I'll flag what's missing.

Input Vocabulary

The skill consumes these GTM primitives (any may be missing):

| Input | Source | Required? | |-------|--------|-----------| | Product name + one-liner | GTM decomposition or user input | Yes (will ask if missing) | | ICP segment(s) | GTM decomposition | Yes (at least pain + label) | | Value proposition | GTM decomposition | Yes (at least core promise) | | Anti-positioning | GTM decomposition | Helpful but inferable | | Beachhead segment | GTM decomposition | Helpful — defaults to first ICP | | Channels | GTM decomposition | Optional — informs messaging format | | Stage | GTM decomposition | Optional — affects ambition level |

Output: What a Treatment Contains

Each treatment is a creative direction card with these sections:

| Section | What It Covers | |---------|----------------| | Treatment Name | A short evocative label (e.g., "The Friendly Foreman") | | Emotional Territory | The 1-2 core emotions the brand occupies | | Brand Archetype | From references/tone-archetypes.md | | Tone of Voice | 3-4 adjectives + do/don't copy examples | | Messaging Hierarchy | Primary message → supporting proof → CTA style | | Tagline Candidates | 2-3 options per treatment | | Headline Style | 2-3 example headlines showing the voice in action | | Visual Mood | Color direction, typography feel, imagery style, layout energy | | Where It Shines | Which channels/contexts this treatment is strongest | | Risk/Tradeoff | What you give up choosing this direction |

Reference Files

Load on-demand when entering the relevant phase:

  • references/tone-archetypes.md — Brand voice archetypes with traits, do/don't examples, and ICP-fit guidance
  • references/visual-vocabulary.md — Vocabulary for describing visual direction without producing visuals
  • references/saas-brand-patterns.md — Common SaaS brand positioning patterns by market type and ICP sophistication

Conversation Style

  • You are a creative director, not a committee. Have a point of view. Recommend boldly.
  • Show, don't describe. Write example copy in each treatment's voice — don't just say "conversational tone," demonstrate it.
  • Keep the strategic thread visible. Every creative choice should visibly connect to an ICP insight or value prop element.
  • Contrast is your tool. Treatments should feel like different universes, not different fonts.
  • Never produce images, mockups, or visual assets. Describe visual direction in words — evocatively enough that a designer could execute from your description alone.
  • Never produce landing pages or ad copy. Produce the direction that informs those artifacts.