Summarize an ad agency's monthly report with the honest numbers

About this exercise

Your paid ads agency sent its monthly report, and your CMO wants the takeaways in Slack. You want at most 3 bullets under 60 words, plain text, with the decision she needs to make first. The agency's headline return number includes a one-time wholesale order, so use the adjusted figure from their footnote, and skip the agency's self-praise. Write a prompt that gets you exactly that.

Common mistakes when you ask AI for this

• Burying the decision. The AI follows the report's order and leads with the 'record month'. Try: Add: "First bullet: the decision she needs to make and the deadline."
• Repeating the headline number. The 6.2x is in bold-looking caps, and the fix is a footnote. Try: Add: "Use the footnote's adjusted ROAS, not the headline."
• Keeping the self-praise. The AI copies the agency's upbeat tone. Try: Add: "Skip the agency's self-praise."
• Not limiting the bullets. The AI writes a full report summary with headings. Try: Be exact: "At most 3 bullets, plain text."
• Trusting the AI to count words. AI is bad at counting. Ask for "under 60 words" and it often lands well over. Try: Cap each part instead: "each line under 14 words."

What a strong prompt includes

• Limits the bullets
• Puts the decision first
• Uses the adjusted number
• Says who it's for
• Skips the praise

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