Writing packaging inserts with AI is a Skill job: you save one set of instructions, and the AI writes the card that goes in every box you ship. It takes one sitting, about an hour from gathering the inputs to a checked, chosen draft. The AI drafts several versions in your voice and to the size of the card. You choose one, check every fact on it, and order a proof before you print a full run.
- Shape
- Skill
- Sitting
- one sitting
The shape: Skill
This job is a Skill because the card is short, the rules are firm, and you will write it more than once. A store with one product needs one card. A store with a few product lines, seasonal offers and a holiday rush needs a card for each, and every one of them should sound like the same business.
A skill here means a saved set of instructions the AI follows every time. In Claude that is a Project with instructions; in ChatGPT it is a custom GPT or a saved project. It can also be a block of text in your notes app that you paste at the top of a fresh chat. You write the rules once, and the next card starts from them.
The AI fits this job because insert copy is hard in a small way. You have a few square inches, a buyer who just opened a box, and one chance to say something that does not read like a template. Most people either write too much or fall back on "Thank you for your order." The AI is quick at short copy and happy to give you eight versions, so you can choose instead of staring at a blank card.
The other half of the shape is that the AI knows nothing about your business beyond what you paste. It does not know your return window, your codes, your website address or what your buyers ask you. Every fact on the card comes from you.
What you give the AI
Gather these before you open the chat.
- The product and what is in the box. Its name, what it does, and anything a buyer has to know to use it well, such as care steps, a first-use step or a storage note.
- Who buys it, in two sentences. "Mostly people buying for themselves after seeing us at a market" tells the AI more than "women 25 to 45".
- The one thing you want the buyer to do next. Reorder, leave a review, follow you, join your list, or contact you before they leave a bad review. Choose one main ask and, at most, one small second line.
- The card size and layout. Business-card size, postcard, folded card, or a printed panel inside the lid. Say whether there is a front and a back, and how much of it is taken by a logo or a photo.
- The facts to print. Your website address, the handle you want followed, a support email, a discount code with its end date, a QR code destination. Copy them from the live source, not from memory.
- Three lines that sound like you. An email you sent a customer, a product caption you like, or a note you once wrote by hand. If you already have a written voice guide, paste it; our brand voice guide page covers making one.
- Your channel's rules. If you sell on a marketplace, paste the part of its policy that covers inserts and review requests.
What comes back
For each card you get several versions of the front and back, each one sized to the card and layout you described, plus a short list of every fact the card states, so you can check them. Ask for five to eight versions. Fewer, and they all sound the same; more, and you stop reading carefully.
Paste this into the saved instructions once, then paste your product notes, voice examples and rules under it.
You write the printed insert card that goes inside every order for a small business.
The product notes, buyer notes, voice examples and channel rules below this prompt are the standard for every card.
For each card, write five versions. Each version has:
1. A front: a short thank-you in the owner's voice, under 15 words.
2. A back: one useful line about using or caring for the product, then one clear next step, short enough to fit the card size and layout given.
3. The exact web address, handle, code or contact line to print, copied from the facts provided.
Rules:
Use only facts from the notes provided.
Ask for one main action per card, and never more than two.
Do not offer anything in exchange for a review, and do not ask only for positive reviews.
Do not invent discount codes, website addresses, guarantees or return terms.
Do not use these words: valued customer, journey, we hope you love it, small business family.
Write in plain words and short sentences.
Match the voice of the examples.
Make each version sound different from the others in its opening.
After the versions, list:
1. Every fact printed on the card, so the owner can check it.
2. Any line that a marketplace or consumer rule might restrict.Then each new card is a short message: "New card for the gift sets, postcard size, the ask is a reorder," with that product's notes under it.
Run the first card for the product you ship most. If it comes back wrong, change the instructions before you write the next one.
How to judge it
You can reject a bad card in under a minute once you know what bad looks like.
A bad card:
- Prints a fact you did not give it. A code, a web address, a guarantee or a return window that is not in your notes is deleted on sight, because a wrong one gets printed hundreds of times.
- Asks for three things. "Leave a review, follow us, tag us and tell a friend" means the buyer does none of them.
- Could go in any box from any shop. Cover your logo; if you cannot tell whose card it is, the voice examples did not make it in.
- Thanks the buyer for "their support" or calls them a "valued customer". Those phrases tell the buyer the card was written for nobody.
- Ties a review to a reward, or asks only happy buyers to post one. That line comes off before anything else is judged.
- Runs too long for the card. Text that fills every corner at a small size is text nobody reads.
- Sounds like the version above it with two words swapped.
A good card sounds like a person who packed the box, tells the buyer one thing they did not know, and asks for one action they can take in under a minute. The quickest test: read it aloud as if you were handing it across a counter. If you would not say it, cut it.
What stays with you
Some of this job no AI can do for you.
Every fact on the card. Web addresses, codes, handles, support emails and return terms are the lines that go wrong at scale. Type the web address into a browser, scan the QR code with your own phone, and test the code at checkout before you print.
The rules for your channel. Marketplaces set their own rules for inserts, and some restrict links, review requests or offers. Consumer protection rules on review incentives apply too. The AI will flag likely problems, but knowing and following the current rules is yours.
The one ask. Choosing what you want a buyer to do next is a business decision, not a writing one. A shop that lives on repeat orders wants a reorder ask; a new shop with no reviews might want a review request; a shop with frequent questions might want the support line up front.
The design and the print. The AI writes words; the card still needs layout, a typeface you can read at arm's length, and a printed proof. Hold the proof next to the product before you approve a full run. Small type that looked fine on screen is often too small on card stock.
The handwritten part. Many small shops add a first name or a short line by hand. No printed card does that, and buyers notice it. If you want help writing those notes in batches, our thank-you notes page covers it.
The packing. Someone has to put the card in the box, in the same place every time, so the buyer sees it before the product.
An example, made up for this page
Say you run a small online shop that sells loose-leaf tea in tins, with a few gift sets in the winter. You ship from a spare room and the card goes in on top of the tissue paper.
You paste in three things you have written: a caption about your smoky black tea, an email you sent a customer whose tin arrived dented, and the "About" paragraph from your site. You add two sentences on buyers (mostly people reordering a favorite, plus gift buyers in December) and your rules: steeping times in minutes, temperatures in Fahrenheit, never the word "artisanal". The card is postcard size with your logo taking the top third of the front. The ask is a reorder, with your website address and a code for repeat buyers that you set up in your store that morning.
The AI returns five versions. One gives a steeping time that does not match your tin label, and you catch it on the fact list. One opens with "Welcome to the family," which you send back. One asks for a reorder, a review and a follow on the same card, so it goes too. You pick the version that says "Steep it shorter than you think," change one word, and add the code you tested at checkout.
Then you write a second card for the gift sets, where the buyer is often not the drinker, so the ask becomes "Tell whoever this is for where to reorder." You order a proof of both cards, hold them against a tin, and shrink the logo.
None of that is a real business or a real result. It shows the size and shape of the sitting, not what it will produce.
Which ask to put on the card
The card has room for one main ask, so choose by what your shop needs most right now.
| What your shop needs | The main ask on the card |
|---|---|
| More second orders | A reorder link, and a code made only for inserts so you can count them |
| More reviews | A plain request for an honest review, with the link, and nothing offered for it |
| Fewer problems that turn into bad reviews | Your support email, with "write to us first if anything is wrong" |
| Buyers who come back without a code | Your email list or your loyalty program; our loyalty program page covers the rules |
If the card should point buyers at more of your catalog, the copy on those pages matters too; our product descriptions page covers writing them.
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