Claude is most useful once it knows your business. Spend an hour setting it up, then use it every day for replies, documents, summaries and planning.
Features below are as of October 2026, from Anthropic's own pages. They change often, so check the links.
Step 1: pick a plan
From the Claude pricing page:
- Free: $0, with usage limits and up to five projects.
- Pro: $20 a month, or $17 a month billed yearly.
- Max: from $100 a month, for heavy use.
- Team: $25 per seat a month billed monthly, or $20 billed yearly, for a standard seat. Adds admin controls and central billing.
Start on Free for a week. Upgrade when you hit the limits on real work.
Step 2: check the privacy setting
On Free, Pro and Max, open Settings, then Privacy, and decide on "Help Improve our AI models". Turn it off if you do not want your chats used for training (how to change it). Team and Enterprise do not train on your data by default.
Never paste passwords, card numbers or sensitive customer data into any chat tool. If you have staff, write the rules down with the AI policy template.
Step 3: tell Claude about your business
Two places hold instructions (personalization features):
- Instructions for Claude, in Settings. These apply to every chat. Put the basics here: what you sell, who buys, and how you write.
- Projects, for one area of work. A project holds files and instructions that every chat inside it can use (what are projects).
A simple setup is one project each for sales, customer support and marketing. Add your one-page context file to each. Here is what to put on that page.
Claude also has memory. It is on by default for Free, Pro and Max, and you can review and edit what it saved in Settings, then Memory (chat search and memory). Memory is good for small things. Keep prices and policies in your file, for the reasons in AI that remembers past conversations.
Step 4: connect your tools, carefully
Claude can connect to Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Drive. It can search and draft emails, check your calendar and read files from Drive. By default it asks for your approval before each action, such as sending an email (Google Workspace connectors).
Keep that approval on. Read every draft before it goes out.
Example prompts you can copy
Each prompt assumes you are in a project that holds your context file.
Find the latest email from [customer name] in Gmail. Draft a reply that answers their question using our delivery times and refund policy from the project files. Under 100 words. Do not send it. Show me the draft.
Here are my notes on how I onboard a new client: [paste]. Turn them into a step-by-step checklist someone new could follow. Mark any step where my notes are unclear, and ask me about it.
Read the attached supplier contract. List the payment terms, notice periods, renewal dates and anything unusual, each with the clause number. I will check the important points with a lawyer.
I have a call with [name] on [day]. Check my calendar for the meeting, and search Gmail for our last five emails. Give me a short summary of where things stand and three questions I should ask.
Using the project files, write a one-page service overview for new clients: what I do, how it works, prices and what happens after they say yes. Make it a document I can export to Word.
Look at my calendar for next week. List the gaps longer than two hours. Suggest which of these tasks to put in each gap: [paste your task list]. Keep Friday afternoon free.
Claude can create documents, slides and spreadsheets. Long pieces open beside the chat, where you can highlight text to change it, and documents export to Word, PDF or Google Docs (artifacts).
More general prompts, which also work in Claude, are in ChatGPT prompts for small business owners.
Make it sound like you
Claude writes in a neutral voice until you show it yours. Add five to ten samples of your writing, a few rules you can check, and a list of words you never use. Put them in your project files. The method is in how to make AI sound like you.
What to keep checking
- Facts, prices and dates. Claude can state wrong things with confidence.
- Anything legal, medical or financial. Use it to prepare, then ask a professional.
- Your context file. Update it the day a price or policy changes.
- Every email and message before it goes to a customer.
If you are still deciding between tools, read ChatGPT vs Claude for business.