Everybody's selling you "the top 20 Claude skills you need to install."
Nobody tells you what a skill actually is.
So you install a bunch of stuff you don't understand, it does something you didn't ask for, and you quietly go back to typing questions into the chat box like you were before. I did that for weeks.
Here's the thing nobody says out loud.
A skill is a folder with a text file in it. That's it. That is genuinely the whole thing. The text file tells Claude how you want a certain kind of job done, and from then on it does the job that way, every time, without you re-explaining it.
That's the entire concept. You can stop being afraid of it now.
Why you'd want one
Think about the thing you explain to Claude over and over.
Mine was my voice. Every single time I asked for something written, I'd paste the same 6 paragraphs about how I talk, what I don't say, no em dashes, don't make me sound like a LinkedIn post. Every time. And half the time I'd forget a piece of it and get back something that sounded like a robot in a blazer.
A skill fixes exactly that. You write those instructions down once, in a file, and Claude reads them automatically whenever the job comes up.
You're not programming. You're writing down the thing you're already saying out loud.
What's actually in the folder
Two things, and only one of them is required.
my-skill/
SKILL.md <- required. the instructions.
anything-else <- optional. examples, templates, a checklist.SKILL.md is a plain text file. You can write it in Notepad. It has a tiny header at the top and then your instructions underneath.
The header looks like this and it is 3 lines:
---
name: brand-voice
description: How Jordan writes. Use whenever writing anything in his voice.
---name is what it's called. description is the important one, because that's how Claude decides when to use it. Write that line like you're telling a new employee when to grab a specific binder off the shelf.
Then underneath, you just... write the instructions. In normal words.
Rest of it's yours
Drop your email and the whole thing opens up right here. No waiting on a confirmation, no download, nothing to install.
You'll also get the new ones as I make them. Leave whenever, no hard feelings.
Your first skill, start to finish
We're going to build the one I actually use. Takes about 10 minutes.
1. Make the folder
On Windows, your skills live here:
C:\Users\<you>\.claude\skills\On a Mac:
~/.claude/skills/Make a new folder in there. Call it brand-voice.
If you can't see the .claude folder, it's hidden. In Windows, type the path straight into the address bar in File Explorer and hit enter. It'll take you right there.
2. Make the file
Inside that folder, make a new text file and name it SKILL.md.
Windows will fight you about the .txt on the end. Turn on file extensions in the View menu, then rename it properly to SKILL.md. If it ends up as SKILL.md.txt it won't work, and you'll spend 20 minutes confused. Ask me how I know.
3. Write it
Open it and put this in. Change everything to be about you.
---
name: brand-voice
description: How I write and talk. Use this whenever writing anything
in my voice, including posts, emails, captions and scripts.
---
# How I write
I'm blunt. I say the thing, then I explain it.
## Always
- Contractions. "don't" not "do not"
- Numbers as digits. "3 things" not "three things"
- Short sentences mixed with long rambling ones, the way people
actually talk
- Cussing when it earns the emphasis. Never as filler
- One idea at a time
## Never
- Em dashes. Use commas, periods, or "..."
- "In today's world", "let me tell you", "the truth is"
- Words like leverage, utilize, robust, seamless
- Three-part lists where everything is perfectly balanced
- Anything that sounds like a TED talk
## The test
Read it out loud. If it sounds like a guy talking to his friend at
11pm on the couch, it's right. If it sounds like a LinkedIn post,
rewrite it.Save it. That's the skill. You're done.
4. Use it
Open Claude, and ask for something written. You don't have to mention the skill. It reads the description, sees the job matches, and uses it.
If you want to be sure it's working, just ask: "which skills do you have?"
The 4 things that actually go wrong
I hit every one of these.
The file is named wrong. SKILL.md, capital letters, and check there's no sneaky .txt on the end.
The description is too vague. "Writing stuff" doesn't tell Claude anything. "Use whenever writing posts, captions, emails or scripts in my voice" does. This is the one that trips most people up, and it's a 10 second fix.
You wrote a novel. Long skills get skimmed just like long emails do. Keep it to a page. If it's longer than that, it's probably 2 skills.
You put the folder in the wrong place. It has to be directly inside .claude/skills/, not nested 3 folders deep.
What to build after that
Once the first one works, the fear's gone and you'll want more. Skills worth having, in the order I'd build them:
- Your voice. The one above. Highest value, everybody needs it.
- Your business facts. What you sell, who buys it, what you charge, what you don't do. Stops you re-explaining your own company every time.
- A job you repeat. Quoting. Following up. Writing the same kind of email. Whatever you do every week.
- A checklist. Something you always forget. Mine catches things before they go out the door.
The honest part
You're not going to nail it on the first try. Mine was garbage for about a week. The output was still off, and I'd go back in and add a line like "stop using the word leverage," save it, and try again.
That's the actual job. It's not a one-shot magic file. It's a thing you keep sharpening, and it gets a little better every time it annoys you.
That's also why nobody selling you a course on this wants to explain it. There's nothing to sell. It's a folder and a text file and about 10 minutes.
Go make the folder.