The first text, and the line you do not cross
Lesson 1 of 6 · Reach them without mail
1 · Learn the move · Constraints + negative instructions
A text lands on an owner's phone between messages from their children. It is the most personal channel you can reach and one of the most regulated. There are two jobs in a first text and the model can do only one of them: it can write the words, and it cannot decide you may send them. Whether you may text a number pulled from a public record depends on consent, do-not-call status, allowed hours and opt-out duties, and those rules differ by channel and by state and carry real money when broken. That decision is counsel's. So the prompt fences the draft hard: who you are and your business, why you are writing, a working opt-out, and nothing else. No pretext opener, no fake familiarity, no price, no urgency. And the draft comes back stamped NOT CLEARED TO SEND, with the list of what must be cleared, every time.
Draft a first text to the owner of one parcel. Identify me and my business, say why I am writing, include a working opt-out. No 'is this John?', no 'following up', no price, no urgency. Label the output NOT CLEARED TO SEND and list what I must clear with counsel before it goes.
2 · Your turn. You write the prompt
You have a phone number for the owner of a 30-acre tract in Tolliver County from a skip trace. You have never spoken to them. A friend in the business swears by a text that opens 'Hey, is this Martin?' as if you already know him. Write the prompt for a first text that stays on the right side of that.
Write the prompt for this scenario as given, or swap in a real one from your own work. The score works the same either way.
Remember: the AI sees only your prompt, not this page. If the situation isn't in your prompt, it doesn't exist.
Optional. These shape the output when you run your prompt below, not your score.