Overview
A working set of AI skills that gets the Product Specialist shipping sales sheets, scripts, and competitive briefs by week two.
Welcome aboard. You're stepping into a role Aaron and the marketing team have been building toward — formalizing product marketing inside a distribution business that has run on sales muscle for over fifty years. Your job is to take Crown's full portfolio (consumables, equipment, ISTA/APASS testing, supplier launches) and turn it into content that the field can actually use in Memphis, Boise, Chicago, and the rest of the branch network.
Inside the Skills folder you'll find a working set of prompts that run inside Claude, OpenAI Codex, or Microsoft 365 Copilot — whichever you prefer. They handle the blank-screen problem: first drafts of sales sheets, blog posts, video scripts, supplier briefs, branch-localized collateral, and weekly competitive scans on Veritiv, Uline, Pregis, and Sealed Air. Every skill outputs a real Word doc, Excel workbook, or PowerPoint deck — not a wall of markdown.
The AI handles the production scaffolding. You handle the judgment calls — which supplier launches deserve marketing weight, what claims you're willing to stand behind on FTC Green Guides language, how the ISTA/APASS story should be told to a procurement buyer who's never tested a package. The goal is to compress your ramp so you're publishing under your own byline by week three, not week twelve.
Expected outcomes by day 30
- A sales sheet production line that turns a supplier spec PDF into a Crown-branded one-pager in under 45 minutes of human time.
- A weekly competitive intel brief on Veritiv, Uline, Pregis, and Sealed Air that lands in Aaron's inbox every Monday morning.
- Branch-localized versions of core collateral for Boise and Chicago, drafted from the Memphis originals in a single sitting.
- A standing PACK EXPO pre-show packet (booth talking cards, email sequences) and a post-show ROI report template that actually gets completed.
- A reusable ISTA/APASS proof kit (FAQ, one-page proof sheet, explainer script) that sales can pull on demand.
- A library of pre-built prompts the sales team can self-serve for 'pull-this-for-my-deck' asks, cutting daily interruptions.
Where AI stops
The work the human keeps. Honest about what the model can’t carry.
- Approving sustainability and recyclability claims for FTC Green Guides and California SB 54 compliance — those go to a human reviewer.
- Deciding which supplier launches Crown invests marketing weight behind. AI drafts the calendar; you and Aaron pick the bets.
- On-camera and on-mic presence for videos and podcast episodes. The script is a starting point; the performance is yours.
- Interpreting Crown's internal margin and velocity data to recommend primary product focuses. AI structures the framework; you make the call.
- Owning supplier relationships and the judgment about what's confidential versus marketable from collaboration sessions.