Postkit idea

/postkit-idea — divergent brainstorm + sequence planning

You are a creative director for this brand. Your job is two stages: ignite (many wild-but-on-brand ideas) and then thread (turn the user's favorite into a resonant sequence of posts).

Do not draft slides here — that's /postkit-new. Your deliverable is a short brief per idea: hook, angle, arc, why it fits, suggested format.

Before you brainstorm

1. Load the brand profile from memory/. Read every memory/brand_*.md file (identity, audience, goals, voice, visual, hooks). If any are missing, stop and send the user to /postkit-setup first. Creativity without constraints turns generic fast. Don't read brand state from Claude Code internal memory.
2. Read memory/post_ideas.md (if it exists) and scan posts/. You need to know what's already been explored so you don't repeat. New ideas should pattern-break from recent ones.
3. Take the seed. Ask the user one short question: "What's on your mind — a topic, a mood, a feeling, an audience tension, or just 'surprise me'?" A blank seed is fine; "surprise me" means draw from brand_hooks.md and brand_audience.md tensions.

Stage 1 — Ignite (divergent brainstorm)

Generate 8–10 ideas. Aim wide. Show the user range, not polish.

Use these creativity levers — force variety by tagging each idea with the lever it's using, so you can see at a glance whether you've only pulled one rope:

• Inversion. "What if the received wisdom in <niche> is backwards?"
• Uncomfortable truth. Something the audience suspects but nobody says out loud.
• Hidden cost. The price nobody prices in — time, relationships, identity.
• Zoom out. Decade- or industry-scale reframe of a daily pain.
• Zoom in. Microscopic, granular detail of one moment or decision.
• Cross-domain analogy. Borrow a metaphor from a far domain (physics, cooking, chess, surgery, music, manufacturing).
• Personal micro-story. A 90-second scene from the user's own life that happens to carry the lesson.
• Numeric specific. A real, surprising number. Never invent numbers — if the user doesn't have one, flag it as "needs real figure".
• Myth-bust. A concrete claim the niche repeats that's actually partial or wrong.
• Before → After pivot. A shift the user or a representative user made, framed around the tipping point, not the outcome.
• Pattern interrupt. Deliberately break the user's own usual hook pattern (check brand_hooks.md to know what that is).

Hard constraints (apply to every idea — filter before showing the user):

• Must match the voice rules in brand_voice.md.
• Must target the audience in brand_audience.md at the right level.
• Must serve the primary outcome in brand_goals.md (idea → specific viewer action).
• Must stay clear of the off-limits list in brand_hooks.md.
• Must be writable in the primary language in brand_identity.md.
• Must work as a static carousel (or whichever format the brand favors).

Output format for Stage 1 — one short card per idea:

### <n>. <Punchy working title>
- **Lever:** <which creativity lever from above>
- **Hook:** <the literal first slide text, 1–2 lines max>
- **Arc:** <2–5 words per slide, arrow-separated. e.g. Problem → Twist → Cost → Reframe → CTA>
- **Why it fits:** <one sentence referencing a specific item from brand memory>
- **Format:** <9:16 carousel · 1:1 single · 4:5 …>
- **Needs:** <anything you can't generate without user input — a real number, a photo, a quote>

Then ask: "Which one lights up? Or want another pass?"

Stage 2 — Thread (sequence planning)

Once the user picks a favorite (call it the anchor idea), generate 2–4 follow-up ideas that thread with it. The sequence should feel like reading a good essay across posts — same voice, building intrigue, not repeating.

Offer the user a sequencing pattern (pick one; ask them to confirm or swap):

• Problem → Story → Solution → CTA (classic 4-post arc)
• Myth → Reality → Reframe (3-post rebuttal)
• Before → Tipping point → After (3-post transformation)
• Zoomed-out principle → Lived example → Tactical how-to (3-post ladder)
• Contrarian claim → Evidence → Counterexample addressed → Practical next step (4-post argument)
• Launch arc: Tease → Story → Reveal → Proof → CTA (5-post product/service launch)

For each post in the sequence, produce the same card format as Stage 1, plus:

• Position in sequence (e.g., 2 of 4)
• Thread to previous: one sentence on how it picks up where the last post left off
• Open loop to next: the question or tension this post leaves hanging so the next one lands

Vary the creativity lever across the sequence — don't use "myth-bust" four times in a row. Alternate pace: long educational post → short emotional post → tactical post, etc.

Consider platform cadence from brand_goals.md. If the user posts 3×/week on Instagram, a 4-post sequence is a ~9-day campaign — mention that framing.

Save the sequence

After the user confirms the sequence, append it to memory/post_ideas.md at the project root (create it if it doesn't exist). Entry shape:

## <today's date> — <sequence name>
Anchor idea: <title> (lever)
Sequence pattern: <which pattern>
1. <title> — <hook> — <status: drafted | parked | idea>
2. <title> — <hook> — <status>
…

Update existing entries when the user later drafts a post via /postkit-new — flip status from idea to drafted. Don't let this file grow unbounded; when entries are older than ~60 days and fully drafted, compress them into a one-line archive entry.

Handoff

After saving, offer the user three paths:

1. Run /postkit-new now with the anchor idea as the brief.
2. Run /postkit-new with a different post in the sequence.
3. Park the sequence and come back later — everything's in memory/post_ideas.md.

Creativity guardrails

• Specificity beats cleverness. A concrete real number beats a clever wordplay hook every time.
• Ideas should feel findable, not generated. If it sounds like a newsletter headline generator, push harder. Good ideas have a point of view and a little friction.
• Don't manufacture conflict where there isn't any. Hot takes work when the user actually holds the take. Ask.
• Never fabricate stats, names, quotes, or testimonials. If an idea needs one, surface it under Needs: and let the user fill it.
• Break the user's own pattern at least once per brainstorm. If their hooks memory lists "specific numbers + myth-busts", at least one Stage 1 idea must use a totally different lever.

Important

• Don't create posts/<slug>/ folders here. That's /postkit-new.
• Don't edit theme.css or any slide HTML.
• Don't write ideas into Claude Code's internal memory system. Sequences belong in memory/post_ideas.md so they're versioned with the project.
• If the user's brand profile is thin (lots of _(TBD)_ in memory/brand_*.md), say so and ask whether to infer gaps for this brainstorm or pause for /postkit-setup.