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At a glance
What it is
This mode runs before any visual work, naming work, or voice-rule work.
A skill is a written procedure a bot loads when a job calls for it. This one is a single file, SKILL.md, and the whole file is on this page.
The whole file, exactly as it downloads. Read it before you rely on it.
SKILL.md
77 lines · 812 words
Mode skill. Default-enabled on the Brand specialist.
Use any time a brand decision is on the table and the onlyness statement is not yet locked in TEAM_MEMORY.md. This mode runs before any visual work, naming work, or voice-rule work. If a teammate hands you a brief that jumps straight to "pick the colors" or "design the logo," run this mode first and report back.
Trigger phrases:
This mode runs before any visual work, naming work, or voice-rule work.
Nothing. It ships with Murage, which is open source. Your bots run on the AI plan you already have.
Yes. Open it in Settings → Skills to read, edit or duplicate it. Skill Guard scans it again after every edit.
Download the app, connect the AI you already pay for, and tell your Chief of Staff what needs doing. Plan on about ten minutes from install to a working team.
No account needed · Runs on the AI plan you already pay for
Paste it into your agent's instructions (CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md or a custom GPT), or add it to a bot in Murage.
Ask Ember for the bot, then switch the skill on in its settings.
Step 1
Send your Chief of Staff this message. It proposes the bot and its role first, and creates it when you say go.
Send this to Ember
“Create a bot that uses the Brand Foundation skill, and show me the plan first.”
You're done when your Chief proposes the bot and its role, and the bot appears in your sidebar once you say go.
Step 2
You're done when you see the bot’s skills and the library.
Step 3
You're done when the skill shows as on for that bot.
Step 4
You're done when the bot takes the job and opens the skill when it needs it.
Prefer to do it yourself? Choose + in the sidebar, then New Bot.Read the full guide to skills and Skill Guard
What it teaches a bot, what it covers, and the whole file to read.
The principle
**Mode skill.** Default-enabled on the Brand specialist.
What it covers
When to use
Procedure
Decision rules
Anti-patterns
Before / after
Each of these library teams gives its bots this skill. Import one and look inside first.
"Help me build a brand for…"
"What should our positioning be?"
"We need a tagline / one-liner."
"Why aren't people remembering us?"
If onlyness is already locked (Brand has stamped it in TEAM_MEMORY.md), skip this mode and run visual-system next.
1. Map the alternatives. Ask the user: "When someone is about to buy from you, what else are they choosing between?" Demand at least three named alternatives, including the option of doing nothing or building it themselves. If Research has posted a competitive scan in TEAM_MEMORY.md, pull from there.
2. Force a single dominant attribute. Ask: "If a buyer described you to a friend in one word — not a list — what word do you want them to use?" Push back on every list. "Premium and approachable" is two words, which means none. The dominant attribute is the one word that, if a competitor tried to claim it, would feel wrong on them.
3. Draft the onlyness statement. Use the frame:
Our [offer] is the only [category] that [unique benefit] for [audience] who [need], in a time when [trend or shift].
Fill every bracket with a specific noun. "Solo bookkeepers" not "small businesses". "Charge by the engagement, not the hour" not "deliver value."
4. Stress-test it. Three checks, in order:
The competitor swap. Substitute the name of the nearest competitor into the sentence. If the sentence remains plausible for them, "only" is not true. Tighten.
The friend test. Could a customer who likes the brand say the sentence to a friend out loud without sounding like a brochure? If not, the words are corporate. Rewrite in plain speech.
The five-year test. Will the sentence still be true in two to five years? If it locks the brand to a feature shipped last month, raise it a level.
5. Lock it. Post the surviving sentence to ## Brand in TEAM_MEMORY.md under a dated ### YYYY-MM-DD — Onlyness statement entry. Add the dominant attribute on a second line. This is the artifact every other brand decision answers to.
One sentence, not a paragraph. If it needs a comma-spliced second clause, it isn't done.
Difference beats betterness. "Better than X" is a comparative claim that requires constant proof. "The only X that Y" is a categorical claim that owns a position. Pick the categorical.
Onlyness is owned at the intersection. "The only meal kit for renters with one square foot of counter space" — the audience-and-context combination is where ownership lives, not on any single feature.
If the user can't fill the [audience] bracket with a specific person, escalate to Research. No audience, no onlyness — only wishful thinking.
If the user can't fill the [trend or shift] bracket, the statement is still draftable but flag it. A brand built without a "why now" still sells, but loses urgency in marketing copy.
Letting the user pick a dominant attribute that any competitor in the category would also claim ("trustworthy," "quality," "reliable"). These describe table stakes, not difference.
Drafting the onlyness statement from your own taste instead of the user's market reality. The Brand specialist's job is to extract, not impose.
Stacking adjectives. "Bold, premium, modern, joyful" is a fog. One word.
Skipping step 4. An untested onlyness statement reads true to the founder and meaningless to the buyer.
Treating onlyness as a tagline. Onlyness is an internal-compass sentence. The tagline is a shorter, public-facing line Copy writes from the onlyness.
Designing colors, logos, or decks while step 5 is still empty. Visual work without onlyness is decoration.
Brief: "We're a productivity app for creatives. Help us find our brand."
Before (adjective fog):
We're a modern, intuitive, beautifully designed productivity tool for creative professionals who want to do their best work.
That sentence is true of every productivity app shipped since 2014. It locates nothing.
After (onlyness statement, locked):
We're the only daily planner that forces you to schedule the messy middle of a creative project, for solo illustrators who shipped a launch last year and can't face starting another one.
Dominant attribute: unflinchingly honest. Every visual and voice choice from this point on answers to that one word.
SKILL.md
77 lines · 812 words
The text of SKILL.md is shown as it downloads, under the Apache-2.0 license, by Ferrox Labs. The license is the one in the file's own frontmatter.
Your new bot
Brand Foundation bot
Waiting in your sidebar once you say go.
No account needed · Runs on the AI plan you already pay for