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A stakeholder says, “Could we create a webinar for this?” or “What if we targeted this new audience?”. It sounds like a small request, so the team starts exploring formats, drafting copy, pulling together slides, or pricing media.
But an idea is not a brief. It does not tell you whether there is a real customer problem, whether it supports the current strategy, what it will take to deliver, or what success would look like.
That is how teams end up working on initiatives that were never properly agreed to in the first place. Everyone assumes someone else made the call.
Before you decide how to execute an idea, use ChatGPT to pull it apart. Ask it to clarify the opportunity, expose the assumptions hiding underneath it, and give stakeholders a clear set of options to choose from.
The goal is not to make every idea sound more (or less) convincing. It is to make the decision clearer: proceed, test it in a smaller way, park it, or say no.
Try this prompt:
You are a senior marketing strategist. Turn the stakeholder idea below into a concise, decision-ready proposal.
Your job is to clarify the thinking, not simply make the idea sound good. Challenge weak logic, identify missing information, and do not invent facts.
Stakeholder idea:
[PASTE THE IDEA]
Relevant business context:
[PASTE GOALS, AUDIENCE, CURRENT PRIORITIES, BUDGET, TIMELINE, AND CONSTRAINTS]
Create the proposal using these sections:
1. What this idea is trying to achieve
- The business or customer problem it may solve
- The opportunity and potential upside
- How it connects to our current priorities
- What success could look like
2. What needs to be true
- The key assumptions behind the idea
- Missing information or unanswered questions
- Risks, dependencies, costs, and likely trade-offs
- Reasons this may not be worth pursuing
3. Options and decision required
- Give 2–3 realistic options, including a smaller test or not proceeding
- Explain the upside, downside, and resources required for each
- Recommend the best next step
- State the specific decision stakeholders need to make
Keep it practical and concise enough to paste into a planning document or meeting agenda.
You will spend less time turning vague suggestions into work, and more time turning the right ideas into action.
Happy prompting!
2 minutes. Your URL. A customer profile worth using.
Most founders can describe their product. They can't describe their customer. Not in a way that actually changes how they sell.
HubSpot for Startups built a free tool to fix that. Paste in your URL, answer a few quick questions, and it generates a structured profile of your best-fit customer. Firmographics, buying triggers, the works.
Takes 2 minutes. No spreadsheet required.