Editorial voice engine — Opus-4.7-powered proactive drafting + dare-voice + Google-signal integration (parked sketch)

DARE.CO.UK · PARKED SKETCH · 2026-05-18

Mirrored from ~/.claude/.../memory/project_editorial_voice_engine_parked.md. This is a design sketch parked for future build — read for context, not as a current deliverable.

2026-05-18 sketch. An LLM-powered (Opus 4.7) creative engine baked into health.dare.co.uk that proactively SUGGESTS ways to write — opening lines, angles, full drafts — in dare’s voice while targeting Google signals. Learns + adapts from Dan’s accept/reject feedback. Recommender pattern at editorial scale; not “you should write” but “here’s a draft, accept or shape it.” Portable to audrey + dogwood + client work.


Dan, 2026-05-18 evening, after seeing health.dare.co.uk Phase 0+1 deployed: “On health.dare I can see an editorial voice engine, that can be active to get actionable on ways to write, ways to get started, it might have sketched some ideas, it will be learning and adapting. Park it for now, sketch it, but this is super interesting way of using your highest grade LLM (Opus 4.7) to do some heavy lifting, some proactive work, it gleans what gives strong google signals, yet it frames it within dare.”

Five-attribute definition (per user_streamlined_purpose_defined_surfaces.md)

Attribute Definition
Purpose Compress the distance between “I should write something” and “I have a draft to react to.” Active drafting, not passive suggestion.
Goal Materially increase the rate of high-quality editorial output across the portfolio — every priority-queue page on health.* should have a draft-able starting point, not just a recommendation.
Approach Opus 4.7 on demand with three context layers: (a) brand-voice canon (dare four pillars + canonical examples), (b) Google signal layer (GSC keyword + impressions data per page), (c) page-specific context (current content if any, sibling pages, target audience). Outputs draft openings / angles / partial drafts → Dan accepts / rejects / refines.
Editorial voice dare four pillars (per feedback_dare_brand_voice_four_pillars.md). For audrey + dogwood variants, brand-specific canonical voice memory required first.
Prompt needed “Draft me a 200-word opener for this page that addresses ‘X’ in dare voice and targets [GSC keyword].” — the engine generates this prompt from page context; Dan refines.

Architecture — three context layers + LLM + feedback loop

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The feedback store IS the learning loop — each accepted draft enriches the brand-voice canon; each rejection refines what NOT to do. Over months, the engine’s suggestions converge on dare’s actual voice + sharpened targeting.

Phases

Phase 1: One-shot drafting (no learning yet)

~half-day build once Phase 0 of health.* is live + Anthropic API key is in 1P (already done).

Phase 2: Multi-angle suggestion

Phase 3: Feedback capture + canon enrichment

Phase 4: GSC signal integration

Phase 5: Active proactivity

Phase 6: Cross-portfolio adaptation

Cost envelope

Opus 4.7 is the LOAD-BEARING choice per Dan’s framing — quality of brand-voice adherence + editorial judgment justifies the model. Cost shape:

Operation Input tokens (est) Output tokens (est) Cost / call (Opus 4.7 pricing)
Draft opening ~3-5k (3 context layers) ~300-500 ~$0.05-0.10
3 angles ~3-5k ~600-900 ~$0.10-0.15
Full draft ~3-5k ~1.5-2k ~$0.15-0.25
Phase 5 daily pre-gen (10 pages × full draft) 30-50k 15-20k ~$1.50-2.50/day

Monthly budget at Phase 5 cadence: ~$45-75. Negligible against the editorial-output gain.

Caching opportunity: brand-voice canon + canonical examples are STABLE across calls — perfect for Anthropic prompt caching. Cache the brand-voice layer (~1-3k tokens) → each subsequent call costs ~10% of uncached. Monthly budget drops to ~$10-20 at Phase 5 cadence.

Per claude-api skill — always include prompt caching in Anthropic SDK apps. Bake in from day one.

The Google-signal integration angle (Dan’s emphasis)

“it gleans what gives strong google signals, yet it frames it within dare.”

The two-axis balance: - Google signal side: what keywords drive traffic to similar dare pages? what’s the search intent? what’s the ranking gap? what query would this page ideally answer? - dare voice side: how does that question get ANSWERED in dare’s register? Not SEO-content factory; SEO-aware essay craft.

The engine’s value is the bridge — not either pole alone. A dare-voiced essay that nobody searches for compounds slowly. A search-targeted page that doesn’t sound like dare violates the brand. The engine threads both.

Per project_markers_from_google_parked.md — this is where the GSC API integration earns its keep. Markers tell us where the gap is; the voice engine writes the bridge.

Open design questions

  1. Canonical-examples corpus. Phase 1 needs ~5 canonical dare long-form pieces as register reference. Which ones? Probably the few /observations/ + /methods-of-business-design/ long-form pieces. Need explicit curation by Dan.
  2. Feedback granularity. Accept/reject is binary; refine is open-ended. How much weight does a refine carry vs an accept? v1 = treat refine as “partial accept, but mind these changes.”
  3. Brand-canon contamination risk. If accepted drafts feed back into the canon, drift compounds. Need a guardrail: canon never auto-expands without Dan’s explicit “promote to canon” action.
  4. GSC integration freshness. GSC data is days-lagging. Engine should be honest when it’s working from stale data; surface confidence level.
  5. UI shape inside health.dare.co.uk. Inline drafting expands cards substantially. Modal? Side panel? Click-through to a dedicated drafting page? v1 = modal; v2 = dedicated page if drafts get long.
  6. Multi-brand canon switching. Phase 6 needs clean brand-voice switching. Memory naming convention: <brand>_voice_canon KV namespace. The engine knows which brand it’s serving from URL.

Why Opus 4.7 specifically

Per Dan’s emphasis on “your highest grade LLM”:

Sibling memories

Resume conditions

Source: parked_sketch_editorial_voice_engine_2026-05-18.md · Rendered 2026-05-18 12:53