Virtual Golf Centre: before Wednesday

Step one

Download the Claude app.

Get it on the computer you use most, and on your phone. You will end up using both.

Do not pay for anything yet. Just download it and make a free account if it asks. We set the subscription up together on Wednesday, on the right plan. I would rather you saw it working before you paid for it.

MacOne download, works on every Mac WindowsChoose the x64 version iPhoneApp Store AndroidGoogle Play

If you are on Windows

There are two versions, x64 and ARM64. Pick x64, it is right for almost every Windows computer. To be certain: press Start, type "About your PC", and look at System type. If it says ARM, grab the ARM64 one instead.

Which email to use

Use the one you want this tied to long term, normally your main work email. It is a nuisance to change later, so worth ten seconds of thought now. Use the same one on your phone.

Do not let this throw you

You will see three tabs. We only use one.

This confuses everybody on day one, so here it is in advance.

Chat

Asking questions and getting answers. Handy, but it is not what we are here for.

Cowork

Where it does actual work for you. Everything we build on Wednesday lives here.

This one

Code

For building software. Not where we are starting, but it is there if you ever want to go further with it.

Have a poke around in Chat before Wednesday if you like, you cannot break anything. I will explain properly on the day why the difference matters.

Step two

Check you can log into everything.

This is the one that decides how much we get done. On the day we connect Claude to your systems, and each one needs you to log in and click allow. If a login does not work, that system does not get connected.

Please do not send me any passwords. Not by email, not by text, not in a document. You type them yourself on the day. I only need to know they work.

Log into each of these once and confirm it lets you in:

Ticks stay on this page only. Nothing is sent anywhere.

Watch out for

Two-factor codes

If any of these text or email you a code when you log in, make sure that phone or inbox is one you will have with you on Wednesday morning.

Tell me now, not on the day

Logins that live with someone else

Sometimes Xero sits with the accountant, or the Facebook page was set up by whoever built the website. If you hit one of those, message me this week. Chasing it at 10am on Wednesday costs us an hour, and there is usually a way around it if I know in advance.

The day

9am to 1pm, at the centre.

The first forty minutes are me teaching, not clicking. That is deliberate. Understand how the thing is put together and you can change it and extend it yourself for years. Watch me set it up and you are stuck the first time something needs changing.

9:00
Get set up, and the three tabs. Claude working on your laptop and your phone, on the right plan. Then five minutes on which tab to use and why.
9:20
How the whole thing is built. Four layers, drawn on paper. What it knows, what it can reach, what it can do, and what it does on its own. Twenty minutes here saves you a hundred phone calls to me later.
9:45
Layer one, what it knows. Your prices, memberships, hours and the way you talk to people. Skip this and everything it writes sounds like a robot.
10:10
Layer two, what it can reach. Connecting Xero, Stripe, Mailchimp, Gym Master, Instagram and Facebook. This is where your logins matter.
10:40
Break. Ten minutes. You will want to check the floor.
10:50
Layer three, things that run on their own. We set one going, shut the laptop, and watch it keep working. This is the difference between asking Claude for things and having it work for you, and it is the reason for the whole day.
11:25
Layer four, the actual jobs. A week of posts, and your monthly owner report with the profit and loss commentary already written. You drive, I sit beside you.
12:00
Outreach. First emails for schools and for corporate Christmas functions. Companies book those across September and October, so this is exactly the right time.
12:25
You build one on your own. No help from me. If you can do it unaided you can keep doing it after I leave, and that is the real test of whether today worked.
12:45
The playbook, and any questions. A short plain English guide to everything we set up, written for you and not for a developer.

If we move faster we spend the spare time on whatever you want to dig into. If something runs late, the last two things I will cut are 9:20 and 10:50. Everything else can be finished afterwards. Those two are the day.

Two things to do before Wednesday.