Newsjacking with ChatGPT or Claude: 5 prompts from headline to pitch

A story breaks in your field. By the time you’ve thought of something smart to say, 40 people have said it.

Newsjacking is the fix: you add your own take while people are still reading about it. Big brands have PR teams for this. You have ChatGPT or Claude and a short morning routine.

Full disclosure: I haven’t done this yet. I’m trialling it now, in public, the same way I learned podcasting by doing it. This guide is the setup I’m testing: a morning news radar, a filter, an angle finder, and 2 prompts to turn the angle into a post or a pitch. No results to show yet, so treat the prompts as starting points.

If AI and building are your lane too, this is where I teach building with AI.

What is newsjacking, and does it work for one person?

Newsjacking means adding your own view to a news story while it’s still fresh. It isn’t only for big companies.

A solo founder with a clear lane and a real opinion has something a brand doesn’t: a person’s voice. Put a face next to it too. I made my own brand photos with AI in a Higgsfield photoshoot. On a story in your lane, that voice is what makes your take worth reading.

The hard part isn’t writing. It’s the speed. The setup below cuts the slow steps: finding the news, deciding if it’s worth it, and finding your angle.

How do you find the news every morning without reading everything?

Set up a radar once, and let it come to you.

Option 1: Google Alerts

Add 3 to 5 keywords from your lane at Google Alerts, choose how often, and results arrive by email (Google help). It’s free and you never think about it again.

Option 2: Google Trends

The Trending now page shows what people search for, in more than 100 countries. The default range is the past 24 hours, and the data refreshes about every 10 minutes (Google Trends help).

Option 3: a scheduled task

Save the “Morning news radar” prompt as a daily task, and the AI does the search before you wake up.

• Claude: scheduled tasks are on paid plans (Pro, Max, Ultra, Team, Enterprise). Pick hourly, daily, weekly or weekdays. Tasks run even when your computer is asleep (Claude Help Center).
• ChatGPT: scheduled tasks exist too, with a limit on how many you keep active. Check your plan’s limit on OpenAI’s help page).

Which radar should you pick?

I’d start with Google Alerts plus the radar prompt run by hand. Automate it once you know which lanes give you good stories.

Can ChatGPT or Claude search today’s news?

Yes. ChatGPT search works on every plan, including Free, and cites its sources (OpenAI help). In Claude, click the + button in the chat box and turn on Web search. Claude’s answers include source links (Claude Help Center).

Paste a link and Claude reads the whole page.

One rule: open the source before you post. An AI summary of the news is a lead, not a fact.

How do you decide which story is worth your time?

Ask 3 questions. Is it in my lane? Is it still fresh? Do I have something real to add?

The “Story filter” prompt scores each headline on those 3 and recommends one story or none. “None” is a good answer. Posting a weak take on a big story does less for you than posting nothing.

How do you find an angle that’s yours?

Get 4 options, then pick the one only you could say.

The “Angle finder” prompt gives you one angle of each kind:

1. From your experience: What you’ve seen or done that relates.
2. Where you disagree: The common take, and why you see it differently.
3. A practical how-to: What your audience should do about it this week.
4. What happens next: Your prediction, labelled as one.

Feed it your own notes, not a role. “Act as a PR expert” gives you the same take as everyone else, which I explain in stop adding roles to your AI prompts. Your background, your opinion and your audience are what make the angle yours. The prompt also tells the AI not to invent experiences for you.

Should you post it or pitch a journalist?

Post first. A same-day post is fully in your control. A pitch depends on a journalist asking for exactly your topic.

The “Same-day post” prompt turns your angle into a LinkedIn post under 200 words that opens with your take, not with a summary of the news.

For pitches, journalists post requests for sources on these services:

• HARO (Help a Reporter Out) sends free daily emails with journalists’ requests (HARO).
• Qwoted has a free Basic plan with 2 pitches a month and a 2-hour delay on requests. Pro costs USD 149.99 a month or USD 1,188 a year, with 35 pitches a month (Qwoted pricing).

When a request matches your lane, the “Journalist pitch” prompt writes a reply under 150 words with one quotable sentence. Then rewrite it in your own words. Journalists read a lot of pitches, and one that sounds like AI is easy to skip.

Which stories should you never newsjack?

Tragedies, disasters, deaths and anything where people are getting hurt. No angle makes those worth it.

Also skip stories where your post would sell something off the back of bad news. If you’d feel awkward reading your post out loud to someone affected, don’t post it.

How do you make this a morning habit?

Save it all in one place. Make a Claude Project or a ChatGPT project with your bio, your lanes, your audience and your past takes in the instructions. Claude Projects work on every plan, and Free accounts get up to 5 (Claude Help Center).

Then each morning starts with your context loaded, and the prompts need fewer blanks filled in.

Plans, prices and settings checked on each tool’s help pages on 9 November 2026. Before you hit publish, run the draft through writing rules so it doesn’t sound like AI: stop ChatGPT and Claude sounding like AI. If getting noticed is the goal behind all this, my guide on getting your first users for a new app covers the channels that brought mine: SEO, Pinterest, social media and speaking.

Search today's news for stories my audience would care about.

My lanes: [3-5 topics you talk about]
My audience: [who follows you and what they want from you]

List the 5 most relevant stories from the past 24 hours. For each: the headline, the source link, the date, and one sentence on why my audience would care.

Only include stories you found a source for. If there's nothing relevant today, say so instead of stretching.

Here are today's headlines: [paste headlines or links]

Score each from 1 to 5 on:
- Fit: how close it is to my lanes ([your lanes])
- Freshness: whether people are still talking about it
- My edge: whether I have real experience to add (my background: [2-3 lines])

Recommend one story or none. If none scores well, tell me to skip today. Don't recommend tragedies or stories where people are getting hurt.

The story: [paste the link or summary]
My background and notes: [what you've done that relates, your opinion, rough thoughts]
My audience: [who]

Give me 4 angles, one of each:
1. From my experience
2. Where I disagree with the common take
3. A practical how-to for my audience
4. What happens next

For each, write the one-sentence take. Mark any angle that depends on a fact I need to check. Use only what's in my notes about me. Don't invent experiences.

Turn my chosen angle into a LinkedIn post.

The story: [link]
My angle: [one sentence]
My rough notes: [paste them]

Rules:
- Under 200 words.
- Open with my take, not the news summary.
- Mention the news in one line and say where it came from.
- Short sentences. No em dashes, no hype words, no hashtag pile.
- Keep my wording where it works. Don't add claims I didn't make.

Help me answer this journalist request: [paste the request]

About me: [one-line credential]
My answer in rough notes: [paste]

Write a reply under 150 words:
- Answer only what they asked.
- Include one sentence they could quote as it is.
- My credential in one line at the end.
- Plain, direct, no flattery, no filler.

Use only facts from my notes. If my notes don't answer their question, tell me what's missing instead of filling the gap.