Classification is one of the most powerful and underused AI prompting applications.

Classification Prompt Template

Classify the following customer message into exactly one category:
[BILLING, TECHNICAL, COMPLAINT, COMPLIMENT, OTHER]

Respond with only the category name, nothing else.

Message: "[paste message]"

Best Practices

• Define categories exhaustively — include an "OTHER" bucket
• Use few-shot examples for edge cases
• Ask for confidence score if needed
• Use Haiku/Flash for cost efficiency at scale

Reference:

Classification prompting

https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/build-with-claude/prompt-engineering/overview