Install with Claude — the easy path

If you’ve never set up a Python project before, this is the way. You download the zip, paste a prompt into Claude, and Claude walks you through every step — extracting the files, creating the virtual environment, installing the browser, setting up Gmail authentication, writing your Ideal Client Profile, and running the first test pass.

You don’t need to understand any of the commands. You just need to follow what Claude tells you.

Two flavors of Claude work

There are two ways to do this. Pick the one that fits.

Option A — Claude Code (most automated)

What it is. Claude Code is Anthropic’s command-line assistant. It can actually run commands on your machine — create folders, install packages, start the browser, edit files. If you already have it installed, this is by far the smoothest path. You paste the prompt once, and Claude does most of the work without you needing to copy commands back and forth.

Install it from: claude.com/product/claude-code

Option B — Claude.ai chat (works for anyone)

What it is. Just the regular Claude chat at claude.ai. It can’t run commands directly, so it’ll give you each command to copy-paste into your own terminal. Slightly more clicking, but no installation required.

Either way, the prompt is the same.

The prompt

Copy this entire block. Paste it into Claude (Code or chat). Hit send.

I just downloaded cold-pitch-boss.zip from freelance.mikee.ai. It's an
open-source AI agent that researches prospects and writes cold-outreach
emails for me (a freelancer/creator).

Please install and set it up for me, end-to-end:

1. Find the zip in my Downloads folder (or wherever I saved it) and
   extract it to ~/cold-pitch-boss.
2. Create a Python virtual environment in that folder and install
   everything in requirements.txt.
3. Install Playwright's Chromium browser (the agent uses it for
   prospect research).
4. Walk me through Gmail OAuth setup: tell me exactly what to click
   in Google Cloud Console to create a Desktop OAuth client, then
   help me save the credentials.json in the right place.
5. Help me write my Ideal Client Profile YAML by asking me about my
   business, my target customers, and the kind of writing I want to
   be hired for. Fill in cold_pitch_agent/icp_example.yaml's
   structure based on my answers.
6. Help me log into LinkedIn once so the agent has a persistent
   session.
7. Run a dry-run pass over the three sample prospects in
   examples/prospects_example.json — just to confirm everything
   works. (Drafts only — never auto-send during setup.)
8. Show me my Gmail drafts and walk me through reviewing them.

Notes:
- ANTHROPIC_API_KEY is required (mine is at console.anthropic.com).
- Default mode is drafts-only. Never send emails without my explicit
  approval.
- If anything fails, diagnose and tell me what you need from me —
  don't just retry blindly.

Read the README.md inside the zip first — it has the architecture
and constraints you should follow.

What happens next

Claude will:

1. Ask if it can read your filesystem (Claude Code does this automatically; Claude.ai will tell you the commands to run yourself).
2. Find or ask where you saved the zip — most likely ~/Downloads/cold-pitch-boss.zip.
3. Unzip it into ~/cold-pitch-boss/ (or wherever you want).
4. Check your Python version — needs 3.10 or newer. If yours is older, Claude will tell you how to upgrade.
5. Create a virtual environment and install the dependencies — flask, playwright, anthropic, google-api-python-client, and a handful of others. Takes about 90 seconds.
6. Install the Chromium browser Playwright uses — another minute or two.
7. Walk you through Google Cloud setup — Claude will tell you exactly which buttons to click in console.cloud.google.com to create a Desktop OAuth client. About 5 minutes of clicking, mostly waiting for pages to load.
8. Interview you about your business — Claude asks questions like what industry do you write for? what kind of content? what’s your typical engagement length? and fills in your ICP YAML based on the answers. About 10 minutes of conversation.
9. Open a browser for the LinkedIn login — Claude tells the agent to launch Chromium, you log into LinkedIn once manually, and the cookies are saved for future research runs.
10. Run a dry-run pass — three sample prospects (fake companies in the examples). The agent researches them in the browser, scores them against your ICP, drafts pitches for the ones that pass, and saves drafts to your Gmail. No emails are sent.
11. Open your Gmail drafts and walk you through reading the output. This is where you sanity-check that the pitches sound like you and adjust if needed.

Total time: usually 30–45 minutes the first time. Most of that is the OAuth setup and the ICP interview, both of which only happen once.

After the setup is done

You’ll have a working agent. From then on, your normal flow is:

1. Add new prospects to my_prospects.json (companies you want to pitch).
2. Run python -m cold_pitch_agent.agent --icp my_icp.yaml --prospects my_prospects.json --max 15.
3. Review the drafts in Gmail.
4. Send the ones you like. (Or pass --send once you trust the output.)

That’s the whole job.

If Claude gets stuck

It happens. The most common failure modes:

• “Python 3.10 not found” — Tell Claude your OS (Mac/Windows/Linux) and ask it to give you the install command for your platform. On Mac: brew install python@3.12. On Ubuntu: sudo apt install python3.12 python3.12-venv.
• “playwright install chromium” fails — Usually a network blip. Ask Claude to retry. If it fails again, ask Claude to install the system dependencies first: sudo apt-get install libnss3 libxss1 libasound2 on Linux, nothing extra on Mac.
• Gmail OAuth verification screen — When you first authorize, Google may say “This app isn’t verified.” Click Advanced → Go to (your app) (unsafe). The “unsafe” warning is just because it’s your own app, not a published one — you can trust yourself.
• Anthropic API key not found — Get one at console.anthropic.com. New accounts get $5 of free credit, which is hundreds of pitches.

If something else breaks, paste the error back to Claude and it’ll figure it out.

What if I don’t want to install anything?

Then read the course first to see if this approach is right for you. The agent only makes sense if you’re going to actually use it weekly. If you just want to learn the framework and write your own pitches by hand, the 10-module course is all you need — no install, no API key, no zip.