Which tool to choose
A general-purpose AI assistant in its latest version learns a style from a few well-chosen examples. Some tools let you save fixed instructions or create a custom assistant that remembers your style from one session to the next: handy if you write often. But the core of the method doesn't change: you need texts of yours as a model. The tool keeps the instruction; the material that makes it effective you bring yourself.
How to do it
- Choose three or four of your texts that represent well how you write: not the most formal ones, but the most "you".
- Give them to the AI asking it to analyze the style, not the content.
- Have it summarize the rules of your style in its own words: that's for you, to verify it understood.
- Then ask it to write the new text following those rules, and correct it where it slips.
The operational syntax:
I'll paste you three texts I wrote myself. Study my writing style, not the content: typical sentence length, level of formality, words and expressions I use often, things I never use, the rhythm. Summarize the rules of my style in a list. Then keep these rules as a reference: when I ask you to write, write as if you were me, not with your standard voice.
Check: after the new text, read it aloud. Where "it doesn't sound like me", flag it to the AI: "I'd never say this sentence like this, it's too [formal/long/cold]. Rewrite it the way I'd say it." Style is refined by correcting the deviations, not on the first try.
A concrete example
Chiara writes with short sentences, a bit ironic, and uses informal address. The AI, left to its own devices, was giving her back impeccable, impersonal texts. She gives it three of her old posts, the AI extracts the rules ("short sentences, direct tone, the occasional joke, never big words"). From that moment the texts come out recognizable as hers. When a friend reads the new page and says "you can tell you wrote it", Chiara understands that the AI learned the voice, it didn't replace it.
When it does NOT work (and how to fix it)
If the texts still come out impersonal
The examples you gave were too neutral or too few. Choose the texts where your voice is most marked, even a well-written email or a heartfelt message, and add a few more. The more the examples shout "this is me", the more the AI has to learn from.
If the AI overdoes it and caricatures your style
It happens: you tell it "ironic" and it slips jokes in everywhere. Correct by dosing: "The style is fine but you're overdoing the jokes, put one here and there, not in every paragraph". Style is also measure, not just marked traits.
If you have to repeat it in every new conversation
The AI by default forgets between one session and the next. If the tool you use lets you save fixed instructions or a custom assistant, put the summary of your style there, so you don't paste it again every time. If you don't have this feature, keep the rules of your style in a file and paste them at the start of each session: thirty seconds that save you the wrong voice.
A tip from someone who really uses it
Don't describe your style in words, show it with examples. "I write in a professional but friendly way" tells the AI nothing: it's vague and everyone interprets it their own way. Three real texts of yours are worth more than a thousand adjectives about your tone, because the AI learns better by imitating than by listening to descriptions. Style is taught by showing it, not by describing it.
Frequently asked questions
How many texts does the AI need to learn my style?
Three or four good examples are enough for normal cases. Quality counts more than quantity: three texts where your voice is sharp are worth more than ten lukewarm ones. If the results stay impersonal, don't add random texts, replace them with others that are more characteristic.
Can I also teach it what NOT to say?
Yes, and it's half the work. List the words and formulas you hate ("never use 'seize the day', 'synergy', exclamation marks"). Prohibitions define style as much as preferences: often your voice is recognizable precisely for what you avoid.
If the AI writes in my voice, are the texts still mine?
They're yours the way a letter dictated to a secretary is: the idea, the voice and the responsibility are yours, the typing isn't. The AI doesn't invent your style, it reproduces it on your order and you correct until it comes back. Whoever confuses "written by hand" with "mine" has never dictated a letter: authorship lies in the choices, not in the fingers on the keyboard.