Dustin OgleEvery post has to pass three checks. It comes from something real that happened in the last seven days, or from our own work. It contains one idea, not four. Somebody who reads it can go do something with it today.
That is the rule set from Scotty Beam's September 2026 field report, where every agent on the content team holds a copy. Boring on purpose. Agents execute a bad plan faster. These checks are how a small shop keeps the plan from turning into a content mill.
Something real, not something trending
"Real in the last seven days" is not a trending sound and not a keyword. It is a thing that happened: a post, a call, a ship, a mistake, a client question, an article that went up this morning.
A shop can take one idea from a field report like that one: drafts, not auto-post. Or strategy before tools. Or publishing is the bottleneck. Not all three in one LinkedIn essay. One.
If you cannot point at a date, you are writing evergreen sludge. Nobody needs AI to tell them what to post. They need a rule that kills posts with no timestamp. Your own work counts. If you only "think about content strategy," that is a mood, not a last-seven-days event.
One idea, not four
Four ideas is how agency posts get long and unused. Hook, then a list, then a framework, then a CTA, then a fifth idea dressed as a story. Likes, no replies. The test from the field report: saves, reshares, and replies over likes. If a post gets a lot of likes and no replies, it was a nice sentence and nothing more.
One idea is a constraint on the writer agent. Describe the job in one sentence, with no "and." The post inherits the same grammar. If the draft has an "and also," the second half is another post. Queue it. Do not smuggle it.
This is also how you repackage without a second writer. The X version is the idea, punchy. The LinkedIn version is the same idea, explained. If LinkedIn needs a new idea, you did not repackage. You opened a second research job and pretended it was formatting.
A reader can do something today
"Thought leadership" fails this check on purpose. There is nothing to do.
Something to do today: write the three checks on a page and paste them into every agent. Turn auto-publish off. Put one backlog item on a calendar as a draft. Read five drafts and kill the ones with four ideas.
If the reader cannot act before they close the tab, you wrote a nice sentence. Nice sentences are how 36 drafts should stay at 0 published. Un-actionable volume trains an audience to skim.
For client work, add a fourth check: would we have sent this for the client?
A human gets bored of four-idea posts and stops. A bot will produce them forever. Paste the same checks into every agent. Without the checks, narrow jobs still execute a bad plan faster.
Open the draft. Ask, out loud: What happened, and when? What is the one idea? What can the reader do today before lunch? If you need "and," fail. If the answer is "rethink their strategy," fail. Then: would we have sent this for the client? If you hesitate, it stays a draft.
One thing you can do today
Write one post about one real thing from the last seven days. Pick a single idea. Write the action the reader can take today. Put it on a calendar as a draft. Do not publish from the chat window. Do not add a second idea "for value."
If you want a shop that will hold these checks on the client's calendar, talk to us.
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