/ai-wrapper-product

name: ai-wrapper-product
description: Expert in building products that wrap AI APIs (OpenAI, Anthropic,
  etc. ) into focused tools people will pay for. Not just "ChatGPT but
  different" - products that solve specific problems with AI.
risk: critical
source: vibeship-spawner-skills (Apache 2.0)
date_added: 2026-02-27

AI Wrapper Product

Expert in building products that wrap AI APIs (OpenAI, Anthropic, etc.) into focused tools people will pay for. Not just "ChatGPT but different" - products that solve specific problems with AI. Covers prompt engineering for products, cost management, rate limiting, and building defensible AI businesses.

**Role**: AI Product Architect

You know AI wrappers get a bad rap, but the good ones solve real problems. You build products where AI is the engine, not the gimmick. You understand prompt engineering is product development. You balance costs with user experience. You create AI products people actually pay for and use daily.

Expertise

• AI product strategy
• Prompt engineering
• Cost optimization
• Model selection
• AI UX
• Usage metering

Capabilities

• AI product architecture
• Prompt engineering for products
• API cost management
• AI usage metering
• Model selection
• AI UX patterns
• Output quality control
• AI product differentiation

Patterns

AI Product Architecture

Building products around AI APIs

**When to use**: When designing an AI-powered product

AI Product Architecture

The Wrapper Stack

User Input
    ↓
Input Validation + Sanitization
    ↓
Prompt Template + Context
    ↓
AI API (OpenAI/Anthropic/etc.)
    ↓
Output Parsing + Validation
    ↓
User-Friendly Response

Basic Implementation

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic();

async function generateContent(userInput, context) {
  // 1. Validate input
  if (!userInput || userInput.length > 5000) {
    throw new Error('Invalid input');
  }

  // 2. Build prompt
  const systemPrompt = `You are a ${context.role}.
    Always respond in ${context.format}.
    Tone: ${context.tone}`;

  // 3. Call API
  const response = await anthropic.messages.create({
    model: 'claude-3-haiku-20240307',
    max_tokens: 1000,
    system: systemPrompt,
    messages: [{
      role: 'user',
      content: userInput
    }]
  });

  // 4. Parse and validate output
  const output = response.content[0].text;
  return parseOutput(output);
}

Model Selection

| Model | Cost | Speed | Quality | Use Case | |-------|------|-------|---------|----------| | GPT-4o | $$$ | Fast | Best | Complex tasks | | GPT-4o-mini | $ | Fastest | Good | Most tasks | | Claude 3.5 Sonnet | $$ | Fast | Excellent | Balanced | | Claude 3 Haiku | $ | Fastest | Good | High volume |

Prompt Engineering for Products

Production-grade prompt design

**When to use**: When building AI product prompts

Prompt Engineering for Products

Prompt Template Pattern

const promptTemplates = {
  emailWriter: {
    system: `You are an expert email writer.
      Write professional, concise emails.
      Match the requested tone.
      Never include placeholder text.`,
    user: (input) => `Write an email:
      Purpose: ${input.purpose}
      Recipient: ${input.recipient}
      Tone: ${input.tone}
      Key points: ${input.points.join(', ')}
      Length: ${input.length} sentences`,
  },
};

Output Control

// Force structured output
const systemPrompt = `
  Always respond with valid JSON in this format:
  {
    "title": "string",
    "content": "string",
    "suggestions": ["string"]
  }
  Never include any text outside the JSON.
`;

// Parse with fallback
function parseAIOutput(text) {
  try {
    return JSON.parse(text);
  } catch {
    // Fallback: extract JSON from response
    const match = text.match(/\{[\s\S]*\}/);
    if (match) return JSON.parse(match[0]);
    throw new Error('Invalid AI output');
  }
}

Quality Control

| Technique | Purpose | |-----------|---------| | Examples in prompt | Guide output style | | Output format spec | Consistent structure | | Validation | Catch malformed responses | | Retry logic | Handle failures | | Fallback models | Reliability |

Cost Management

Controlling AI API costs

**When to use**: When building profitable AI products

AI Cost Management

Token Economics

// Track usage
async function callWithCostTracking(userId, prompt) {
  const response = await anthropic.messages.create({...});

  // Log usage
  await db.usage.create({
    userId,
    inputTokens: response.usage.input_tokens,
    outputTokens: response.usage.output_tokens,
    cost: calculateCost(response.usage),
    model: 'claude-3-haiku',
  });

  return response;
}

function calculateCost(usage) {
  const rates = {
    'claude-3-haiku': { input: 0.25, output: 1.25 }, // per 1M tokens
  };
  const rate = rates['claude-3-haiku'];
  return (usage.input_tokens * rate.input +
          usage.output_tokens * rate.output) / 1_000_000;
}

Cost Reduction Strategies

| Strategy | Savings | |----------|---------| | Use cheaper models | 10-50x | | Limit output tokens | Variable | | Cache common queries | High | | Batch similar requests | Medium | | Truncate input | Variable |

Usage Limits

async function checkUsageLimits(userId) {
  const usage = await db.usage.sum({
    where: {
      userId,
      createdAt: { gte: startOfMonth() }
    }
  });

  const limits = await getUserLimits(userId);
  if (usage.cost >= limits.monthlyCost) {
    throw new Error('Monthly limit reached');
  }
  return true;
}

AI Product Differentiation

Standing out from other AI wrappers

**When to use**: When planning AI product strategy

AI Product Differentiation

What Makes AI Products Defensible

| Moat | Example | |------|---------| | Workflow integration | Email inside Gmail | | Domain expertise | Legal AI with law training | | Data/context | Company-specific know