An MCP is a door from Claude into one of your tools. Open these five and Claude stops being a chatbot and starts being your operator. With the setup path for each.
Most business owners hit the same wall around month two. Claude can think about your business but can’t do anything in it. It can write a Klaviyo campaign but can’t see your Klaviyo results. It can analyze 200 reviews, but only if you paste them in by hand.
MCPs (Model Context Protocol servers) fix that. In Claude they show up as connectors. Each one lets Claude read data from a specific tool and, if you allow it, take actions there. Here are the 5 that matter most for a business owner.
Step Zero, The Basics
Start with the everyday connectors. Turn on Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Drive, and add Slack if your team lives there. They cover most of the "what’s on my plate" work, and you add them the same way as everything below. (Claude’s connector guide)
The Five
01
Your store, Shopify
Shopify’s own connector joined Claude’s directory in April 2026. Claude can review orders and customers, check inventory, run analytics on your store and, if you ask, create discount codes or update products.
In Claude, open Customize (renamed Plugins on newer accounts) and go to Connectors. Click + and search for Shopify. You can also click Add to Claude on its page in the connector directory.
Sign in to your Shopify account and approve the access it asks for.
Start a new chat and paste the prompt below.
Store Analyst Prompt
You're my e-commerce analyst. Use the Shopify connector to read my store. Don't create, edit or delete anything unless I say so.
1. Pull my orders from the last 90 days.
2. Rank my top 5 and bottom 3 products by revenue, with units sold and how each compares to the 90 days before.
3. Look for customer patterns: repeat vs first-time buyers, average order value, products often bought together, and any timing pattern by day or week.
4. Pick the ONE best-seller I should push hardest next month and explain why, using the numbers.
5. Give me 3 marketing angles for that product based on who actually buys it.
Format: a short table for steps 2 and 3, then bullets. Show the date range you used. If some data isn't available through the connector, tell me instead of estimating.
On Wix or Square? Both have their own connectors in the directory too. WooCommerce, BigCommerce and Squarespace don’t yet, so use Zapier (number 03).
02
Your email platform, Klaviyo
Klaviyo built its own connector. Claude can pull campaign reports, read your flows, segments and profiles, and draft campaigns for you to review.
In Claude, open Customize (renamed Plugins on newer accounts) and go to Connectors. Click + and search for Klaviyo. You can also click Add to Claude on its page in the connector directory.
Sign in to your Klaviyo account and approve the access it asks for.
Start a new chat and paste the prompt below.
Email Strategist Prompt
You're my email marketing strategist. Use my email platform connector to read my campaigns and flows. Don't create, send or change anything until I approve it.
1. Pull my campaigns from the last 90 days. Show my top 3 by revenue and bottom 3 by open rate, with the subject line and send date for each.
2. Tell me what the top 3 have in common (subject style, length, offer, send day) and what the bottom 3 are missing.
3. Rewrite the 3 weakest subject lines using what's working in my top 3. Give 2 options each.
4. Review my abandoned cart flow (or my closest equivalent). List each step and its timing, then name the single biggest gap and how to fix it.
Format: tables for steps 1 and 3, bullets for the rest. If a metric isn't available, say so instead of guessing.
Mailchimp, Kit, MailerLite and beehiiv all have their own connectors now too, and the same prompt works with each.
03
Everything else, Zapier
Most influencer and affiliate platforms don’t have a Claude connector. Zapier’s connector reaches the apps on Zapier, which it puts at about 9,000. Refersion is on Zapier, for example. This is your fix for the long tail of business tools.
Make sure the tool you want is connected inside your Zapier account.
Add the Zapier connector to Claude the same way as the others, or just ask Claude in a chat to connect to Zapier MCP and click Connect on the card.
Sign in to Zapier, click Allow, and paste the onboarding prompt Zapier gives you. (Zapier’s steps)
Each action Claude runs through Zapier uses 2 tasks from your Zapier plan, so watch your task count.
Partnerships Analyst Prompt
You're my partnerships analyst. Use the Zapier connector to pull data from [your affiliate or influencer tool]. Only use read actions. Ask before running anything that sends, creates or updates.
1. Pull the last 6 months of creator or affiliate partners with revenue, orders, commission or fee paid, and dates.
2. Rank the top 5 by revenue and the 5 with the worst return (highest cost for the least revenue).
3. Describe what my best partners have in common: audience size, niche, content type, offer or code used.
4. Suggest one new outreach angle to test next quarter, based on that pattern.
5. Draft a short, personal outreach message for each of the 3 creator profiles I should go after next.
Format: a table for steps 1 and 2, then bullets and the 3 drafts. If Zapier can't reach a field, tell me which one.
04
Your reviews, Apify
Loox, Yotpo, Stamped and Judge.me don’t have Claude connectors, but Apify does. Apify runs web scrapers, and its store has a community-built Shopify Review Scraper that detects all four. Now Claude can read every review and find real patterns, like four reviews this month mentioning the same fit issue in a medium.
In Claude, open Customize (renamed Plugins on newer accounts) and go to Connectors. Click + and search for Apify. You can also click Add to Claude on its page in the connector directory.
Sign in to your Apify account and approve the access it asks for.
Start a new chat and paste the prompt below.
Apify’s free plan includes $5 a month of usage, and each scraper run uses some of it.
Review Researcher Prompt
You're my customer insights researcher. Use the Apify connector to run a Shopify review scraper on my store: [your store URL]. Before you run it, tell me roughly how much of my Apify credit it will use.
1. Pull the reviews from the last 12 months.
2. Group them by rating, then by topic (fit, quality, shipping, price, how people use it, and anything else that keeps coming up).
3. Count how many reviews mention each topic and quote 2 real examples for each.
4. Give me the 3 product changes customers are asking for, ranked by how often they come up.
5. Pull 3 exact lines from 5-star reviews I could use in marketing, with the reviewer's first name or initial only.
Rules: quote reviews exactly, never paraphrase them as quotes. If the scraper can't find reviews on my site, tell me which review app it detected.
05
Your books, QuickBooks
Intuit’s QuickBooks connector answers plain-English questions about your money, like profit and loss, cash flow, who owes you and sales by product. It can also create and send invoices, and it shows you a preview and asks before anything goes out.
In Claude, open Customize (renamed Plugins on newer accounts) and go to Connectors. Click + and search for QuickBooks. You can also click Add to Claude on its page in the connector directory.
Sign in to your QuickBooks account and approve the access it asks for.
Start a new chat and paste the prompt below.
Fractional CFO Prompt
You're my fractional CFO. Use my accounting connector to read my books. Don't create, send or change anything (invoices, customers, payments) without my OK.
1. Pull revenue for the last 6 months by product or service line, month by month. Tell me which line is growing fastest and which is shrinking.
2. Compare this quarter's spending to last quarter's by category. Flag any category that grew more than 30%.
3. Show who owes me money and how overdue it is, and which bills are due in the next 30 days.
4. Give me the 3 money moves you'd make this month based on what you found.
Format: tables for steps 1 to 3, then bullets. Show the date ranges you used. Mark anything you're estimating. This is analysis, not tax or legal advice.
On Xero or FreshBooks? Both have their own read-only connectors now, so you don’t need Zapier for them.
The Right Order
Set up the basics first, then add ONE connector at a time. Use it for a week before adding the next. You’ll learn how to prompt against your real business data, and you won’t end up with five half-configured connections.