Tips for writing the perfect AI prompts ✍️

Hey AI Puppies, 

Are you starting to get your AI groove? Now that ChatGPT has been in our lives for a while, paws crossed you’re starting to get the hang of things 🤞🐾

Like any other tool we use at work, everyone has their own way of doing things when it comes to AI. 

But unlike other tools you might be familiar with, ChatGPT (and similar chatbots) have so much room for creativity that you can – and should – develop a completely unique AI style ⚡

If you haven’t found your AI voice yet, we’re here to help! In this week’s newsletter, we’re taking a look at the subtle art of AI prompt writing ✍️

Want to make the most of AI? 

The better your prompt, the better your results, so keep reading for 5 ways to secure stronger chatbot answers!

Prompt Tip #1: Set the Scene

The I in AI stands for intelligence because, like humans, AI chatbots need context and information in order to come to a conclusion. 

If your current prompts read more like Google searches than conversations you’d have in the office, you’re probably not making the most of AI’s capabilities!

Do your AI and yourself a favor, and give your chatbot a situation with more than one variable or piece of information to work with. Consider adding details like:

👉Your role/title

👉What type of company you work for and the size

👉A brief summary of your situation

👉What you hope the response achieves

👉Any concerns you have about the situation

So, Instead of writing, “Write me an email apologizing for a delayed order delivery” and getting this…

… set the scene with details that a human coworker would either already know or need to know in order to help. 

A better prompt for this situation would be this:

Chatbots are trained on so much information that you rarely need to worry about overloading them. You can even copy and paste in large chunks of text, and, depending on the platform, attach documents. 

For example, we copied in a news article with the prompt:

“I am the owner of a dog training school and a new dog training school just opened up in my town. I am going to copy and paste an article about its opening below. Can you please tell me what I need to know about my new competitor to make sure I don't lose customers?” 

And got this:

Always set the scene, and always provide as much detail as possible.

Prompt Tip #2: Write How You Talk

Now, before you spend too much time crafting the perfect prompt with a boatload of context, remember to write the prompt exactly how you would speak it out loud to a human. 

When you write a prompt:

👉Keep it organic

👉Don’t overthink it

👉Treat it like a conversation with a coworker

ChatGPT isn’t going to correct your grammar and spelling, and you aren’t writing a formal letter to your boss! In fact, AI is so good at sifting through information that you can even treat the prompt as a dumping ground for your thoughts. 

For example, we entered this rambling prompt, and still got a great response:

Don’t forget it’s a Q&A chat, so you should keep it going like you would a conversation. 

We followed up with this question:

“okay that helps a lot, what should I get started on first? we only have about a month before the party so I don't know whats going to take the longest to set up or organize, or who to contact first”

And got this:

The more human you are, the more applicable responses you’ll get!

Prompt Tip #3: Define Specific Parameters

ChatGPT and similar bots quite literally have a mind of their own, so it’s up to you to define the guardrails of the response that you want. 

You can try adding parameters like:

👉The format you want the response in

👉The word count you need

👉The tone you’re going for

Think about what type of response would speed up your work the most, and go from there!

Here’s an example prompt:

“I'm an analyst at a holiday card company and I just got this article sent to me by a coworker that I'm going to copy and paste below. she wants me to incorporate it into the pitch deck we're working on for our new line of Christmas cards this year. Can you read it for me and outline 3 key takeaways with 5 bullet points underneath each takeaway? the bullet points should be no longer than 100 words each.”

We won’t include the whole response, but here’s ChatGPT’s first key takeaway and bullet points we asked for:

The more specific you get, the more time you’ll save interpreting the response!

Prompt Tip #4: Push For Clarity, Ask For Context

As much as we love ChatGPT and other generative AIs, they’re imperfect in their current form. They can still overlook information, get something wrong, or mislead you, so don’t be afraid to nudge your chatbot toward improving its answer. 

This can include simple follow-ups like

👉Why do you think that, and where did that opinion come from?

👉I think you got this part wrong. Can you confirm that’s what you meant?

👉I think we’re off track. Can you regenerate that response with more focus on my initial question?

Here’s an example on Claude from a few weeks ago when we were researching AI tools for pitch decks:

With great power comes great responsibility, and it’s our responsibility as the humans in the room to keep AI in line!

Prompt Tip #5: Using ChatGPT? Set Custom Instructions

Finally, if you’re a ChatGPT Plus user, you can save yourself a lot of time on prompt writing by setting up Custom Instructions. 

ChatGPT doesn’t have a strong enough memory to incorporate everything it’s learned about you into every response, but this setting automatically reminds your bot who you are and what your goals are every time you log on – meaning you don’t have to type out as much context. 

Other chatbots have similar features, but this article explains how to set it up on ChatGPT. 

Here’s what the setting page looks like:

Your future self will thank you for this one!

Your Next Assignment

This week’s assignment is something to think about long-term: defining your unique prompt writing style in a way that works for your biz. 

You won’t get there overnight, but it won’t be long until you’re a chatbot pro!

📲As always, we’re posting our latest AI discoveries to our channels on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, and TikTok 📲

If you have anything specific you’d like us to explore (we’re open to anything), send us a message at [email protected] 👀

Oh, and we’ll be taking next week off for Thanksgiving! We’ll be back after that with more 👋

Cheers,

The AI Puppy