How to Write Good ChatGPT Prompts

Generative AI is set to change the way in which work, providing us with information and content on all manner of subjects from just some simple instructions. However, the software is still finicky enough that you won’t always get what you wanted, or like. Let’s go over a few ways in which to improve your prompts using ChatGPT.

We’ve narrowed it down to five simple tips you can use to get better results from any generative AI tool; we’re just using ChatGPT as an example as it’s the most popular of its kind right now. Think of them as ways to make it easier to talk to the computer and get what you want, without too many detours and frustration.

Define Your Goal

The first thing you need to do is to figure out what you want ChatGPT to do before you even touch your keyboard. If you want information on a certain topic, that’s usually quite simple — though you should try and narrow it down a bit. If you want the AI to do something creative, think on whether you’d like it to be a short story or a poem, and what style.

This is a very abstract stage and it can be hard to figure out, but think of the whole process as if you were building a house. This stage is the foundation, so it needs to be solid or the rest will just collapse.

You need to ask yourself what you want before you ask ChatGPT to perform.

For example, I asked it  “tell me about quantum physics” and I got a short summary of what it is. That’s cool, for sure, but it’s nothing I couldn’t have gotten from Wikipedia, either.

Be Specific

To get better output from ChatGPT, we therefore need to be more specific. Think of it this way: if I ask you how the weather is in your hometown, I’ll either get a fairly long, rambling answer where you detail what goes on in each season, or you’ll tell me how it is right now. There’s a lot of ambiguity in the question, so to get a better answer I would have to ask you how the weather is today, or in a particular season.

The same goes for ChatGPT.

For example, I asked it “write me a poem” and what I got was a long period where it processed my request then a fairly decent bit of rhyme reminiscent of the naturalists.

Of course, that was ChatGPT guessing what I would like, and in this case it was right. Still, I could be a lot more specific and probably not only get something more tailored to me, it may even improve the overall quality a bit.

The next prompt I entered was “write me a poem in the style of Wordsworth about a flower.”

That wasn’t just better, it came out much faster, too. Of course, I could have been even more specific and told me which period of Wordsworth’s work, or the type of flower. Every time you change one of your parameters, or add and remove one, you’re changing the output and, hopefully, getting better answers.

Provide Context

Part of being specific is to provide context and examples to your prompts.

For example, if we continue with our example above, I could ask for a poem about a daffodil on a Scottish hillside.

Already the poem has changed a lot in tone, maybe becoming more like what you want. Another, maybe better example, is to write a short mystery story. For example, a man walks in the woods where he finds a silver key. What is the key good for? What obstacles does he encounter on his way to unlocking it? How does overcoming these obstacles change him?

By asking these questions, you’re kind of doing some of the heavy lifting for the AI, mapping out the way in which the story needs to unfold. Though what emerged from these instructions was rather formulaic, it was a lot better than what it had given us before.

Of course, this doesn’t just work for creative stuff, it’s with anything and everything.

If I ask ChatGPT for a marketing email, I get a bland bit of corporatese, but if I ask for a promotional email for a specific product, I get something that’s probably a lot more usable.

This also works as a way to modify output. For example, if you ask for the definition of something really complicated, like music theory, ChatGPT will disgorge a very complicated explanation about this insanely complicated subject.

However, if I ask “what is music theory in simple terms,” the result is a lot more pleasant to read.

Use Natural Language

However, as you try to be more precise, try not to stray too far into hyper specific language, either. While you can ask ChatGPT the definition of a lot of jargon, legalese, technical terms and other impenetrable language, actually using it in a prompt won’t work.

So you can ask “what is quantum entanglement?”, but not have it write a story where it’s one of the mechanics. You can ask what “wherein” means, but not say “write me a story wherein the hero dies, notwithstanding his efforts.” You need to be as clear and concise as possible without using fuzzy commands.

In this case, it pays to think of it as a person: if you ask a guy in the street “pray tell may I find a public house beyond yonder hill?” he’ll probably look at you funny, and not give you anything useful. Then again, if you ask him if there’s a bar on the other side of the hill he’ll gladly tell you.

Same goes for ChatGPT: just because it seems like it speaks English, doesn’t mean that it actually knows what’s going on. It pays to be simple, direct, and clear. Think of it as a way to improve your own writing as you play with it a bit.

Test, Test, Test

Finally, though, expect to spend a lot of your time with ChatGPT tinkering: it’s rare that you enter a prompt and what you hoped for emerges right away. Instead, you’ll be tweaking prompts, experimenting with different ways to express yourself and also just goofing off.

The software is very much still experimental and ChatGPT is learning as more and more people use it. It could be that by the time this article is published it can handle technical terms it couldn’t before, or it has figured out how to use “wherein.”

As useful as ChatGPT is, right now the best thing you can do is just dive in and learn from it as it learns from you. Hopefully you’ll both end up smarter than you were before.