Crafting Powerful Prompts for AI

AI is all the rage lately because of how much it is transforming the way things are done. It is both scary and wonderfully amazing at the same time. And what it is for sure is a technology that is here to stay, and it will continue to change the way things are done. I realized that, scared or not, I had better embrace it and lean into utilizing it. And unlike some who utilize AI to write all of their articles and blogs, I still write my own.

But that is not to say that it is not an extremely useful tool for ideas, help in editing, and even just digging down deeper into things you want to learn and know. Of all the AI technology popping up, I have found myself using ChatGPT the most. And no matter how amazing it is or will become, it is like all things that require an input: garbage in, garbage out. The better your prompt, the better your results.

So, what makes a good prompt is crucial knowledge that we need to embrace to take advantage of the AI revolution. One of the first things you need to understand about AI and, specifically, LLMs (large language models) like ChatGPT is how it goes about providing your answers to your queries or, as they are known – prompts. The basic idea is it breaks down your prompt and then very quickly reviews all of its “knowledge” to sensitize and answer back, combining many reference points together. It leverages a vast dataset of text to understand the context and generate relevant and coherent answers. Based on that, here are a few tips on creating prompts that should help you better utilize AI and, specifically, ChatGPT.

Clarity

When crafting prompts, make sure they are specific, clear, and purposeful by providing detailed information. Avoid vagueness and give the AI a clear direction. Also, make sure to state your intent so that ChatGPT understands your goal. Whether you need a simplified explanation or guidance with a specific task, let it know. I know for me, at first, I was way too short in my prompts, believing that it was supposed to be this tool that just read my mind. But it is the overall time savings and new ideas that are its real power, so the more time you spend getting the details of what you need specifically, the better. Unlike normal human conversation, there are no external clues to context, so you must provide all of that in your prompt.

Spelling and grammar

The next tip is to make sure your spelling and grammar are as clean as they can be. For some, this might be a challenge, so I recommend using a tool like Grammarly, which maintains correct spelling and grammar to ensure smooth communication. While ChatGPT can handle some mistakes, clear prompts help it provide more reliable responses. Just like clarity and specifics, the AI has no external cues to help it determine how to handle subject-verb agreement errors and misspellings due to its reliance on input data, and therefore the answer you get might not fit what you expect to receive.

Output

Next, direct the desired output format in your question. Do you prefer the answer you receive to be in the form of a list, step-by-step instructions, or a concise paragraph? Like what you are asking for information on, you will want to communicate the format clearly. Also, specifics of what type of voice you prefer, how you want the response to come across, and more.

Conversing with AI

Lastly, remember with ChatGPT and other AI text tools, like Google’s Bard, the conversation is just that, a conversation with you and the AI. Feel free to ask follow-up questions to refine the conversation. Ask it for clarity on a certain part of the response, or ask it to give you step-by-step instructions on a suggestion it just made.

Inside that conversation, you can get more details, and it will remember and pull from the context of your conversation. Also, experiment with different phrasings if you’re not getting what you want. By tweaking the way you ask your question, you can find the response that resonates best. When it comes to certain projects, I will go back to that same conversation in ChatGPT’s history and work from there, as it allows some of the context we created earlier to carry forward and get better results.

ChatGPT can be a powerful assistant if you master its abilities and get to know how to best communicate and gather the details you want!