As we ride the wave of artificial intelligence, tools like ChatGPT are becoming our daily go-to's for crafting messages, creating content, answering questions and more. You can interact with ChatGPT in natural language, but it can also do some suprising tricks with the right prompts. Here are some slick tips on “prompt engineering” that will save you hours.
1. Take Your Audience into Account:
Just like knowing your market is crucial in business, instructing ChatGPT about its audience can dramatically refine its responses. Whether you're creating content for a group of budding entrepreneurs or for a seasoned board of directors, make sure ChatGPT knows the score.
Give it a try:
Write an article on Edmund Hillary suitable for primary school students. Use New Zealand English spelling without too many colloquialisms.
ChatGPT responds well to specific queries.
2. Creativity Within Constraints:
In business, we often excel when we have to work within specific parameters - the same holds true for ChatGPT. Define the number of words or paragraphs you want in your response. You'll be pleasantly surprised by how well ChatGPT performs with set boundaries.
Try this prompt:
Reword my email below in 3 paragraphs and less than 400 words: [paste your input here].
3. Summarise complex text
Navigating through complex, jargon-filled text can be a real pain, but ChatGPT has got your back. If you find yourself scratching your head over an intricate scientific paper or a confusing legal document, let ChatGPT take over. You can simply copy and paste the text into ChatGPT and it can simplify it into layman's terms, making the dense information digestible. If you’ve ever seen those YouTube videos of an expert explaining the same concept at different levels of complexity — this is a lot like that. Just ask ChatGPT to bring the complexity to the level that you want.
Try this prompt:
Explain the concept of the Official Cash Rate and how it relates to inflation at an undergrad student level.
4. Don't Reinvent the Wheel:
Entrepreneurs are busy people. If there's a pre-existing chunk of text that you'd like to incorporate into your material, just copy and paste it into ChatGPT. It's a quick, easy, and efficient way to generate valuable content.
Try this prompt:
Use the outline of my marketing plan below and write a comprehensive plan that would bring a new fitness app to the Australian market: [paste your input here].
5. Channel the Greats:
We've all been inspired by the words of business gurus or motivational speakers. What if ChatGPT could echo that? Inject the wisdom of Richard Branson or the enthusiasm of Gary Vaynerchuck into your content by having ChatGPT mimic their style.
Try this prompt:
Write a humorous April fools joke in the style of Elon Musk’s email to employees.
6. Structure Your Insights:
Business is all about data and how you present it. ChatGPT can help organise your information in a tabular format. Need to compile potential investment ideas, business strategies or market trends? ChatGPT has got you covered. There is a little advanced tip here, too. By default ChatGPT cannot draw charts. However, if you ask it to draw an ‘ASCII art’ (meaning a visual drawn with computer characters), it will do its best to comply. While your branding team may not be happy with the rough look of ASCII charts, they do a perfectly good job of visualising data quickly.
Try this prompt:
Show a chart drawn with ASCII art of population growth rate for OECD countries, ordered by rate.
ChatGPT can visualise data if you ask it to draw a chart with ASCII art.
7. Feed It Some Data:
Just like you'd brief your team before a big presentation, give ChatGPT some context before you ask your question. Feed it some data, like a list of successful marketing campaigns, then ask it to generate a unique strategy for your new product.
Try this prompt:
I have a carrot, tomatoes, kimchi and beef steak in the fridge. What can I cook? Provide amounts for 4 people.
These tips aren't exclusive to the latest GPT-4, they're also compatible with older versions of ChatGPT. So give these strategies a whirl, and watch how you turn this AI tool into a sharp asset for your business ventures.
