Writing better prompts for ChatGPT can greatly improve the effectiveness and accuracy of the model’s responses. By providing clear and specific instructions, along with appropriate context and background information, you can help ChatGPT understand exactly what you are looking for and generate more relevant and useful responses. Additionally, using natural language and an open-ended approach can lead to more varied and creative responses, rather than limiting the model to a set of pre-determined options.
In this blog post, I will explore various tips and best practices for writing better prompts for ChatGPT, and how doing so can enhance your overall experience with the model.
- Be clear and specific: Clearly state what information or task you want ChatGPT to perform.
- Keep it simple: Avoid using complex vocabulary or jargon that the model may not understand.
- Provide context: Provide background information or context for the task so that ChatGPT can better understand what you’re asking for.
- Use natural language: Write prompts in a way that sounds natural and conversational.
- Be open-ended: Avoid yes/no or multiple-choice questions, as they limit the model’s responses.
- Be mindful of the model’s capabilities and limitations: ChatGPT is a language model, it can understand and generate human language but it can not do things that are outside its scope or capabilities.
Bad Prompt: “What is the capital of France?”
This prompt can be considered bad because it’s a closed-ended question and it’s not providing any context or background information. ChatGPT could simply respond with the capital city “Paris” and nothing more.
Better Prompt: “Can you tell me about the culture, history, and notable landmarks of Paris, the capital of France?”
This open-ended prompt provides more context and background information, and it encourages ChatGPT to generate a more detailed and interesting response.
I often say please and thank you to ChatGPT. You know, just in case.
Hans Scharler
Bonus Tip
Ask ChatGPT to interview me with clarifying questions before ChatGPT replies. When ChatGPT flips around and asks me questions, the conversation will transform. This mode helps ChatGPT zero in on the context of the question.
