The use of Generative AI has exploded in the last year. According to McKinsey’s global survey, one-third of companies surveyed now use Gen AI for one or more business functions. Read on to learn how to leverage one of the biggest AI tools around – ChatGPT – to enhance creativity, innovation and problem-solving.
ChatGPT is an AI-based chatbot. You enter a ‘prompt’ into its interface and receive a virtually instant response. We entered a prompt asking ChatGPT how it works, and it generated this answer:
“ChatGPT works by processing the text input it receives and generating a response based on patterns it has learned from vast amounts of text data during its training. It breaks down the input text into smaller parts, analyses their meanings, and then predicts the most appropriate response based on its understanding of language patterns.
Think of it like having a really smart friend who has read a ton of books and articles and can give you helpful responses based on what they’ve learned. It doesn’t ‘understand’ like a human does, but it’s very good at mimicking human-like responses by analysing patterns in language.”
What can you use ChatGPT for?
ChatGPT will give you an answer to just about any question. (Not all answers are totally accurate, which is why you should never just copy and paste from ChatGPT). It can act as a writing assistant and provide article outlines. It can summarise research and translate text into 95 languages. And it’s incredibly useful for generating ideas and brainstorming different perspectives on specific topics.
Want specifics? You can use it to:
- Devise an advertising campaign strategy.
- Draft a compelling sales pitch.
- Critique an article you’ve written and recommend improvements.
- Develop a white paper on your chosen topic.
- Craft a content calendar.
- Learn the best gamification techniques to incorporate into your app.
- Generate a list of discussion points for a podcast.
- Develop a character for a book you’re writing.
- Turn your existing content into another format, e.g. blog post to video script.
How to get the most out of ChatGPT
ChatGPT really comes into its own when you get to grips with prompt engineering. This is the practice of creating the right inputs to generate optimal outputs. Follow the five steps below to design the perfect prompts for your needs.
1. Provide context
So that ChatGPT can provide a tailored response, you need to feed it with information. For example, if you want ChatGPT to generate a mission statement for your music marketing business, you’ll need to specify your company’s beliefs, values, aims and objectives. Otherwise, you’ll receive a very generic response that won’t resonate with your target audience.
2. Be specific
The more specific your prompt is, the better the output. Let’s say you want ChatGPT to create a personalised proposal for a potential client. You need to say who the client is, what their pain points are, what your product or service is and how it can help. So your prompt might look like this:
Draft a personalised proposal for a potential client, the owner of a dance school. They have the following pain points [list pain points]. The proposal should include the benefits of a niche marketing service. The benefits are: [list benefits].
3. Set parameters
To customise ChatGPT’s responses further, use AI parameters. These are settings that can be tweaked to influence how ChatGPT behaves and responds. Here are some common parameters:
- Temperature – controls the randomness of responses. Enter ‘set temperature = [0 to 10]’. The higher the temperature, the more adventurous and creative the response.
- Max tokens – sets the length of the response. Enter ‘set max_length = 50’ for a medium-length response. The higher the value, the longer and more detailed response you’ll get.
- Diversity penalty – keeps AI-generated text fresh and interesting by ensuring certain words aren’t used too frequently. Enter ‘set diversity_penalty = 1’ for a balanced response that’s both coherent and diverse.
4. Specify the output format
You don’t have to accept ChatGPT’s standard response format, which is usually a series of sentences or paragraphs. Instead, instruct ChatGPT on the output format you want. You can request plain text, lists, tables, HTML code, emojis, quotes and more!
5. Refine your prompts
If you’re not 100% happy with the responses ChatGPT generates for you, go back and refine your prompts. It may help to ask ChatGPT to use a particular tone of voice, or ask multi-step questions and then write new prompts based on those responses.
Bonus tip! You can even ask ChatGPT to apply brainstorming techniques such as the SCAMPER method (substitute, combine, adapt, modify, purpose, eliminate and reverse).
Unlock new ideas and expand thinking with ChatGPT
While some might see ChatGPT as a threat to human creativity and innovation, it can stimulate divergent thinking, challenge traditional constraints and facilitate learning. It can also enhance productivity and efficiency.
The trick to extracting value from ChatGPT is through carefully crafted prompts. We’ll leave you with this enormous list of 195 well-engineered prompts from Semrush. These should help you generate ideas, discover insights, access resources and find better ways of working to help grow your creative business.
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