Don't Use ChatGPT Until You Watch This Video

Leila Gharani
21 Sept 202313:39

TLDRThe video script offers a guide on optimizing interactions with ChatGPT by utilizing custom instructions and effective prompts. It emphasizes the importance of setting clear preferences for the AI's responses, such as tone, style, and content specificity, to avoid generic or irrelevant answers. The script also introduces techniques like self-critic, self-prompting, and specifying output formats to enhance the quality and relevance of the AI's responses, ultimately improving the user's experience with the language model.

Takeaways

  • 📝 Utilize custom instructions to inform ChatGPT about your background and preferences for tailored responses.
  • 🎯 Specify your desired tone, level of formality, and response length to optimize interactions with ChatGPT.
  • 💬 Set clear expectations for ChatGPT's responses, such as avoiding explanations or providing only code snippets when needed.
  • 🔍 Request the confidence level of ChatGPT's answers and ask for source URLs when dealing with factual information.
  • 🖋️ Teach ChatGPT your writing style by providing examples, so it can generate content that matches your personal tone and approach.
  • 🔄 Use self-critiquing prompts to have ChatGPT analyze and improve its own text for enhanced quality.
  • 🤔 Employ self-prompting techniques to refine the prompts you give ChatGPT, ensuring more targeted and effective outputs.
  • ✏️ Limit response length by specifying a word count in your prompts to avoid overly lengthy replies.
  • 📊 Request outputs in various formats like tables, CSV, HTML, JSON, or XML to suit your specific use case.
  • 🌐 Be mindful of the 'garbage in, garbage out' principle, meaning the quality of your prompts directly affects the quality of ChatGPT's responses.

Q & A

  • What is the main issue with using ChatGPT without custom instructions?

    -Without custom instructions, ChatGPT may provide poor quality answers that are not tailored to the user's specific needs, leading to wasted time and frustration due to back-and-forth interactions.

  • How can custom instructions improve the interaction with ChatGPT?

    -Custom instructions allow users to provide context about themselves and their preferences, such as their profession, location, and desired tone, which helps ChatGPT deliver more relevant and personalized responses.

  • What are some examples of information you might include in custom instructions for ChatGPT?

    -Examples include specifying your occupation (like a teacher or software developer), your location (such as the city or region), and your preferred level of formality or the length of responses.

  • How can you make ChatGPT's responses more efficient for your needs?

    -You can instruct ChatGPT to provide only the most efficient solution or code snippet without additional explanations when dealing with tasks like Excel formulas or programming code.

  • What is the benefit of setting a confidence level and providing sources in ChatGPT's responses?

    -It helps ensure the accuracy of the information and allows users to verify the facts from valid sources, which is particularly useful for factual topics and research-based queries.

  • How can you teach ChatGPT to write in your personal style?

    -By providing ChatGPT with examples of your writing, it can learn and save your style under a specific label (e.g., 'LG_STYLE') and then use that style to write articles or content based on your instructions.

  • What is the self-critic feature and how does it work?

    -The self-critic feature allows ChatGPT to review its own text, analyze it for potential improvements, and provide feedback on clarity, specificity, and other aspects of the content.

  • How can self-prompting be used to optimize ChatGPT's prompts?

    -By asking ChatGPT to generate multiple prompts focused on a specific task, you can select the most effective one and use it to get a better, more customized response.

  • What is the advantage of specifying a word count in your prompts?

    -Specifying a word count helps to avoid lengthy replies and ensures that the response is concise and to the point, which can be particularly useful for presentations, blog posts, or other content with space limitations.

  • What are some different output formats that ChatGPT can provide?

    -ChatGPT can provide outputs in various formats such as plain text, tables, CSV, HTML, JSON, XML, and even as a Pandas data frame, depending on the user's requirements.

  • Why is it important to optimize your prompts when using ChatGPT?

    -Optimizing prompts helps to refine the output, making it more relevant, accurate, and useful for the user. It reduces the time spent on back-and-forth interactions and increases the efficiency of the AI's responses.

Outlines

00:00

🤖 Maximizing ChatGPT with Custom Instructions

The paragraph discusses the importance of customizing ChatGPT's responses for better interaction. It suggests using custom instructions accessible through the profile icon to inform ChatGPT about the user's identity, preferences, and desired response style. This customization can include details about the user's profession, location, and preferred tone, which can significantly enhance the relevance and quality of responses. The speaker shares personal experience with Excel formulas and how custom settings can streamline interactions by eliminating unnecessary explanations.

05:04

📝 Developing a Personal Writing Style with ChatGPT

This section explores the process of teaching ChatGPT to emulate the user's writing style. By providing examples of personal writing, users can label their style (e.g., 'LG_STYLE') for future reference. The AI can then be instructed to write articles or content in the user's specific style, ensuring a more authentic and personalized output. The speaker demonstrates this by giving examples from their own website and discusses how the AI can be used to write on topics such as the importance of daily coffee for productivity, in a manner consistent with the user's style.

10:08

📊 Utilizing ChatGPT for Self-Critique and Prompt Optimization

The paragraph delves into the use of ChatGPT for self-criticism and prompt optimization. It describes how users can ask ChatGPT to critique its own text and suggest improvements, enhancing clarity and effectiveness. Additionally, the concept of self-prompting is introduced, where ChatGPT is prompted to create optimal prompts for a specific task, such as writing an email encouraging team participation in a team-building event. The speaker emphasizes the benefits of this method, including more targeted and effective communication.

📝 Adjusting Output Length and Format with ChatGPT

This part of the script focuses on controlling the length and format of ChatGPT's output. Users can specify a word count limit or ask the AI to condense existing text to a desired length. The script also highlights the versatility of ChatGPT in presenting information in various formats, such as tables, CSV, HTML, JSON, or XML. The speaker provides practical examples of how to request and use these formats, including creating a table of FIFA World Cup winners and adjusting an HTML table for better readability.

Mindmap

Keywords

💡ChatGPT

ChatGPT is an AI language model developed by OpenAI that is capable of generating human-like text based on the prompts given to it. In the context of the video, it is the primary tool being discussed for improving user interactions through customized prompts and settings.

💡Custom Instructions

Custom Instructions are a feature within ChatGPT that allows users to set specific preferences for how the AI should respond to their queries. This includes details such as the user's background, desired tone, and response length.

💡Excel Formulas

Excel formulas are mathematical expressions used in Microsoft Excel to perform calculations and数据分析. In the video, the speaker uses an example of an Excel formula to demonstrate how custom settings in ChatGPT can provide direct answers without unnecessary explanations.

💡Confidence Level

The Confidence Level refers to the degree of certainty an AI model like ChatGPT has in its responses, particularly when providing factual information. In the video, the user sets ChatGPT to always inform about the confidence level of its answers for fact-checking purposes.

💡Writing Style

Writing Style refers to the unique way in which an individual or entity composes text, which can include tone, vocabulary, and structure. The video emphasizes the ability to train ChatGPT to mimic a user's personal writing style by providing examples.

💡Self-Critic

Self-Critic is a concept where ChatGPT is asked to evaluate and critique its own generated text, providing feedback on areas for improvement. This allows for refinement of the AI's responses based on user dissatisfaction.

💡Self-Prompting

Self-Prompting involves using ChatGPT to generate a series of prompts that lead to an optimized output. It's a meta-cognitive approach where the AI is instructed to question and refine its prompts before providing a final response.

💡Word Count

Word Count refers to the number of words in a given piece of text. In the context of the video, the user can specify a maximum word count in their prompts to limit the length of ChatGPT's responses.

💡Output Format

Output Format refers to the way information is presented by ChatGPT, which can include plain text, tables, CSV, HTML, JSON, XML, or as a Pandas data frame. Users can specify the desired format for better integration with other applications.

💡Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO)

Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO) is a computer science adage that suggests the quality of the output is directly related to the quality of the input data. In the video, it serves as a reminder that precise and well-structured prompts will yield better responses from ChatGPT.

Highlights

Custom instructions can be set by users to inform ChatGPT about their preferences and context, leading to more tailored responses.

Users should provide context about their profession and location to receive responses relevant to their field and region.

The tone and style of responses can be adjusted through custom instructions, such as being friendly, casual, formal, or neutral.

ChatGPT can be instructed to provide only the most efficient solution without explanations, which is useful for users with expertise in a particular area.

Custom settings can include the confidence level of answers and the provision of source URLs for factual topics.

ChatGPT can be taught to write in a user's personal style by providing examples, improving the authenticity of generated text.

The AI can act as a self-critic, reviewing its own text and providing feedback for improvement.

Self-prompting can be used to optimize the prompts given to ChatGPT, resulting in better outputs.

ChatGPT can generate multiple prompts for a specific task, allowing users to choose the most suitable one.

The AI can be instructed to adhere to a specific word count, making responses more concise.

ChatGPT can output information in various formats, such as tables, CSV, HTML, JSON, or XML, depending on the user's needs.

The importance of clear and specific inputs to receive quality outputs from ChatGPT, emphasizing the 'garbage in, garbage out' principle.

Users can improve their use of ChatGPT by understanding and utilizing custom instructions and prompts effectively.

The video provides practical tips and applications for using ChatGPT, aiming to enhance user experience and productivity.

The demonstration of using ChatGPT for professional tasks, such as writing articles or emails, showcases its versatility.

The video encourages users to subscribe for more content on optimizing and utilizing AI tools like ChatGPT.