The 15 best tips to master prompt engineering for marketing and content

In the jungle of AI, ChatGPT training, and all prompt engineering tips and tricks, here’s all that you, as a content producer or marketer, need to know to nail your prompts.

You can skip all other (free) courses and training; below, you will find a collection of all my lessons on AI, ChatGPT, and how-to prompt.

Why prompt engineering matters

Writing a prompt is more than just asking a question; it’s asking it well. The magic of prompts is in giving the feedback and the type of answer you want. The more background you give on your prompt and the more specific you are, the better the output. Takes practice. Iterate, analyze, and refine.

Remember, garbage in is garbage out

1. For the right prompt, you have to know the problem you’re trying to solve. ChatGPT and prompt engineering are less about the technology and more about the challenge or problem you’re trying to solve.

2. Be specific and provide context. Treat ChatGPT as if you give orders to a 7-year-old; very clear and specific with details.

3. Write what type of answer you expect, e.g., ‘in table format’ or ‘top ten most…’ or ‘a bullet list’ and ‘in 500 words’.

4. Break things down into smaller parts to get a thorough, narrow answer.

5. Use clear language and proper grammar, except if it’s very domain-specific and you need your knowledge to write the right prompt.

Experiment

6. Experiment with the role-play scenario; ‘imagine you are an expert marketer…’ so the engine takes over the persona. Or ‘act as a travel agent … ‘. ‘Explain to me just like I am 10 years old.’ 

7. Or include a debate style in your prompt to ask about the pros and cons related to your query; you can ask for arguments for and against a specific topic. E.g., ‘present arguments for and against…’

8. Or you can use an analogy to explain complex ideas. E.g., ‘Explain quantum physics using a sports analogy’.

9. You can also do a creative exercise. Ask ChatGPT to brainstorm or ideate a fictional narrative related to your query. e.g., ‘I’m writing a story about traveling to a parallel universe. Help me brainstorm some unique laws of nature that this parallel universe might have.’

Include these in your prompt

10. And include the audience in your prompt ‘My audience is marketers who use to work with agencies’.

11. Include what sources you want ChatGPT to use, e.g.,’ Include reliable sources like TripAdvisor or reliable sources’ or ‘rank them accordingly to Google review.’ If you want to go all out, add here the ‘in a table format with the columns place, trip advisor ranking, google review ranking’. Try this and be surprised by the output.

12. Experiment with all sorts of ways to write your prompt. Often, slightly changing your query leads to different responses and levels of creativity.

13. Define the tone of voice of the output, e.g., formal, fun, include emojis, etcetera. Read more

14. Don’t forget to say ‘Hi’ and ‘thank you’. That does something to your brain, and you’ll get even better output. Read more

15. Last but not least, don’t be afraid to say that you used AI.

Bonus: the 4 best free AI courses for marketing and content people

Here are the best free courses on AI and ChatGPT. 

→ ChatGPT & Google Bard for increased productivity, 
The basics of the basics, all about predictability and probability. Learn how to interact with the tool, craft specific prompts, and maximize its potential

→ Google’s generative AI learning path
A little more in-depth basics about the origin and growth of AI; you can skip this course if the first is already detailed enough for you

→ LinkedIn’s career essentials in generative AI
On how to overcome AI fear and how not to normalize mediocracy in AI output. Pick the chapters to your liking; not all are equally relevant and interesting.
• How do we overcome the fear, judgment, and prejudice about AI? AI is a tool in the service of humanity. Broaden your perspective (do your research), start making things, and stay creative. 
• Overcome the normalization of mediocrity; if you become lazy and rely on machines without staying creative, you receive outcomes that are devoid of the sparkle of human ingenuity. That will be noticeable in your output and content.
• And remember, you are the power behind AI; your knowledge and creativity make the difference between mediocre, good and great output. 

→ Learn to Prompt
This is my favorite of these four courses, where I learned the most and significantly improved my prompts. A hands-on guide to the basics of prompting with some useful tips and tricks. The key videos to watch: Video 1: 'Useful features for marketers'. Video 4: 'Top tips to create good ChatGPT prompts'. Video 5: ‘Train ChatGPT to write email like me’

Selection criteria for this list

My starting point in the review and recommendations is what you need to know as a strategist, content producer, marketer, brand marketer, project manager, or any other manager.

• No in-depth details on how AI exactly works, its origin, and its features and releases. Only the basics to explain the downfalls of AI so you can use that to your advantage.
• No focus on different types of AI, generative AI, discriminative AI, general AI, VAE, and anomaly detections. Only what you need to know for your daily job: some ChatGPT and CoPilot-like features.
• No visual AI like Dall-E or Midjourney. Quite amazing, but please leave the visual design up to the visual designers.
• No deep dive into AI for voice, like Alexa with conversational speech recognition using LLM and giving output in natural AI-generated conversation
• No need to have a daily changing list of apps and tools. All you need to know for now are the big players. And to buckle up for the AI rollercoaster battle in 2024 between Google, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and OpenAI.

Grab a cup of coffee and speed up those videos to 1.25 or 1.5x (you'll thank me later). 

Final words, embrace the AI revolution

Enjoy. You are the power behind AI. 

‘AI will not replace your job; you will be replaced by someone who uses AI’

AI is a great opportunity to dive into your knowledge and show your expertise. You write the prompts; AI does the rest.   

So what are you waiting for? These are the four courses worth your time. Start with the first and end with the last. 

Disclaimer

This page is a different edit from ‘Improve your prompts with these 4 free AI courses’ and ‘The 4 best free AI courses for marketing and content’. So if the content looks familiar, that's right. This is my little experiment to play with one piece and have three different edits to expand the lifetime of this content.