You can ask OpenAI’s artificial intelligence many things, but if the prompt is not well structured, it will always tell you the same thing, you’re not going to get the answer you want or it could also generate hallucinations that confuse you.
Since prompt engineering became popular, various requests have not stopped going viral, such as converting images into Ghibli, Funko Pop or action figures like Hot Toys. There are also some that are used to search for things on the Internet or others that unlock secret ChatGPT modes, such as the cold attitude or the Gmail email writer mode.
Anyway, there are a lot, but you don’t always have to look for a specific one for each thing you need. To go from being a beginner to an advanced user with AI, it is important to understand the principles of the structures of these prompts.
Fortunately, there are some tips that apply to virtually every situation. If you follow the recommendations, you won’t have to go online to copy and paste onebut you can create it from scratch and maybe it will work better for you.
The perfect prompt for ChatGPT does not exist
What you find on many sites that “this is the ideal prompt for when you should study” or “use this prompt to get a better answer” are not actually “perfect.”
While most are done in a professional way to make things easier for you and usually give you the advantage of an in-depth answer, they are not always going to be that helpful. Relying on copy and paste prompts only limits you and even errors may occur in the response that artificial intelligence gives you.
To stop being a beginner user, you have to stop thinking that there is a great “magic phrase” that solves everything, because sometimes you are going to need something more specific and You won’t always find prompt structures ready for you..
Those “cheats that unlock ChatGPT capabilities” are not impossible to create on your own. The way chatbots like this one or Gemini and Copilot work is primarily through context, intent, and detailed information.
If you manage to follow this, the system will understand what you need and will not depend on a “single formula”. Acting under these criteria is what will save you time and it will make AI more useful for what you need. In fact, many experts have talked about how to use prompts precisely to optimize the use of virtual assistants.
What are the fundamental pillars to create a good prompt?
Don’t worry, you don’t have to go through a course to learn how to create a prompt for ChatGPT or any other language model (LLM). With follow a parameter structure and a little practiceyou will see that it is simpler than it seems.
First you have to understand that each chatbot has its rules and limits, while the models also influence the response. In OpenAI artificial intelligence, you have the famous GPT-4o, GPT-o1, GPT-5 and others.
So the first thing is to find out what you need and what virtual assistant plan you have available to know if you can use it, as this can make a difference if you use it to your advantage. Leaving that aside, there is a structure that can serve at a general level:
- Role: tell the AI to become a professional or a specific character, starting with “You are [rol]For example, if you need to study English, let it be a “language tutor” or if you are going to ask for a gym routine, let it be a “coach.”
- Mission: “Your goal is…” or “I need you to do x” (Give the prompt).
- Context: Give it all the information that is relevant and that can help the AI respond clearly. Remember that the more specific you are, the better the result could be.
- Format: It requires a format, such as a table, a list, a sketch, a draft, and even if it is an image, you could indicate resolution or aspect ratio.
- Iteration: to make clarifications before I give you an answer, such as “ask a question if you don’t understand something” or “tell me if more information is needed before I answer.”
As the MakeUseOf expert explains, there are three main elements that you have to focus on: Clarity, Context y Restrictions. The first is the proper selection of AI modelthe second is to determine what your objective is and tell all the details that help find the answer. Lastly, there is the format and the limits you want to set.
Following each of the steps, according to the AI itself, a prompt should look like this: «You are a Windows 11 technical support expert. Your objective is to give step-by-step instructions to configure the permissions of a folder. This is what you need to know: The user already has a ‘Guest’ account. The folder to be restricted is called ‘Private Files’. It generates the response as an easy-to-understand numbered list.»
If you adapt these guidelines to exactly what you need to complete your task or work, you will surely you will always get a good answer and you will stop depending on formulaic prompts.