Some say that AI tools like ChatGPT, Deepseek, or Gemini are as close to magic as tech has ever gotten. Others are less impressed; for them, these things are little more than glorified search engines. But the truth may lie somewhere between these extremes. People who understand this tend to know how to get the best responses from generative AI.
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There’s more to using Artificial Intelligence than just requesting answers and getting them. The quality of output you get from it greatly depends on the precision of your requests. It’s for this reason that the skill set called “prompt engineering” exists.
But this article isn’t a course on prompt engineering. What we’ll do here instead is to explain how to improve the output you receive from generative AI. Here are our recommendations:
Be Specific
Generative AI is not your friend or acquaintance. It has very little information about your background, way of thinking, or interests (unless you provide it with this information). So it lacks sufficient context to answer your vague questions to your satisfaction.
If you’re going to collect definitive answers with this technology, your questions will have to be clear and specific. So, instead of asking:
- Tell me about marketing,
You could ask:
- What are some effective digital marketing strategies for a small online retail business in 2025?
The more detail you provide (goals, audience, constraints, etc.), the better the response you’ll get from AI.
Include Background or Context
This is an extension of the first tip. Again, AI can only help you to the extent that you enable it. Quite often, the enablement that it requires is background information or context.
For example, if you want ideas for a project you’re working on, you should describe your role, audience, the purpose, and key details. The following is an example of a well-written prompt for AI:
- I am a secondary school physics teacher in Nigeria, creating a lesson on elementary particles. Please provide me with a 15-minute engaging introduction.
Break Down Complex Requests
If you input a single, multi-part and complex request, your generative AI model may be “overwhelmed” by it and end up producing surface-level answers. To achieve decent results, you’ll want to break the task into a series of steps.
Instead of asking:
- Write a business plan for a startup.
Follow these steps:
- Describe the startup idea in a few sentences.
- Ask for an outline of key sections of the business plan.
- Request for each section to be written individually.
You are more likely to get output with greater depth and accuracy this way.
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Refine by Tweaking
The first response generated by AI may fall short of your expectations. But you can make it better by asking follow-up questions, correcting inaccuracies, or demanding revisions.
When your generative AI tool (e.g. ChatGPT or Claude) delivers a less-than-satisfactory answer, you could continue the session with this:
Make the previous response more concise, and add real-world examples.
Use a Style Prompt
You should consider the expectations and preferences of your specific audience when you’re trying to address them, even if it’s with the aid of AI. Because this technology is heavily reliant on the quality of your input, you’re better off including a style prompt when you want it to produce content.
Here are a few prompts that specify tone or style:
- Write in a professional and persuasive tone.
- Make it casual, like a blog post for young people.
These types of instructions are useful sometimes and enable your AI model to supply output that fits your needs better.
Try Different Ways to Phrase the Same Request
You could see improved responses when you rephrase your requests or ask the same question from a different angle. Instead of asking:
- What are the causes of inflation?
You could try this:
- Explain the main factors that contributed to inflation in Nigeria between 2020 and 2025.
Learn from Previous Experiences
As you use generative AI tools, make a mental note of what works and what doesn’t. As you try different formats, tones, and strategies, identify the ones that deliver decent results and use them more often.
You could keep a record of successful prompts or templates for use in the future, so you don’t have to recall them from memory every time you need them.
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Final Words
You have probably observed that AI, as a technology, is only as good as the prompt that triggers its answers. Those prompts are yours to come up with. This article has shown you how to get the best responses from generative AI. You can follow the tips we’ve shared here for professional, creative, or leisurely tasks.
Featured Image Source: SciTech Daily
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