How to Write an AI Prompt: 6 Questions and Before-and-After Examples

Why a short prompt gets an average answer

Type "write a birthday message for a coworker" and you'll get the kind of card people forward in group chats. The model isn't being lazy. It just doesn't know who the coworker is, how well you know each other or what you're going for. At every fork like that, it picks the most common option. Stack up ten common options and you get the most ordinary text imaginable.

So here's the main rule: settle the forks that matter to you in advance. Let the model decide the rest.

The intern rule

Picture a sharp new hire reading your prompt on their first day. They know nothing about the project, but they'll do exactly what's written. Is your text enough for them? If not, add to it. And explain not just what to do but why: "keep it short because people will read it on their phones" works better than a bare "keep it short."

Six questions the model will otherwise answer for you

1. Who's answeringNot just "you're an expert," but a role that fits the task: "you're an editor who writes for people with no background in economics."
2. What to doA verb and an outcome: "write three versions," "cut it to 500 characters," "find the mistakes and explain each one."
3. For whom and why"For my grandma, who's scared of banks," "so my coworker smiles instead of rolling their eyes."
4. In what formFormat and length: a list, a table, an email, no more than five sentences.
5. What it should look likeA sample: your old text, an example of the tone, a reference to a style. One example explains more than a paragraph of description.
6. What to avoidA ban plus an alternative: not "no fluff" but "no fluff, write like you're talking to a friend in the kitchen."

Three before-and-after examples

Before: "Write a birthday message for a coworker." After: "Write a birthday message for Anya from accounting, she's turning 30. We're on casual terms, she loves cats and keeps saving the team from deadlines. Three short versions for the team chat, lightly funny, no 'wishing you health and happiness' and no poems."

Before: "Explain mortgage refinancing." After: "Explain mortgage refinancing to someone with no finance background. They want to know whether it's worth doing when their rate is above market. Five points, each with an example in rubles, and end with three questions to ask the bank."

Before: "A listing for selling a bike." After: "A listing for Avito, Russia's biggest classifieds site: city bike, three years old, everything works, a scratch on the frame. The buyer is a student who needs cheap transportation. Honest, no exclamation points, under 600 characters, and end with when they can come see it."

How to refine a prompt

• Ask it to ask you questions. Add at the end: "before answering, ask me up to five clarifying questions." The model will find the forks you forgot about.
• Edit with specifics, not judgments. Not "make it better" but "the first paragraph is too long, cut it to two sentences and open with a number."
• Start over if the conversation went sideways. A long thread with a dozen edits confuses the model. Collect the tweaks that worked into one prompt and open a new chat.

Common mistakes

• Vague praise words instead of traits. The model has its own idea of "interesting," "creative" or "high quality." Describe what interesting looks like: with an example, a surprising comparison, a question at the end.
• Requirements that fight each other. "Detailed but short": pick one, or explain what exactly should be detailed.
• Everything in one pile. If the task has three steps, ask for one step at a time and check each one.
• Unchecked facts. The model can confidently invent a number or a link. More on that in AI hallucinations.

A prompt for an AI character

A character description is a prompt too, just a long-running one. The model will talk the way the character is described, so a dry questionnaire gets you a dry conversation partner. Here's what to spell out:

1. Personality through actions, not adjectives. Not "kind" but "gives away his last sandwich and pretends he isn't hungry."
2. Way of speaking: short sentences or long ones, pet phrases, how they swear and how they get flustered.
3. How they relate to you: a stranger, an old friend, a rival, someone they owe.
4. The opening line. It sets the tone for the whole conversation: from it the model picks up reply length, style and mood.
5. A rule against inventing shared history you didn't set up. Otherwise the character might "remember" a fight that never happened.

How to build a personality from scratch is covered in how to create a character's personality, and ready-made templates for roleplay stories are in our collection of roleplay prompts.