Comprehensive ChatGPT Prompts for Marketing Mastery

Back in the Dark Ages of mid-2022, marketers had to rely on AI content that was outrageously different to what we know today. 

Then along came ChatGPT, which has given plenty of marketers and creatives precious time back as they focus on more important tasks. ChatGPT will market your business — if you know which buttons to push. 

Read on to learn how to talk the AI talk for content assets that walk the walk.

What Makes a Good Prompt?

It may seem counterintuitive, but the more boring your prompt, the better the results. Investing some initial effort to create a prompt for your collateral will give you a replicable system that works. The secret? Keep it simple, structured and specific. Here’s how you do it:

✔ Do Use Lists: Lists clarify each guideline or command separately, leaving little room for semantic muddling or inaccurate interpretation. Bullets or numbered lists detailing each criterion in concise sentences lead to better results.

✘ Don’t Be Cute: Here’s where many of us fall off the bandwagon. You want your AI marketing copy to engage and inspire, right? This doesn’t mean you need to engage and inspire the robot.  

AI is trained in semantics (how each word relates to others in a sentence) that are nowhere near as complex as our own. That means creative and vague language in prompts can clutter the command. There’s more room for lexicon hysteria.

✔ Do Provide Structure: Based on your asset, include a desired structure in your ChatGPT prompt. These describe the form of the output you’re expecting, and if the results don’t provide, you can directly call it out. Need help creating a structure? Ask ChatGPT to produce one in advance. 

✘ Don’t Shy Away From Technical Commands: Semantics? Natural Language Processing? Stay with me here. When speaking to humans, we need to talk in relatable language. Likewise, when speaking to AI, we should do the same. Use technical commands where you can to enhance ChatGPT’s understanding of what you need. (If it’s not your thing, don’t worry — it’s not mine either. We’re going to give you some below.) 

✔ Do Be Specific and Thorough: State the obvious, from describing your ideal customer persona to the exact words that portray the brand voice you want to replicate. The more specific details you can give, the better the results. 

✘ Don’t Settle: If the outputs aren’t what you expect, you have two options. First, tell ChatGPT something like “This is not what I requested. Make it [insert instruction],” and see what comes up. Failing that, try tweaking your prompts to add more clarity. 

✔ Do Create Master Prompts for Each Content Type: Creating a generic set of prompts for social media posts, email marketing, blogs and anything else in your marketing strategy saves time. That way, when you generate an asset, you only need to tweak a couple of words and voilà — you have a polished prompt ready to go. 

So now we’ve covered the basics, let’s dive into the ingredients that cook up an effective ChatGPT prompt for each asset in your content marketing efforts.

Informational Blog Post

SEO blog posts are the cornerstone of digital marketing. They should ideally be between 1,500 and 2,000 words to cover a topic in-depth, provide value to your target audience and optimize for search engines. 

But long-form AI content generation means more room for potential error in the outputs. Keep the content flowing and accurate with this prompt structure: 

1. Task Overview

Explain the type of article and its purpose in 2 to 3 sentences. Some considerations are whether you want a commercial or informational blog post and if you intend to convert or nurture the audience. 

2. Outline or Structural Guidance

Provide the structure. If you’ve had ChatGPT generate one for you, check whether it’s what you want, adjust it if necessary and plug it in. On the other hand, if you’re creating according to a content brief, list the article structure detailing headings and what should be included in the body copy. 

Example:

[H1] Help! Why Do I Love Cats So Much? 

[Body copy] Explain in detail why cats are loveable and what the audience will learn in the article. 

[H2] Cats Across The Ages

[Body copy] Provide a comprehensive analysis of where cats come from, their natural behaviors in the wild and how they became domesticated.

[H2] Why Am I Covered in Cats?

[Body copy] Describe how wild feline traits translate to a modern domesticated environment, helping the audience understand their cat’s comportment around the house. 

You get the gist. 

3. A Numbered List of Guidelines

AI is good at producing content quickly, but sometimes it needs help with accuracy. Your guidelines are where the magic happens. Here’s a baseline set of instructions to include for your articles — but feel free to mix and match these for all other content types in your marketing strategy too. 

Tip: Find some additional technical prompts in our downloadable guide!

Examples: 

1. Organize headings and subheadings in a logical order.
2. Ensure each heading or subheading is connected to the topic.
3. Use a [insert designated brand voice] tone in the headings and body copy.
4. Write in the [first/second/third] person. 
5. Speak directly to the target audience. The ideal customer persona is [describe audience].
6. Ensure the copy is [informational/commercial], focusing on [type of information required] to illustrate [blog topic]. 
7. Write [word count] words. 
8. Make sentences [short/long]. 
9. Write in [desired dialect] [language].

4. Optimization

This one’s pretty straightforward: Tell ChatGPT to include a list of words you need to optimize your copy for SEO. There are plenty of places to find related keywords to help you rank, like your creative brief (if you’re working with one) or MarketMuse — and remember, you can always brainstorm your own or ask ChatGPT to provide a few.

Example: 

Embed the following keywords naturally into the headings and body copy: [insert keywords]. 

Email Marketing

89% of marketers say they see an ROI on AI-generated email content. An email campaign drives brand awareness and sales in little words. But, don’t be fooled — this doesn’t mean prompt engineering a couple of sentences will cut it. Here’s how to structure an email marketing command: 

1. Task Overview

As above, you’ll still need to mention whether this has commercial or informational intent and whether you desire to educate or convert leads. For email prompts, it helps to add specific information about the stage of the funnel your audience is in. State one overarching goal for the email, such as attracting traffic to your website, making a direct sale, filling out a survey or otherwise. 

2. An Existing Example

Emails don’t always follow a high-level structure like blogs. Instead, include an example of a previous email in your campaign so the AI understands the tone and style of the content you aim for. 

3. List of Guidelines

Email campaign prompts require a unique voice and data-backed arguments to drive the desired action. If you don’t have any compelling market research about your business, ChatGPT can help with data analysis, too.

Examples: 

1. The audience is a [potential customer/existing customer].
2. Keep sentences short and directly to the point. 
3. This email campaign must [convert/nurture]. End with a persuasive CTA encouraging the audience to [desired action].
4. To enhance CTR, generate [number] alternative subject lines based on the email content.
5. (a) Include data to back your arguments and reference the information. 

(b) Include [insert your data, statistics or sources] to back your arguments and show where it has been used.

Social Media

Social media prompts compete with an ocean of other content, and the playoff for engagement is fierce. So how do you prompt to make your socials stand out among the noise? 

1. Task Overview

As always, your social media marketing task overview should detail exactly what the asset is and what it aims to achieve. Like emails, include one specific goal such as ramping audience engagement, conversion or inspiring action. You can cheat a little here by instructing ChatGPT to generate a week or month’s content, but remember to indicate whether you’re aiming for Facebook, X or a LinkedIn post.

2. Copy Examples

Include examples of previous posts that nailed the goals you’re shooting for. Because social media copy is relatively short, throw in a couple to give ChatGPT a range of inspiration to mix and match. 

3. List of Guidelines

Among the socials, there’s high competition for your audience’s attention. There are also plenty of ways to make your business stand out. Here are a few ways to do it: 

Examples:

1. [Use/Do not use] emojis — provide any specific emojis you want to add.
2. [Include/Do not include] bullet lists. 
3. Add a persuasive CTA at the [beginning/end] to drive [desired action].
4. Analyze [social media platform] posts from [link social media account] and replicate the [tone, style, engagement, etc.].
5. Use a [charming/sassy/whimsical/mischievous, etc.] tone of voice.

4. Optimization

Platforms like YouTube use keywords in video marketing descriptions to match content with relevant audiences. Ask ChatGPT to insert related keywords or a list of trending, suitable hashtags into your social copy to connect with your target market. 

Infographics

You can strategically plug infographics into your social media, email campaigns and blog posts. Supported by visual design, they can convey complex ideas in a logical and digestible way. Here’s how to make an effective ChatGPT prompt for your copy elements: 

1. Task Overview

Explain the purpose of your infographic and what it will be used for. This could be demonstrating the steps of a process, providing general information and more. 

2. Outline or Structural Guide

Ask ChatGPT to build an outline in advance or insert the structure based on your creative brief. 

Example:

[H1] [Insert Title].

[Intro copy] [Describe the information to cover in the introduction].

[Datapoint 1] [Insert title].

[Body copy] [Briefly describe copy elements to include].

[Datapoint 2] [Insert title].

[Body copy] [Briefly describe copy elements to include].

Etc. 

3. List of Guidelines

If your design elements are ready, you can upload them into ChatGPT for reference. It’ll analyze and understand the visual elements with which it must comply. Here are a few extra prompts for design-supported content. 

Examples:

1. Improve the [H1/datapoint titles] to make them more engaging. 
2. Ensure [title/introduction/datapoints/copy] is no more than [number] [words/characters].
3. Use the design attached to draw visual metaphors from the copy.

Marketing Made Simpler: No Unicorns Required

Forget the fluff and get real with your prompts. Use these tips to create a library of master prompts for your collateral, then enjoy a repeatable, time-light process to bolster your content strategy. 

If you’re running low on time, grab a copy of our downloadable ChatGPT prompts for marketing. Here, you’ll find a summarized version of examples included in this article to copy, tweak and paste for the ultimate AI-generated copy.