“But how do I get started using AI?”: 11 real-life on-the-ground examples of chats I’ve had with ChatGPT
Writing, business building, and song choices - examples of easy ways to get started with AI
Last week I wrote about tips for getting started with ChatGPT. This week, I’ve still got AI on the brain, so I’m dedicating this week’s post to sharing examples and chats of how I’ve used ChatGPT.
Most of these examples are related to developing content for this newsletter or for my coaching business. I brainstorm with ChatGPT and get feedback. Some of the questions I already know the answers, but I find it helpful seeing those answers in a structured way.
Note: In the screenshots I show below, I don’t always show the entire ChatGPT output. My goal is to demonstrate the types of prompts I use and a flavor of the answers ChatGPT returns. If you’re interested in the full experience of working with ChatGPT, you’ll have to try it yourself!
One more note: With the exception of the screenshots, this entire post was written by me without any AI feedback. It may be a little rough around the edges, but I like it. 😁
1. Feedback on writing
One of the most common tasks I use ChatGPT for is feedback on my writing.
Note: I DO NOT want ChatGPT to rewrite my posts for me. I want my writing to represent me 100%, and I fully believe that relying on ChatGPT wording recommendations will result in cookie-cutter bland writing.
In the below example, I took none of ChatGPT’s feedback. Its feedback wasn’t wrong, but the imagery in this paragraph feels distinctly me. I know not everyone may “get” the image (maybe none…), but I wanted to try it out, see how I felt about it, then adapt next time if I feel the need to do so.
I also like purposely testing ChatGPT on pieces of my writing that may seem off-the-wall, just to see what it picks out to smooth over. It’s a signal to me that that piece of writing is unique to me.
2. Creating a business plan
Last year when I was starting to kick up this business, I attempted several times to create a business plan in collaboration with a business coach. Despite her best efforts for support, I could not wrap my head around this document. Everything I wrote felt thin and floppy.
So I tried out ChatGPT. I fed into it a description of my vision, my background, who I wanted to serve, what I hoped to accomplish, what I could offer. And within a minute, I built out for me a beautiful comprehensive business plan. I now had a solid first draft to work off of to refine.
In the video below, I recreated an on-the-fly example. My recommendation would be to feed it more information that I gave here. The next step would be to go through each section and make it your own. You can then feed each section back in to ChatGPT to revise it.
This is a writing example where I don’t mind using ChatGPT’s recommended words, since I’m using it to organize my thoughts and plan around the business. It’s not content or ideas that are important to me to be directly attributed to me and my ability as a writer.
When working with AI, it’s helpful to have these kind of usage frameworks for yourself. What are your boundaries for how you’re willing to use AI and for what purpose?
3. Creating long-form content
I’m always wondering how my content is likely to resonate with my audience. With ChatGPT, I can get instant access to the masses - because it has been trained on the masses. This is an example where I know these answers are somewhere inside me, but I doubt them. When I see them coming from ChatGPT, I feel more reassured that these strategies can be successful.
4. Writing a negotiation email
I use ChatGPT quite often to help me draft emails. In these cases, similar to the business plan, I don’t mind using ChatGPT’s language. Drafting emails aren’t really a creative task, and my goal is to be professional and at times, influential in a mechanical sort of way.
Especially in the case of a task like negotiating, using ChatGPT is particularly helpful. Effectively negotiating before accepting a new job offer can influence the trajectory of your compensation in the new role, but it’s a task few people have extensive experience with. With ChatGPT, I can benefit from extensive collective knowledge.
5. Creating a podcast name
Creating a podcast name was one of my earliest use cases for ChatGPT. I can tell because my response after it generated a series of titles was “those were awesome.” I think I remember sitting at the computer with a huge grin on my face, marveling at this new technology. I didn’t end up using any of these titles, but it was a fantastic way to get the creative juices flowing.
6. Designing an announcement visualization
About two months ago, I announced I’m open for coaching. As part of my announcement, I wanted to create a lettering illustration as my cover page. I’ve been practicing lettering for years, but I’m really terrible at composition, so I thought I’d give ChatGPT a whirl for ideas.
The first example was an overwhelming mess of color with a comic book-feel. I wanted something softer and beautiful. After a few more iterations, we created a design that I liked. This experience demonstrates the importance of not using AI straight out of the box. I collaborate with it actively until I get an output that matches my vision.
7. Categorizing my post topics
I recently did a coaching assessment that included a discussion on my competitive advantage (a mix of analytical / technical and emotional / creative intelligence).
One of the suggestions to capitalize on this advantage was to identify 3-5 topics I could speak on as an expert.
Interested in a way to capture these themes based on my own data, I fed the titles of my newsletter posts into ChatGPT and asked it to identify themes.
ChatGPT’s identified themes is an excellent jumping off point to continue honing in what value I can provide for people out in the world.
8. Developing a brand
Speaking of developing brands, as part of my conversation above on categorizing my posts into themes, I asked ChatGPT how these topics relate to my brand. I am not a marketer, though I’ve worked as a data scientist supporting marketing strategy. Using AI and ChatGPT is like having any type of expert at your fingertips. With ChatGPT, I can take a crash course on marketing, with a little consulting on the side.
9. Creating an AI consulting framework
Moving right along on how to use AI for business development…
Recently I’ve been having more conversations with people around how to use AI. So much so that I’m starting to play around with the idea of adding AI coaching to my offerings.
In this conversation, I brainstorm with AI on what an AI coaching session could look like. I also ask it about reasonable rates to consider charging. In fact, discussing pricing for services with AI has been another helpful unlock. It can calculate rates on the fly as I feed it new parameters, and again, because it’s harnessing collective knowledge, it’s like doing market research without having to click through dozens of articles.
One outcome from my conversation with AI on AI coaching is I thought of the term - “AI Confidence Coaching”. The beauty of this example is this wasn’t a term that AI suggested. It’s a term that bubbled up for me as I made my own connections between AI was telling me and drawing on my own experience, knowledge, and goals for this type of service.
10. Designing a LinkedIn Business page
After having some idea on what an AI coaching offering could look like, I turned to thinking about ways to market and make visible this offering. I don’t currently have a website for my coaching business, but I have created a the barest of bones LinkedIn Business page.
While I’m not ready to launch these ideas yet, I believe in the value of letting ideas percolate and develop organically. And now I’ve seeded some ideas suggested by ChatGPT.
11. Picking a good-bye song
My last example is kind of silly but was actually immensely helpful.
A couple weeks ago I was looking for a good-bye song for a project. In this chat, you can see ChatGPT providing lots of examples, but they weren’t what I was looking for. In this case, my responses were very short, but ChatGPT still delivered.
(And if you’re curious - in the end, I did go with a Taylor Swift song - “Long Live (Taylor’s Version)”. I love my Tay-Tay and this song perfectly captured the vibe I was going for.)
And that’s it!
Those are 10 conversations coming direct to you from ChatGPT. They were fun to have and supercharged my ability to accomplish the task at hand.
Some of these tasks I could certainly have completed on my own, but I find the structured answers of ChatGPT along with rich imagery and suggestions comforting and less cognitive taxing to create.
Building confidence in growing a business
Since most of my examples reflect working on a business and brand, I want to speak briefly on the utility of ChatGPT for this specific purpose.
A lot of working on a business and brand comes with self-doubt and wondering if how I’m positioning myself is “right”. ChatGPT is built by default to be helpful and encouraging, which is a great environment for managing the uncertainty of packaging one’s hopes, dreams, and vision for other people.
Be intentional and use AI with care
The possibilities of AI are staggering. I feel it when I use it. There’s a high in being able to easily accomplish tasks that used to feel more onerous and draining to do.
But it’s important to acknowledge the many downsides of AI. It’s also staggering what AI can do that’s harmful - from misinformation to deep-fake scams to atrophy of the brain to taking away jobs. Even its impact on the environment (the amount of computing required consumes valuable resources) requires a deep look.
For now, I am incredibly excited by what people can create using AI. And I believe it’s important to test out the technology and decide for yourself based on your own on-the-ground experiences what your stance will be when using AI. By being more informed, you’ll not only be keeping yourself and your skills up-to-date with emerging challenges but you’ll be able to be part of shaping how AI is used in the future.
Parting thoughts
As I reflect on the benefits of using AI, I recognize how differently I feel walking away from the same task when I work with AI vs. on my own. On my own, I can often walk away from a task like creating a business plan feeling slightly dissatisfied and confused about what to do next. When I work with ChatGPT, I walk away feeling focused, accomplished, and confident in what I’m working toward.
How about you? What are examples of how you use AI, and what has surprised you about using AI? I’d love to see your examples and learn from how you are taking advantage of this incredible technology.
As a leadership coach, I partner with individuals to achieve personal and professional balance and fulfillment through growth and resilience. Learn more about my coaching here. If you are interested in working with me 1:1 to explore how you can create your best life, please leave a comment or send me a note at the link below!