Dos and Don’ts of ChatGPT Essay Writing – How to Ask ChatGPT for Writing Help

The AI revolution is here to stay. Artificial intelligence language models are such a useful writing and research time-saver, literacy in these tools is likely going to be mandatory in the coming years. 

Of course, this program is not without significant flaws and quirks. In order to get the most out of ChatGPT, we’ll be discussing what this tool is best at, what it fails to do, and ultimately how it can save you time without compromising the quality of the final work. Let’s discuss the dos and don’ts of ChatGPT essay writing and how to ask ChatGPT for writing help. 

Pro 1 – Great for first drafts 

ChatGPT is, above all, an excellent drafter. It can take your ideas and facts and spin them into a full essay with a usable structure and a solid baseline for your next draft. If you’re a person who struggles to start a piece of writing and prefers to edit instead, this can get the creative juices flowing faster. 

ChatGPT is also excellent at implementing your keyword research. Simply provide a list of SEO keywords and ask the program to organically include each keyword as many times as you like. This can occasionally result in some awkward sentences as the program attempts to cram more keywords into the content than comfortably fit, but that’s what the second drafting stage is for. As it is, you’re off to a great start with your essay or blog. 

Con 1 – Bad at research 

If you open ChatGPT today, you’ll see a big honking warning at the bottom of the page: “ChatGPT can make mistakes. Consider checking important information.” 

This is not to be taken lightly. ChatGPT is a predictive language model that’s slightly more advanced than the predictive text feature on your phone. The program can’t do up to date research (its training ended in 2021 or early 2022) and it isn’t connected to the internet, so you won’t be getting out of the responsibility of properly researching your subject. 

As mentioned above, ChatGPT is most useful for organizing the content and keyword research you’ve already done into a coherent blog or essay.  

Pro 2 – Great for competitor analysis 

A common method of bolstering your SEO research is to grab the text from a competitor’s website and ask ChatGPT to analyze the text for repeated keywords of a certain category. For example, if you’re doing SEO research for a Montessori school, you can request ChatGPT to analyze some text and provide you with a report of keywords including or related to Montessori schooling. You can then use an SEO tool like SEMRush to analyze the provided keywords and determine which phrases are getting the most traffic and which you could realistically rank for. 

Con 2 – Bad for intros and conclusions 

In my experience using this tool, the easiest way to determine if ChatGPT was the primary author behind a piece of writing is to look at the intro and conclusion. You would not believe how often ChatGPT falls back on the phrase “In today’s such-and-such landscape.” Basically, if you see an essay beginning with that phrase, the first paragraph was either written by AI or the author is as imaginative as an AI language model. (Kindly don’t look back at our essays that begin with this phrase — I learned my lesson.) 

ChatGPT is also very repetitive in its conclusions. It’s common for the program to include at least 2 outros for whatever reason, especially if you’re including a CTA. Be sure you double-check the copy before you post it, or your writing will look very sloppy. 

Pro 3 – It’s free 

The utility of ChatGPT is emphasized by the fact that it’s free to use. Sure, they have a paid monthly subscription if you want GPT-4, but between you and me, the free version has never posed me any significant issues. The free version is of course to give ChatGPT a lot of learning experience with real people, so you’re using it is ultimately making the product better. Really, they should be paying you. 

Con 3 – It’s free 

You definitely get more than what you paid for, but this service is not without its flaws and shortcomings. It’s been pretty well dispelled by this point that ChatGPT is going to replace professional writers in any meaningful way because the software is simply unable to create unique, valuable material without significant intervention from an SEO-trained writer. 

That’s why 1GS Digital Agency offers content services for your blog, social media, and website. You don’t need to purchase an expensive subscription to an SEO tool, and you don’t need to write and rewrite the second and third drafts of your essay — we’ll do it all for you. All we need is the go ahead. Speak with a 1GS agent today to learn more about the value of professional content writing for improving your online presence.