ChatGPT Custom Instructions: Step-by-Step Guide

Today, we are going to talk about an incredible ChatGPT feature that can significantly improve your interactions with this artificial intelligence: Custom Instructions. With this feature, you can configure ChatGPT to respond according to your specific preferences and needs, saving time and getting more precise and contextualized answers.

In this article, we will explore how to use ChatGPT Custom Instructions in detail. We will follow a detailed step-by-step, starting with a basic explanation and moving on to more complex and creative examples.

Get ready to discover how to optimize your interactions with ChatGPT and take your productivity to the next level!

Understanding ChatGPT Custom Instructions

ChatGPT offers a feature called Custom Instructions, available to all users, including the free version. This feature allows you to configure the AI to provide answers more aligned with your needs and preferences, significantly improving the quality of interactions.

To access Custom Instructions, simply click on the “Customize ChatGPT” option. In this menu, you will find two main fields:

1. What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?
2. How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Enabling Instructions for New Chats

In the Custom Instructions settings window, there is an important option called “Enable for new chats”. Be sure to activate this option so that ChatGPT uses the inserted instructions. This ensures that custom instructions are applied to all new conversations initiated after the setup.

Remember, custom instructions will only be applied to new conversations. This means that any changes made to the instructions will not affect ongoing conversations. Therefore, it is crucial to enable this option whenever adjusting or updating your instructions.

Filling Out the First Field

The first field allows you to provide information about yourself, helping ChatGPT to better understand the context of your questions. Here are some examples of information you can include:

• Where are you based?
• What do you do for work?
• What are your hobbies and interests?
• What subjects can you talk about for hours?
• What are some goals you have?

Basic Example

Let’s start with a simple example:

I am a tour guide. I am in Porto de Galinhas – PE, where I receive and guide tourists. I love beaches.

This type of information helps ChatGPT tailor its responses more accurately. For example, when sending a simple prompt like “sunset,” ChatGPT’s response will be contextualized based on the provided instructions:

“The sunset is a wonderful natural spectacle, isn’t it? In Porto de Galinhas, it can be especially stunning. If you are guiding a group, a tip is to take tourists to Praia de Muro Alto or Praia do Cupe, which offer incredible sunset views.”

Filling Out the Second Field

The second field allows you to define how ChatGPT should respond. You can adjust the tone, formality, and other response preferences. Here are some suggestions:

• How formal or casual should ChatGPT be?
• How long or short should responses generally be?
• How do you want to be addressed?
• Should ChatGPT have opinions on topics or remain neutral?

Basic Example

To keep the explanation clear, let’s see a simple example:

Respond in a friendly manner using an informal tone. Always reply in English, even if I ask in another language. Call me Mr. Jaspion.

With these settings, ChatGPT will adjust its responses according to these preferences. For example, when asking “Where is Porto de Galinhas?” in Portuguese, by default the response will be given in English, as configured:

“Porto de Galinhas is located on the southern coast of Pernambuco. It is a famous beach known for its natural pools and crystal clear waters.”

Improving Custom Instructions

Now that you understand the basics of how to set up Custom Instructions, let’s explore how to further enhance these settings to get even more relevant and detailed responses.

Structure for Filling Out the Fields

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

To maximize the effectiveness of ChatGPT’s responses, consider including detailed but relevant information about yourself. Here are some items you can choose and add:

• Profession/Role
• Main Responsibilities
• Knowledge or Experience
• Challenges
• Goals and Objectives
• Academic Background
• Current Projects
• Jargon or Terminology
• Interactions
• Learning Style
• Communication Style
• Preferred Tools
• Location and Time Zone
• Values and Principles
• Language
• Age
• Gender and Ethnic/Cultural Characteristics
• Marital Status/Family Structure
• Socioeconomic Status
• Cognitive Conditions (ADHD, autism, dyslexia, etc.)
• Physical Conditions (disabilities: visual, motor, etc.)
• Favorite Books, Movies, Music, Games, Teams, etc.

Detailed Example

Let’s create a more complete example for our Tour Guide using some of these options:

Profession/Role: I am a Tour Guide.
Main Responsibilities: Conducting visitors to the main tourist spots in Porto de Galinhas, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients.
Knowledge or Experience: History, geography, culture, and curiosities of Porto de Galinhas, communication and customer service skills.
Academic Background: I have a degree in tourism and history.
Challenges: Dealing with unforeseen events such as traffic, weather, and technical problems, adapting itineraries to clients’ preferences and needs, staying updated on local news and events.
Current Projects: Offering virtual tours, personalized tours, and themed tours such as gastronomic, ecological, and historical.
Jargon or Terminology: Praia de Muro Alto, Maracaípe, Pontal de Maracaípe, natural pools, rafts, tapioca.
Goals and Objectives: Providing a unique and memorable experience for visitors, receiving positive reviews and recommendations, increasing the number of clients and income.
Interactions: Visitors from different countries, cultures, and languages, other tour guides, travel agencies, hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions.
Values and Principles: I value diversity and respect, and I believe in offering quality and honesty service.
Language: My native language is English. I am fluent in Portuguese and Spanish.

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

For this field, you can be even more specific about the tone and style of the responses. Here are some examples of items that can be included:

• Tone and Formality
• Level of Detail
• Preferred References
• Types of Suggestions
• Links
• Types of Questions
• Problem-Solving Method
• Level of Critical Thinking
• Level of Creativity
• Response Format
• Checks and Balances
• Bias / Awareness of Prejudices
• Language Preferences

Detailed Example

Let’s continue with our Tour Guide:

Tone and Formality: Friendly and informal.
Level of Detail: Brief and interesting explanations, with tips and recommendations.
Preferred References: Websites, books, and movies about Porto de Galinhas, famous personalities and artists from the region, fun facts and curiosities.
Types of Suggestions: Suggestions for places to visit, eat, shop, and have fun, according to the client’s profile and budget.
Links: Links to reliable and useful sites, such as travel agencies, public transport, museums, and events.
Types of Questions: Open-ended questions to get to know the client better, their expectations and interests, closed questions to confirm information and preferences.
Problem-Solving Method: Use clear and objective instructions to solve problems, explain the causes and consequences of problems, offer viable alternatives and solutions, ask for feedback and apologize to the client.

Practical and Compact Example

If your instructions exceed the 1500-character limit per field, you can compact them. Here’s how the examples above could be summarized:

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

I am a Tour Guide, responsible for conducting visitors to the main tourist spots in Porto de Galinhas, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients. I have knowledge in history, geography, culture, and curiosities of Porto de Galinhas, as well as communication and customer service skills. I have a degree in tourism and history. I face challenges such as dealing with unforeseen events (traffic, weather, and technical problems), adapting itineraries to clients’ preferences and staying updated on local events. Currently, I offer virtual, personalized, and themed tours (gastronomic, ecological, and historical). I use terms such as Praia de Muro Alto, Maracaípe, Pontal de Maracaípe, natural pools, rafts, and tapioca. My goals are to provide unique experiences, receive positive reviews, increase clients and income. I interact with visitors from different countries and cultures, other guides, travel agencies, hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions. I value diversity and respect, offering quality and honesty service. I speak English, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Respond in a friendly and informal manner, with brief and interesting explanations, including tips and recommendations. Reference websites, books, and movies about Porto de Galinhas, famous personalities and artists from the region, and fun facts. Suggest places to visit, eat, shop, and have fun, according to the client’s profile and budget. Include links to reliable and useful sites, such as travel agencies, public transport, museums, and events. Ask open-ended questions to get to know the client better, their expectations and interests, as well as closed questions to confirm information and preferences. Use clear and objective instructions to solve problems, explaining causes and consequences, offering viable alternatives and solutions, and asking for feedback and apologizing when necessary.

These compact forms still provide all essential information without exceeding the character limit.

Adjusting and Experimenting

Remember, the key to getting the best responses is to constantly adjust and experiment with your custom instructions. Don’t hesitate to make modifications as necessary until you find the perfect setup that works for you.

Creative and Advanced Examples of Custom Instructions

After mastering the basics and improvements in Custom Instructions, it’s time to explore creative and advanced examples. These examples show how you can use this feature innovatively to get even more out of ChatGPT.

Creative Examples

Different Roles

An interesting way to use Custom Instructions is to set up different profiles for ChatGPT to respond according to the role you are playing at the moment. For example, you might be a tour guide during the week and a personal development consultant on the weekend. Here’s how you can set this up:

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

Role 1: Tour Guide
Profession/Role: Tour Guide
Main Responsibilities: Conducting visitors to the main tourist spots in Porto de Galinhas, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients.

Role 2: Personal Development Consultant
Profession/Role: Personal Development Consultant
Main Responsibilities: Helping clients identify strengths and areas for improvement, setting personal development goals, providing strategies and tools to achieve them.

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Role 1: Tour Guide
Tone and Formality: Friendly and informal
Level of Detail: Brief and interesting explanations, with tips and recommendations.

Role 2: Personal Development Consultant
Tone and Formality: Inspirational and motivational
Level of Detail: Detailed explanations with inspiring stories and comparisons.

Once done, you can send a prompt explicitly invoking one of the roles, for example:

Adopt Role 1 and suggest a 3-day itinerary for a young couple.

Automatically Detecting the Role

You can make ChatGPT automatically identify which role you are playing and respond accordingly. This can be done by setting up the instructions for ChatGPT to analyze the context before responding:

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

Before returning any response, identify which of the roles below I am playing and respond accordingly (indicate the role in the response).

Role 1: Tour Guide
Profession/Role: Tour Guide
Main Responsibilities: Conducting visitors to the main tourist spots in Porto de Galinhas, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients.

Role 2: Personal Development Consultant
Profession/Role: Personal Development Consultant
Main Responsibilities: Helping clients identify strengths and areas for improvement, setting personal development goals, providing strategies and tools to achieve them.

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Role 1: Tour Guide
Tone and Formality: Friendly and informal
Level of Detail: Brief and interesting explanations, with tips and recommendations.

Role 2: Personal Development Consultant
Tone and Formality: Inspirational and motivational
Level of Detail: Detailed explanations with inspiring stories and comparisons.

Once done, try sending the following prompts:

How to gain more confidence when starting a new job?

Suggest a high-end, 3-day itinerary for a group of 5 people.

If it fails to identify the context, you can always resort to explicitly invoking the role directly in the prompt:

Adopt Role 2 and respond: How to gain more confidence when starting a new job?

Detecting the Role by the Day of the Week

Another advanced and creative way to use Custom Instructions is to configure them so that ChatGPT adjusts its responses based on the day of the week. This is especially useful if you play different roles on different days. But here, be aware that it is a creative experiment and not 100% reliable, although it has performed well in various tests.

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

Location and Time Zone: I am in New York, United States.
Before returning any response, identify what day of the week I am sending the prompt and respond according to the instructions below (indicate the day of the week and the role in the response).

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday:
Profession/Role: Tour Guide
Main Responsibilities: Conducting visitors to the main tourist spots in Porto de Galinhas, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients.

Thursday and Friday:
Profession/Role: Personal Development Consultant
Main Responsibilities: Helping clients identify strengths and areas for improvement, setting personal development goals, providing strategies and tools to achieve them.

Saturday and Sunday:
Personal Role: Father of two children, a girl aged 4 and a boy aged 6, and a dedicated husband. Looking to strengthen family bonds through joint activities, educate children based on values such as respect and cooperation, promote mental and physical health of the family.

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday:
Tone and Formality: Friendly and informal
Level of Detail: Brief and interesting explanations, including tips and recommendations.

Thursday and Friday:
Tone and Formality: Inspirational and motivational
Level of Detail: Detailed explanations with inspiring stories and comparisons.

Saturday and Sunday:
Tone and Formality: Friendly and informal with a tone of understanding and empathy. Include lots of emojis in the response. Suggest games and activities suitable for the children’s ages and always add a suggestion for a couple’s activity to do together at the end of the day.

Practical Example

Let’s see how these instructions work in practice. Imagine you send a simple prompt like “Plan my workday” on a Wednesday. ChatGPT should automatically identify that it is a day you are acting as a Tour Guide and respond accordingly:

“Today is Wednesday, so as a Tour Guide, you can start the day by leading a group of visitors to Praia de Muro Alto. Then, take them to lunch at a local restaurant offering typical dishes. In the afternoon, explore the natural pools of Porto de Galinhas and end the day with a visit to the historic center, sharing cultural and historical information.”

If the same prompt is sent on a Friday, ChatGPT should adopt the role of Personal Development Consultant:

“Today is Friday, so as a Personal Development Consultant, you can start the day by reviewing your clients’ goals and adjusting strategies as needed. Then, conduct a coaching session focused on identifying strengths and areas for improvement. End the day by preparing a progress report for each client.”

And if the prompt is sent on a Sunday, ChatGPT should adopt the personal role:

“Today is Sunday, a perfect day to strengthen family bonds! Start the day with a family breakfast, then take the children to the park to play and have fun. In the afternoon, do an art activity at home, such as painting or drawing together. And to end the day, prepare a special dinner with your partner and plan a family movie night.”

Custom Commands

Another advanced way to use Custom Instructions is to create specific commands that can be triggered in the chat. These commands help optimize the interaction with ChatGPT, making responses more useful and precise.

First Field: What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses?

(Leave this field blank for this example.)

Second Field: How would you like ChatGPT to respond?

Below is a list of commands in the format “/command: description”, where:

• /command – indicates the name of the command preceded by a slash (no space).
• description – the instructions and actions to be performed for the command.

If I send, exclusively, one of the commands below in the prompt, execute the instructions described in the command in question.

/improveAI: analyze my last request and the response generated for it, and include additional information and relevant details to complement the previous response and improve the generated result.
/examplesAI: analyze my last request and the response generated for it, identify the context and provide practical examples to complement and improve understanding of the topic in question.
/summarizeAI: analyze the interactions made in this chat, considering all the adjustments and improvements made so far, and provide a concise summary of our progress so far.
/simplifyAI: analyze the last generated response and rewrite it in an informal way with simplified language that even a child would understand. Use emojis to make the response more visual and attractive.

Note: I included “AI” at the end of each command name to avoid ChatGPT getting confused and thinking the slash (/) was a typing error. “Improve,” “Summarize,” and “Simplify” are action verbs, which could cause this confusion.

Practical Example with Commands

Let’s see how these commands work in practice. Imagine you asked ChatGPT to write a text about the benefits of using artificial intelligence in education. After the initial response, you can use the custom commands to improve the interaction:

1. For ChatGPT to analyze the response and add relevant details:

/improveAI

2. For ChatGPT to provide practical examples to complement the response:

/examplesAI

3. For ChatGPT to summarize the progress of the conversation so far:

/summarizeAI

4. For ChatGPT to rewrite the last response in a simpler and more visual way:

/simplifyAI

These examples show how Custom Instructions can be used creatively and advancedly to improve your interactions with ChatGPT.

Using Custom Instructions in Other AIs

Custom Instructions are a unique feature of ChatGPT, but the idea behind them can be applied to other artificial intelligences. Let’s explore how you can adapt these instructions for use on different AI platforms, even if they do not offer native support for customization.

Manually Applying Instructions

To use custom instructions in other AIs, you can insert the information directly into the prompt. This requires a bit more manual work but can provide similar results. Here’s an example of how this can be done:

Practical Example

Let’s adapt the instructions of a Tour Guide so they can be used on Google Gemini, Claude AI , or any other tool:

Custom Instructions

User Profile:
I am a Tour Guide in Porto de Galinhas. My responsibilities include conducting visitors to the main tourist spots, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients. I have knowledge in history, geography, and local culture. I have a degree in tourism and history. I often deal with challenges such as traffic, weather, and itinerary adaptation.
How to Respond:
Respond in a friendly and informal manner, with brief and interesting explanations, including tips and recommendations.

Prompt to use in other AIs

User Profile:
I am a Tour Guide in Porto de Galinhas. My responsibilities include conducting visitors to the main tourist spots, providing historical and cultural information, ensuring the safety and satisfaction of clients. I have knowledge in history, geography, and local culture. I have a degree in tourism and history. I often deal with challenges such as traffic, weather, and itinerary adaptation.
How to Respond:
Respond in a friendly and informal manner, with brief and interesting explanations, including tips and recommendations.

The above information refers to the user profile I want you to consider for this conversation. Before continuing, please confirm if you understand.

Expected Response

“Understood! You are a tour guide in Porto de Galinhas, responsible for conducting visitors and providing historical and cultural information. I will respond in a friendly and informal manner, including tips and recommendations. How can I help today?”

Practical Usage Examples

Here are some examples of prompts adapted for different AI platforms, using the custom instructions directly in the prompt text:

Example 1

The following information is the user profile for this conversation.
Profile: I am a personal development consultant. My responsibilities include helping clients identify strengths, set goals, and provide strategies to achieve them.
How to Respond: Respond in an inspirational and motivational manner, with success stories and comparisons.
Suggest strategies to improve confidence in a new job.

Expected Response

“As a personal development consultant, it’s crucial to help your clients identify and build on their strengths. An effective strategy is to use examples of success, such as stories of people who have overcome similar challenges. Start by setting small achievable goals to gradually build confidence.”

Example 2

The following information is the user profile for this interaction:
Profile: Father of two children, 4 and 6 years old, looking for educational activities for the weekend.
How to Respond: Respond in a friendly and understanding manner, suggesting fun and educational activities for young children.
What are some educational activities I can do with my children this weekend?

Expected Response

“As a father of two young children, you can plan several fun and educational activities. Try a treasure hunt in the backyard where the children can learn about plants and insects. Another idea is to create an art project with recyclable materials, encouraging creativity and environmental awareness. And how about a reading session with illustrated books, followed by a discussion about the stories?”

Adapting to Different Contexts

The flexibility of custom instructions allows you to adapt the same concept for different contexts and platforms. Whatever AI you are using, provide clear and specific information at the beginning of the prompt to guide the response in the desired manner.

Conclusion

ChatGPT’s Custom Instructions are a powerful tool for improving your interactions with this AI, making them more efficient, accurate, and aligned with your needs and preferences. By properly setting up the fields “What would you like ChatGPT to know about you to provide better responses” and “How should ChatGPT respond,” you can get more contextualized and relevant responses, saving time and effort.

We explored from basic examples to more advanced and creative settings, showing how this feature can be adapted for different contexts and roles you play. Additionally, we saw how to apply similar concepts on other AI platforms, even without native support for customization.

The key to getting the best results is to constantly adjust and experiment with your instructions, refining them as needed to find the perfect setup. Remember to focus on the most relevant and essential information for your specific needs.

Now that you know the potential of Custom Instructions, start applying them in your daily interactions with ChatGPT and see the difference they can make. And don’t forget, the possibilities for customization are endless, so feel free to explore and innovate!

Thank you very much for reading and see you next time!