How to Generate Very Long Texts with AI: Complete Tutorial
Generating very long and high-quality texts with AI may seem challenging, but with the right method, it is perfectly possible. In this article, we will explore a detailed step-by-step guide to creating extensive and coherent texts using artificial intelligence. You will learn how to use effective prompts, structure your content, and make the most of tools like ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Claude, and similar.
Whether you need to create blog articles, theses, e-books, website pages, or reports, the techniques presented here will be useful for a wide variety of text content. We will cover the initial steps, showing examples of what not to do, to how to refine the generated text to achieve exceptional results.
Get ready to learn how to turn your prompts into clear and detailed instructions that will guide AI to produce long, well-structured, and consistent texts. Let’s get started!
Table of Contents
Bad Examples and Initial Improvements
To start, let’s look at some examples of inadequate prompts for generating long texts:
Generate a blog article about yoga.
Generate a thesis about quantum computing.
Generate the content for a webpage about car mechanics.
What do these prompts have in common? They are extremely vague, without context, detail, or direction. Despite this, the AI still generates some content, but we don’t want a generic and mediocre result, right?
To improve, let’s take the first example “Generate a blog article about yoga” and turn it into something more effective.
Improved Prompt:
Act as an experienced blogger specializing in yoga, with extensive knowledge in content marketing. Your task is to write a 2000-word blog article on the topic: "Benefits of Yoga for Mental Health: How Practice Can Help with Anxiety and Depression."
Be empathetic and inspiring. Write in an accessible way, avoiding technical jargon and explaining concepts simply and friendly. Be positive and encouraging. Be authentic.
This prompt offers clear and specific instructions to the AI:
- Assume a role: Instructs the AI to act as a yoga blogger.
- Define the task: Specifies creating a 2000-word article.
- Specify the theme: Focuses on a specific and detailed topic.
- Direct the style: Indicates the tone and style of the article.
Let’s analyze the result of this prompt.
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
The generated article is well-structured, with an introduction, topics, and subtopics, but it did not meet the request to generate 2000 words (generated close to 1000 words) and did not cover the subjects in depth. This teaches us that the greater the complexity and size of the task, the less likely the AI will completely meet the request.
Contextualization and Initial Planning
Let’s continue using the blog article about yoga as an example: “Benefits of Yoga for Mental Health: How Practice Can Help with Anxiety and Depression.” The step-by-step is valid and can be followed, with minor adjustments, to generate a wide variety of content, including:
- Blog articles with 2,000 / 3,000 / 5,000 words.
- Complete theses or final projects with dozens of pages.
- E-books on any subject with dozens of pages.
- Texts for websites, landing pages, reports, presentations.
- Any other text content.
Although I used ChatGPT to generate the results I am posting in the article, you can apply the same techniques to other AIs, such as Google Gemini, Claude, among others.
Before starting to generate the actual text, we may need ideas on what to write. In step 1, we will ask the AI to generate content ideas.
Step 1: Generating Ideas
If you already have the idea ready and well-structured, even better. Otherwise, here are two models of prompts that can be used to generate ideas.
Prompt to generate ideas for general topics
- Blog posts
- E-books
- Various articles
- Reports
- Guides and tutorials
- Social media posts
- Marketing emails
- Scripts for videos or podcasts
- Internal communications or corporate memos
- Lesson plans or educational materials
Model:
Act as {{ROLE}}. Your task is to suggest {{QUANTITY}} topics for {{CONTENT TYPE}} considering the following requirements:
The theme must be relevant to the target audience: {{TARGET AUDIENCE}}.
It should address a current trend or problem related to {{THEME OR TOPIC}}.
Include a brief description of each suggested topic, explaining its relevance and how it can add value to the audience.
Practical example:
Act as a content marketing specialist, with over 10 years of experience helping companies grow through blogs. Your task is to suggest 10 topics for blog posts considering the following requirements:
The theme must be relevant to the target audience: people who practice or want to practice yoga, of all ages, interested in holistic health, mental and spiritual well-being.
It should address a current trend or problem related to yoga.
Include a brief description of each suggested topic, explaining its relevance and how it can add value to the audience.
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
In addition to this, I also created a specific prompt for academic work topics:
Prompt for generating ideas for academic work topics
Model:
Act as an academic advisor specialized in {{AREA}}, with over 30 years of experience helping students complete their theses or final projects. Your first task is to suggest {{NUMBER}} topics for theses or final projects considering the following requirements:
1. {{METHODOLOGY - e.g., literature review, scientific article, experimental project, reception study, business plan...}}
2. The topic should be interesting, current, and relevant.
3. The field of the topic should be {{AREA}}.
4. Include a concise description of each suggested topic, justifying your choice, suitability, and identified opportunities.
Practical example:
Act as an academic advisor specializing in technology, with over 30 years of experience helping students complete their theses. Your first task is to suggest 10 thesis topics considering the following requirements:
1. Literature review methodology.
2. The topic must be interesting, current, and relevant.
3. The topic area must be technology.
4. Include a concise description of each suggested topic, justifying the reason for your choice, suitability, and identified opportunities.
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
Step 2: Generating the Structure
Now that we have our ideas and defined topics, the next step is to create a detailed structure for the text. This outline serves as a map that will guide the AI in generating content, ensuring that the final text is well-organized and coherent.
Steps to create a good outline
- Define the main objective of your text
- Clarify the purpose of the text and the expected outcome.
- List the main topics
- Identify the main sections that should be covered.
- Detail subtopics for each section
- Divide each main topic into subtopics to cover all relevant aspects.
- Determine the logical order of topics
- Organize the topics and subtopics in a logical and fluid manner.
- Include key points you want to address in each section
- Add essential information that needs to be covered in each part of the text.
Generating an outline with AI
We can use AI itself to generate a detailed outline. Let’s modify the original prompt to focus on creating the structure:
Act as an experienced blogger specializing in yoga, with extensive knowledge in content marketing. The final goal is to write a blog article on the topic: "Benefits of Yoga for Mental Health: How Practice Can Help with Anxiety and Depression."
Be empathetic and inspiring. Write in an accessible way, avoiding technical jargon and explaining concepts simply and friendly. Be positive and encouraging. Be authentic.
Your first task is to generate a detailed outline for the article.
This prompt results in a well-organized structure, starting with the introduction, followed by several detailed sections, and ending with a conclusion.
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
As always, there are other ways and prompts that can be used to generate the outline. Here is a simpler and more direct example:
Act as an experienced blogger specializing in yoga, with extensive knowledge in content marketing.
Generate a detailed outline for a blog article on the topic: "Benefits of Yoga for Mental Health: How Practice Can Help with Anxiety and Depression."
In this example, the focus is entirely on generating the outline, which is the most important at this moment. Later, you can detail tone, style, and other instructions.
And now, before moving on to the next step, it’s ideal to evaluate the generated outline and make improvements. If you master the subject of the text, you can analyze each topic, subtopic, and key points and make the adjustments you deem necessary.
Step 3: Expanding the Structure
Now that we have a well-structured outline, it’s time to expand it to create the complete content. We will generate section by section, ensuring that each part of the text is detailed and coherent. This process may involve creating specific prompts for each section of the article, allowing greater control over the final content.
Let’s start with the following prompt model:
Based on this outline, start writing the article, one part at a time, starting with:
{{SECTION}}
Generating the Introduction
Based on the model presented above, we can generate the introduction:
Based on this outline, start writing the article, one part at a time, starting with:
1. Introduction
- Inspirational Opening:
Start with a motivational quote or a brief personal story about how yoga transformed your life or the life of someone you know.
- Contextualization:
Briefly explain what yoga is and its growing popularity as a wellness practice.
- Purpose of the Article:
Present the purpose of the article: to explore the benefits of yoga for mental health, especially in combating anxiety and depression.
And before proceeding with the next sections, I again highlight the numerous possibilities and customizations that can be made in the above prompt and also in the next ones. Some options that could be included are:
- Expected size:
- 1000 words.
- 2, 3, 4… paragraphs.
- Reinforce desired tone and style.
- Other relevant details and information:
- Request to provide the text formatted with heading tags (H2, H3, H4…), markdown, include lists or tables, etc. (as applicable, according to the section).
- Focus on SEO, using keywords strongly related to the topic.
- And it never hurts to ask to write originally, without plagiarism. And if it includes quotes, always indicate the source.
Generating the Main Sections
After the introduction, let’s proceed with the main sections. Each section should be generated individually. And now, we can adopt some strategies according to our goal and expectation. I, Fabio, named and adopt the following friendly nomenclatures: “Lazy Mode”, “Improved Lazy Mode”, “Incredible Content Mode” and “Exceptional and Memorable Content Mode”.
“Lazy Mode”
If you want to adopt “lazy mode”, all you need to do is tell the AI:
Proceed to the next section.
Thanks to the generated outline, the AI knows what the next section is and will generate the content based on it.
“Improved Lazy Mode”
I recommend that you adopt, at least, “improved lazy mode”, which consists of including the outline excerpt corresponding to the desired section, following the model below:
Proceed to the next section:
{{SECTION}}
This mode is safer than the previous one. See how it would look with section 2 of the article:
Proceed to the next section:
2. What is Yoga?
- Basic Definition:
Define yoga simply, highlighting that it is a practice combining physical postures, breathing techniques, and meditation.
- Brief History:
Mention the origin of yoga in India and its evolution over the centuries.
- Types of Yoga:
Introduce the main types of yoga (Hatha, Vinyasa, Kundalini, etc.) briefly and simply.
Doing this section by section, you will be able to generate a very good text with thousands of words.
“Incredible Content Mode”
If you are not content with a very good result, you may want to activate “incredible content mode”, using the prompt model below:
Proceed to the next section:
{{SECTION}}
{{SPECIFIC INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE SECTION}}
With this prompt, you can provide customized instructions to the AI, section by section. It is especially useful if you master the subject of the text you are writing, as you can guide the model to address some specific topic or ask it to include lists, tables, practical examples, etc.
Still in “incredible content mode”, you can analyze the generated result and make improvements before moving to the next section. But be warned: if the expectation is to generate really giant texts, there is a risk of running out of context window and the AI getting lost (see the solution later in this article).
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
Before proceeding, here is the generated result using “improved lazy mode”:
Here we finish Step 3. To activate “exceptional and memorable content mode”, we need to move to the next step.
Step 4: Use Human Intelligence
Although AI is a powerful tool for generating long texts, integrating human elements is essential to ensure that the content is authentic, engaging, and relevant.
Following the steps so far, we already have an extensive and well-structured text. However, to transform this content into something really “exceptional and memorable”, we need to use our own intelligence. This involves reviewing, refining, and personalizing the text, ensuring that it is not only correct but also interesting and engaging.
Detailed Review
- Carefully Review the Text
- Check Information: Verify that all facts and data are correct. AI can make mistakes or provide outdated information.
- Check Coherence: Ensure that the text makes sense from start to finish, with well-connected ideas.
- Eliminate Redundancies: Remove any unnecessary repetition. Each part of the text should add new information.
- Review Style and Tone
- Consistency: Ensure that the writing style is consistent throughout the text.
- Appropriate for the Audience: The tone should be suitable for your target audience, whether formal or informal.
- Confirm Originality
- Check Plagiarism: Use tools to verify that the content is not a reproduction of existing information. Some good options include Originality.ai, Content at Scale, Paraphaser and Grammarly.
- Detect AI-Generated Content: Tools like GPTZero, Crossplag and some already mentioned above can help identify parts of the text that seem AI-generated, allowing adjustments to make them more natural.
Reformulation and Addition of Content
- Rewrite Parts of the Text
- Identify Areas for Improvement: Find points that can be improved or need more details.
- Add Examples and Stories: Make the text more engaging with practical examples and relevant stories.
- Add Personal Opinions
- Complement the Text: If you have knowledge on the subject, include your own opinions and insights. This adds a personal and unique touch to the text.
“Exceptional and Memorable Content Mode” successfully activated
Following this step-by-step guide, you will transform an AI-generated text into exceptional and memorable content. Remember, the key is continuous iteration and refinement, using your own intelligence to complement what the AI generated.
Bonus Tips
To further enrich your content and make it visually appealing, you can use AI to suggest and generate images. Additionally, you can request more information at any time and deepen your content.
Here are some useful prompts for this:
Suggesting Images
To get suggestions for images that can illustrate your article, you can use the following prompt:
Can you suggest a cover image for this article and ideas for images to illustrate the body of the article?
Generated Result:
(using ChatGPT 4o, translated from the original in Portuguese)
In addition to the image suggestions, ChatGPT (Plus version) automatically generated the cover image, see the result:
Generating Images with AI
After getting the suggestions, you can ask AI to provide a specific prompt to generate each image. I suggest the following model as a base:
Provide me with a prompt that I can use to generate this image:
{{DESCRIPTION}}
Deepening the Content
Use the following prompts to deepen your content:
Ask for elaborations:
Explain the concept of {{TOPIC}} in more detail.
Request examples:
Provide three practical examples of {{CONCEPT}} in action.
Explore different angles:
Address {{TOPIC}} from the {{ECONOMIC/SOCIAL/TECHNOLOGICAL...}} perspective.
Common Problems and Solutions
Now let’s look at two common problems that can happen during the process of creating long texts covered in this article and possible solutions.
Loss of Context
One of the biggest difficulties in generating long texts with AI is the loss of context. Language AIs, like ChatGPT, have a limited memory capacity, meaning that as the text extends, they can start to forget important information mentioned earlier. This can lead to inconsistent or repetitive responses.
Strategies to Avoid Loss of Context
- Create a Detailed Outline
- As we saw in previous steps, having a well-structured outline helps the AI stay focused on each specific section, avoiding loss of context.
- Generate Text in Parts
- Generate the text section by section, as described in the article. This helps the AI maintain focus and consistency.
- Reinforce the Progress Made
- Another strategy is to keep reminding the AI of the progress made. This can be done with a prompt like:
Continuing the text on {{TOPIC}}, remembering that we have already covered {{MAIN POINTS}}, now develop {{NEXT TOPIC}}.
- Summarize Main Points Periodically
- Ask the AI to summarize the main points covered so far before continuing to the next section.
Before moving on to the next section, summarize our progress and the main points covered so far.
Recovering Lost Context
If the AI loses context and starts generating inconsistent responses, you can try to recover the context by following these steps:
- Start a New Chat
- Send the outline using a prompt like:
"""{{INSERT THE OUTLINE}}"""
The above is the outline of a blog article I am writing on the topic {{TOPIC}}.
Before continuing, confirm that you understood up to this point.
- Attach the text that has already been generated before using a prompt like:
Now I am attaching a part of this article that is already ready.
Analyze the attachment and the previously sent outline and perform the following task: continue writing the article, one part at a time, starting with:
{{SECTION}}
{{SPECIFIC INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE ARTICLE OR SECTION}}
Following these steps, you will be able to continue generating the text with coherence and consistency, from the point where the context was lost.
End of Free Usage
Using AI tools in the free version can be extremely useful, but it also brings some limitations. One of the most common is the end of free usage after a certain number of interactions or usage time, which can interrupt your workflow.
Strategies to Overcome Limitations
- Divide the Work into Sessions
- Plan your work sessions with the AI to maximize the use of free time. Divide the content that needs to be generated into smaller parts that can be completed within the interaction limit.
- For example, if you know that the AI has a limit of 25 free interactions per day, plan to generate each section of the text in sessions that use up to 25 prompts.
- Use Free Alternatives
- There are several AI tools available that offer similar functionalities. If one tool reaches its free limit, you can switch to another.
- Each of these tools has its own limitations and advantages, so it is useful to be familiar with several options. See suggestions in the article: Discover 7 Free Alternatives to ChatGPT for AI Innovation.
- Create Multiple Accounts
- Another strategy is to create more than one account on the AI tool you are using. This can allow you to continue your work without interruptions, switching between accounts when one reaches the limit.
Conclusion
Generating long and high-quality texts with the help of artificial intelligence can be challenging, but it is perfectly possible with the right strategies and techniques. In this article, we explored a detailed step-by-step guide to creating extensive and coherent content using AI, from generating ideas to the final review.
Now that you have all the tools and strategies, it’s time to put them into practice. Try the prompts, follow the detailed steps in this article, and watch your long texts become more structured and high-quality. With dedication and attention to detail, you will be able to produce exceptional and memorable content with the help of artificial intelligence.
If this article was helpful to you, share the link with others who can also benefit from these tips and techniques. Keep exploring and improving your AI content creation skills.