Ask Wudpecker allows you to unlock more insights from meetings beyond the summary. But in order to do that in the best way, we have to know how to communicate well with AI.
The questions or actions that you give to the chat on Ask Wudpecker are called prompts. The answers that you receive are called responses.
For example:
Prompt: What was the deadline for the report?
Response: The deadline for the report is next Wednesday.
Ask Wudpecker is like a ChatGPT chat for your meetings, but it already knows the context of the discussions.
What if the response is not what I wanted?
Try a different prompt, and you might get surprised by the new results! AI is very capable but sometimes you need to go through trial and error to correctly nudge it in the right direction.
Remember, however, that AI can make mistakes. If you’d like to double check where Ask Wudpecker got its information, use the Sources feature.
Tips for Writing Prompts
You can talk to AI like a person, even though it might feel counter-intuitive. Here’s what it means in practice.
1) Be specific
Write whole sentences and mention names.
Using whole sentences and mentioning names provides clarity and precision in your request. This allows the AI to understand exactly what information you need and who it pertains to, resulting in more accurate and relevant responses.
Don’t do this ❌
feedback
Do this ✅
What was Acme's feedback regarding our platform?
Provide context.
It’s more likely that AI will give you useless answers if you don’t limit the context. To minimize the amount of prompts you need to write, explain what you need to do with the information.
Don’t do this ❌
prospect needs
Do this ✅
Create a proposal that addresses the needs and pain points the prospect mentioned. Under each, list solutions we can provide.
2) Keep it simple.
Break down a complex prompt into multiple requests.
Sometimes, if you want comprehensive answers, you need to have separate prompts. This ensures that each query is addressed thoroughly and clearly. Note: if you’re okay with a more succinct answer, it is of course okay to list a bunch of different questions in the same prompt, if that works for you!
Don’t do this ❌
What challenges and achievements did Mike mention and what are his next steps?
Do this ✅
What challenges or obstacles were brought up by Mike?
What achievements did Mike mention?
What are the next steps for Mike?
Don’t write too much.
Try to keep your prompts under 4,000 characters (650-700 words), and make sure they are clear and simple.
Don’t do this ❌
Could you please provide an in-depth and detailed explanation of what the interviewee mentioned, elaborated on, and discussed regarding their design philosophy, including, but not limited to, any specific principles they follow, their approach to user-centric design, and how they integrate user feedback into their design process?
Do this ✅
What did the interviewee mention about their design philosophy?
3) Describe the structure and tone
There are many ways to control the output layout of AI insights. Here are some examples:
“each section should have at least 3 bullet points”
“don’t include small talk”
“Make 4 headings, and name them “A”, “B”, “C” and “D”. Under each, include bullet points of details about that heading”
“add a table at the end with action items, responsible people, and deadlines”
“Write from my point of view, like “I mentioned” instead of “Alex mentioned””
“Write in this format: [paste example text here]”
“make it informal in US English”
Technical Background
Ask Wudpecker is powered by Gemini 1.5. This newest version of Gemini has a context memory of 1 million tokens, so hallucinations aren’t as likely as before and the AI knows to take the whole chat as context for the next queries. In simple terms, this means that you can ask separate, consecutive questions and AI can connect the dots.
User: Did Jenny find our platform easy to use?
AI: Jenny mentioned that she found the platform user-friendly and intuitive.
User: What about the competitor’s?
AI: Jenny noted that the competitor's platform was less intuitive and had a steeper learning curve compared to ours.
Note: this only applies to a single Ask Wudpecker chat in a single call. If you give a prompt in one call and then go to another, the second chat is not connected to the first one and its history or context.
The secret with perfecting AI prompts is to give just enough information that Ai doesn’t get confused but also not too little that it doesn’t understand the purpose and context of your request.
More Examples
We’ve covered practical examples of prompt to use in specific use cases in these blogs.
Prompts for…
Provide Feedback
Got any feedback regarding Ask Wudpecker? We’d be happy to hear, so we can make it even better. Please leave a message for us by clicking on Help on Wudpecker’s browser application.