Stop writing prompts from scratch. Use patterns.

Hey,

Most people write every prompt from scratch, like they’re reinventing the wheel each time they open ChatGPT. That’s why the results are so inconsistent, one prompt slaps, the next is mush, and you can’t figure out why.

The fix isn’t being more clever. It’s having a few reliable structures you reuse. Good prompters aren’t typing magic spells, they’re plugging their topic into patterns that work every time. Today I’ll give you a few of the ones I use daily.

IN THIS EMAIL

» Why patterns beat one-off prompts » Three patterns you can use today » Where to grab the full set

🧠 Why patterns win

A pattern is just a reusable shape for a prompt. Instead of starting from a blank line and hoping, you drop your specific topic into a structure that’s already proven to pull a good answer out of the model.

The benefit is consistency. When you write from scratch, your results swing wildly depending on your mood and how clearly you happened to phrase things. When you use a pattern, you get the same high floor every time, because the structure is doing the heavy lifting, not your in-the-moment wording. It’s the difference between cooking from a recipe and just throwing things in a pan.

🔧 Three to use today

The role pattern. Don’t ask a question into the void, assign an expert first. “You’re a senior [role] with 10 years of experience. [Your question].” You’re telling the model which slice of its knowledge to pull from. Same question, sharper answer.

The example pattern (few-shot). Show, don’t just tell. If you want output in a certain style, paste one or two examples of what “good” looks like before you ask. “Here are two headlines I love: [examples]. Write me five more in that exact style.” The model is a world-class mimic, give it something to mimic.

The step-by-step pattern. For anything with reasoning, add “think through this step by step before giving your answer.” It stops the model from blurting a fast, shallow response and makes it actually work through the problem. The quality jump on complex questions is genuinely big.

Each of these is a structure, not a one-off. Learn the shape once, use it forever.

🔒 Grab the full set

These three are just a taste. I put all of my go-to patterns into a free resource you can keep open in a tab and copy from while you work:

→ 10 Prompt Patterns That Always Work

Bookmark it, and the next time you’re about to write a prompt from scratch, check if there’s a pattern for it first. There usually is.

This week: pick one of the three above and use it five times. Patterns only stick once they’re muscle memory.

• László

P.S. If your business wants its best prompts and workflows captured into a system the whole team can use, instead of living in one person’s head, that’s what we build at Growth Lab Studios. Start here.

P.P.S. Want the back catalog? Every past issue lives in the newsletter archive.