Almost a year ago I started building my personal brand on LinkedIn.
I joined as a writer and wanted to build momentum there.
During that time, I’d flirt with some AI tools.
I’d try some weirdly amazing stuff with ChatGPT.
I loved what it was capable of.
I loved how it would help my creativity when I’d write.
It was stealing more of my attention.
But I had one problem with it.
Losing track of what was chatted.
Every chat was limited to a few exchanges.
And after that, it would start everything from scratch.
I even tried to play a chess game with ChatGPT.
But it would forget what moves I made after a few tries.
It was a challenge to do many other things too.
The point I’m going to make here is that ChatGPT didn’t have memory.
It was until a few days ago.
ChatGPT got smarter.
It can now keep things in the brain.
And not only in the same chat but in the entire model.
When you tell it one thing in one chat, it will remember it in another one too.
Yeah. It seems small but it’s a huge thing.
This will change the way we use AI.
It’s like you hire a mini-assistant.
That keeps in mind everything you tell it to.
And you can ask it anytime you want.
It will change the way you write with it and also avoid repetitive explanations in the prompts.
“So yeah how does that work?”
Here’s how to use the ChatGPT memory feature:
Setting up the memory settings
The very first thing you should do is turn on the memory in ChatGPT.
Look at the screenshot below.
Click your profile picture in the upper right corner of the ChatGPT tab.
Click on Settings and then Personalization.
You’ll see a “Settings” box.
Before everything, turn on the memory toggle.
Memory will automatically work once you address it in your prompt.
i.e. “Remember X”, “Keep this in mind”.
The red arrow shows the custom instructions you might’ve heard of.
It’s one of the best ways to set rules and instructions for it.
And everything ChatGPT keeps in its memory will be kept in a certain place.
A place where you can always access and manage.
You can always add or remove anything you want.
Everything sent to its memory will be there.
And that place is the Manage option above the blue arrow.
After you click on “Manage”, it will show the box in the screenshot below.
The interesting thing?
ChatGPT will keep everything in mind once you tell it to.
You can provide details of who you are.
Or you can tell it what tone of voice you use while writing.
All it takes is a request.
Let’s go through that in details.
Let’s train ChatGPT on its memory
Imagine you tell a human what to always keep in mind.
You tell him to always use a specific word when he speaks.
You don’t need to tell him that every single time.
The same now goes with ChatGPT.
You just prompt it with a specific rule of thumb and it will always follow that.
Watch how I put something into its memory.
The prompt I used is:
”I want you to keep this in your memory that every time I write "$post" I want you to take the text after it and write a LinkedIn post out of it. I want you to write it at the reading level of a 4th-grade level student. Always include a headline and a subheading with a strong CTA. Make the sentences one-liners. After each sentence, add a double-enter space. Avoid hardly pronounced words and slang.”
One thing to look for is the “Memory updated” option.
If it shows up, the details are kept in the memory.
If you click that option, it will show you all the memory we previously discussed.
From now on, ChatGPT will act upon what is said in this prompt.
And even interesting, it wouldn’t be limited to only this chat.
It will rather work in every new chat that I open.
Let me open a new chat to test it.
Check out this screenshot.
The chat followed all the instructions that I provided in the previous one.
And pay closer attention to how I used the “$post” to remind its memory.
This is a major update to ChatGPT.
You can even train one chat on certain rules.
And then always use that chat for that specific task.
I’m sure this will bring very new opportunities.
And I’ll be coming up with some.
Did you hear about the new ChatGPT 4o version?
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