ChatGPT Custom Instructions: Examples for Creators
ChatGPT custom instructions are a short standing brief that ChatGPT reads before every new chat: who you are, and how you want it to answer. You set them under Personalization in ChatGPT’s settings. For a creator, good instructions cover your audience, your voice in a few concrete rules, and the formats you write most. Keep the rest (offers, client details, long examples) somewhere ChatGPT can look up when it needs it.
Below are examples you can copy and edit, then the line where instructions stop being the right tool.
What do custom instructions do?
They add your text to the start of every new conversation, so you don’t type “I run a newsletter for freelance designers, keep it casual” each time. They apply across chats, while a project’s instructions apply only inside that project.
Custom instructions are not memory. ChatGPT’s memory is the list of facts it saves about you as you talk. Instructions are what you wrote on purpose, and they stay as written until you change them. ChatGPT memory full covers the memory side.
There’s a character limit, and it has changed over time and by plan. Check the counter in your settings, and assume short beats long either way: a tight brief gets followed, a long one gets diluted.
What should a creator put in custom instructions?
Answer the two questions the settings ask, in plain sentences.
About you: what you make, for whom, and where it’s published.
How to respond: voice rules you can check, the formats you need, and what to never do.
Rules you can check work better than adjectives. “Friendly and professional” means nothing to a model. “Short sentences, no exclamation marks, never start with a question” does.
What are good ChatGPT custom instructions examples?
These are made-up profiles that show the shape. Copy one, then replace every detail with yours.
Newsletter writer
About me: I write a weekly newsletter for freelance designers about pricing and clients. Readers are 3 to 10 years into freelancing.
How to respond: Write like a peer, not a coach. Short paragraphs, one idea each. Use concrete numbers when I give them; never invent stats. No “In today’s world” openers, no emoji, no hashtags.
Short-form video creator
About me: I make 30 to 60 second videos on home cooking for busy parents, posted on TikTok and Reels.
How to respond: Scripts start with the hook in under 8 words. Spoken style: contractions, no lists read aloud. Give 3 hook options before the script. Mark on-screen text in brackets.
Solo marketer for a small business
About me: I’m the only marketer at a 6-person bakery. We post on Instagram and send a monthly email.
How to respond: Warm, local, specific to food. Never use “indulge” or “elevate”. Captions under 60 words. Always end emails with one clear action.
Ghostwriter with several clients
About me: I ghostwrite LinkedIn posts for founders.
How to respond: Ask me which client a post is for before writing. Don’t carry one client’s style into another’s post.
That last one shows the limit. Instructions are one block for every chat, so they can’t hold three clients’ voices at once. AI for ghostwriters covers how to keep clients apart.
What should you leave out?
| Put in custom instructions | Keep elsewhere |
|---|---|
| Your role and audience in two sentences | Full brand voice guide with examples |
| Five to eight checkable voice rules | Offer details, prices, proof |
| Formats you write every week | Client-by-client briefs |
| Hard “never do” rules | Past decisions and content plans |
| Passwords, keys, private client data |
The left column changes rarely and applies to everything. The right column is long, changes often or only matters for some chats. Squeezing it into instructions is how you hit the limit and get vaguer answers.
For the voice guide itself, Brand voice guide for AI has a template, and How to make ChatGPT remember your brand voice compares instructions, memory, projects and custom GPTs.
When are custom instructions not enough?
Three common cases:
- More than one brand. One set of instructions can’t switch voices cleanly. Projects help inside ChatGPT, and managing multiple brands with AI covers the wider setup.
- More than one AI. ChatGPT’s instructions stay in ChatGPT. Claude has its own preferences field, Cursor has its rules, and you end up maintaining three copies. Share memory between Claude and ChatGPT shows how to keep one copy instead.
- Long reference material. Offers, past posts and research don’t fit, and they shouldn’t. They belong in notes the assistant searches when the chat needs them.
In those cases, keep instructions short and add one line: “Before writing, search my notes for the voice and offer of the brand I name.” With a notes vault connected to ChatGPT, that line does the heavy lifting.
FAQ
Where are custom instructions in ChatGPT?
In Settings, under Personalization. Projects have their own instructions field, inside each project.
Do custom instructions apply to old chats?
Plan for new chats. Start a fresh conversation after you change them, so you know the new version is the one being read.
What’s the difference between custom instructions and memory?
You write custom instructions on purpose, and they stay fixed. Memory is what ChatGPT saves about you from conversations, and it changes as you talk.
Can I use different custom instructions for different clients?
Not at the account level; there’s one set. Use a project per client, or keep each client’s brief in a separate notes vault and point ChatGPT at the right one.
Where Valta fits
Valta is a vault of Markdown notes with an MCP server. Connect it to ChatGPT as a custom connector, and to Claude, Cursor or VS Code too, and each one can search and save the same notes. Your instructions stay short; the voice guide, offers and client briefs live in notes. No AI runs on Valta’s side: ChatGPT writes, Valta keeps and links the notes.
Free gives you 1 vault and up to 100 notes. Pro, at $9 a month or $90 a year, gives you up to 5 vaults. Each vault has its own connector URL that opens only that vault, so a client’s brief can’t turn up in another client’s chat. Pro starts with a 14-day free trial, then that price; cancel before it ends and you pay nothing. There’s no AI bill inside Valta to pass on, because ChatGPT does the thinking. See the pricing section.
Start your free vault and move your voice guide out of the instructions box.