Tables: The Most Underutilized AI Prompt
If you liked it, then you should’ve used a table with it.
We have all suffered the never-ending PowerPoint presentation, squinting at a sea of 10-point font, wondering if we accidentally signed up for an eye exam. Our brains check out before we even reach the second bullet point. Don’t let that happen to you, and try my “give it to me in a table” prompt. Let’s do it!
My top 3 tables and prompts 3️⃣
I regularly use the following tables to reduce content fatigue:
⚖️ The pros and cons table compares options clearly and concisely.
🔢 The decision matrix table compares products, services, or decision options.
⚠️ The risk and impact table ranks financial, operational, regulatory, or other risks by severity.
Let’s create a pros-and-cons table! ⚖️
A pros-and-cons table is perfect for fast decision-making. It cuts through the noise to show what matters.
Consider this: You run a sales organization and have found a niche in creating high-quality slides that attract new customers. Your team is all over the place using different apps to make the slides, so we want to standardize. Let’s have AI create a pros-and-cons table for the most popular apps.
💡 I will have the AI create a rigid table design for this prompt so it reads well for my newsletter. You can play around with the formatting by modifying the prompt. First, let’s run the prompt, and then I will share some additional ideas.
Prompt: I am conducting a competitive analysis of products that offer great slide-creation and sharing experiences. Some slides will be shared directly with customers, others on our website. Analyze options from Google, Microsoft, and Canva. Put the pros and cons in a table, using an emoji checkbox and emoji x for each feature. List the top 10 features only. Use one word for the feature and no more than two for each product.
AI Response: [see image]
As you can see, the pros-and-cons table effectively analyzes the products at a high level. Of course, I will still have to drill down into each product to decide, but this is a great starting point.
Here are some use cases where you might want to use a pros-and-cons table:
🚀 Plan a product launch to evaluate feasibility, cost, and market readiness before committing resources.
💰 Evaluate budget options by comparing spending priorities to optimize your financial objectives.
🔍 Assess insurance plans to compare features, flexibility, and cost.
The decision matrix table 🔢
Planning a vacation sounds fun until you are knee-deep in tabs, comparing flights, hotels, and ‘must-see’ spots that blur together to the point you consider staying home.
We face the same kind of decision overload at work, ending up in endless back-and-forth messages that feel like we are flipping a coin to make decisions. Why not take a more thoughtful approach? A decision matrix table helps you cut through the chaos, weigh your options logically, and make more objective decisions.
The scenario: You are a marketing executive at a global toy brand and work in the puzzles division. You must make critical budget decisions based on various marketing channels. You want AI to help you build a decision matrix table to weigh the value for each channel.
Prompt: You are a marketing executive who understands global brands that sell board games. Create a decision matrix table to compare five marketing channels: Social Media Ads, Influencer Marketing, Email Marketing, Content Marketing, and Paid Search. You will weigh each channel based on its value to my particular business. Provide a title for the table and list the top 3 options.
AI Response: [see image]
Here are some other ideas for decision matrix tables you might find helpful:
📦 Manage supplier options by comparing pricing, reliability, and lead times.
🆕 Prioritize new product proposals by evaluating projected ROI, market demand, and resource requirements.
🎓 Choose a training program by measuring skill impact, time commitment, and employee satisfaction.
🤝 Determine partnership opportunities by reviewing brand alignment, legal considerations, and potential audience reach.
The risk and impact table ⚠️
Nobody likes surprises, so that is where risk and impact tables come in. They help you spot problems before they burst unknowingly into the scene.
The scenario: You are a homebuilder in Central Florida and want to know the risks of building before making a financial decision. You require a risk mitigation strategy to help in the decision-making process.
Prompt: I am a homebuilder in Central Florida. I am looking to purchase land and build a 50-home community center. Create a top 5 risk and impact table to help me make informed financial decisions. Provide a title at the top that lists the highest potential risk. Provide the output in a markdown table. Label each risk with a unique identifier, like R1, R2, etc.
Here are some use cases where a risk impact table might come in handy for your business:
📉 Sales and Marketing can pinpoint misaligned campaigns, enabling quick strategy adjustments.
🕵️♂️ Finance can highlight potential budget overruns and fraud with mitigation controls.
🚚 Operations can identify supply chain disruptions early and define contingency plans, such as supplier diversification.
🏢 Human Resources can flag high turnover risks and identify retention strategies and cost-efficient recruitment practices.
☁️ Information Technology can identify vulnerabilities in cloud infrastructure with mitigations like swifter response times and advanced security protocols.
Pro tip: Add tables to your initial prompt ✅
When you prompt AI and know the results will require you to scroll through a large text corpus, try telling the AI to put it in a table.
Here is an open-ended prompt that will deliver a densely packed-response:
Open-ended AI Prompt: List the best places to hold a conference in San Francisco in the fall.
AI Response: [see image]
Instead, try this prompt:
Improved AI Prompt with a table: List the best places to hold a conference in San Francisco in the fall. Provide the top 5 in a table with a URL, venue name, and their capacity.
AI response as a table: [see image]
Happy tabling! 🎉📊