Your Search engine optimisation information to the ChatGPT API

ChatGPT introduced the rollout of its API (GPT 3.5 Turbo) on March 1. 

I’m bullish on ChatGPT’s utility for a number of totally different Search engine optimisation-related capabilities like key phrase analysis, native Search engine optimisation, content material, and hyperlink constructing. Having spent a lot time utilizing ChatGPT, I’m additionally painfully conscious of its limitations.

Whereas the API received’t be a panacea (and the net interface is definitely a lot better for some duties), it may possibly assist tackle among the shortcomings of the net interface.

This text will present you the way to maximize ChatGPT’s API with particular Search engine optimisation use circumstances.

Find out how to use the ChatGPT API

To leverage the ChatGPT API, you want to have the ability to entry the API within the first place. ChatGPT’s guardian firm OpenAI has intensive documentation for utilizing the API.

When you’re trying to study extra about constructing a device or interacting straight with the API there’s additionally a very good walk-through right here.

You may also use AppsScript to question the ChatGPT API in Google Sheets, which we’ll stroll by right here step-by-step.

No matter your method, you’ll want to start out by getting an API key.

Getting your ChatGPT API key

Upon getting an OpenAI account, you may generate your API key both by following this hyperlink whereas logged in or clicking View API keys within the profile dropdown:

Then click on Create new secret key.

Copy the API key you generated.

Connecting the ChatGPT API to Google Sheets

There’s an easy option to join ChatGPT to Google Sheets (h/t Keith Mint).

First, create a brand new Google Sheet, then click on on Extensions and select Apps Script:

You then paste the next code (along with your API key instead of YOUR API KEY):

const SECRET_KEY = "YOUR API KEY";
const MAX_TOKENS = 800;
const TEMPERATURE = 0.9;

operate AI_ChatGPT(immediate, temperature = 0.4, mannequin = "gpt-3.5-turbo") {
  const url = "https://api.openai.com/v1/chat/completions";
  const payload = {
    mannequin: mannequin,
    messages: [
      { role: "system", content: "You are a helpful assistant." },
      { role: "user", content: prompt },
    ],
    temperature: TEMPERATURE,
    max_tokens: MAX_TOKENS,
  };
  const choices = {
    contentType: "utility/json",
    headers: { Authorization: "Bearer " + SECRET_KEY },
    payload: JSON.stringify(payload),
  };
  const res = JSON.parse(UrlFetchApp.fetch(url, choices).getContentText());
  return res.decisions[0].message.content material.trim();
}

Click on save inside Apps Script:

Then you should utilize the next operate format to use a immediate to a cell:

=AI_ChatGPT("YOUR PROMPT HERE")

As Mint factors out in his article, you can even reference a cell if you wish to have a number of cells use prompts that refer again to at least one cell (just like the title or matter of a weblog put up):

Within the instance above, I used easy prompts just like the one pictured, then created a second paragraph for this matter. (We’ll stroll by extra particular purposes for the API shortly.) 

ChatGPT API pricing

Earlier than you begin leveraging the ChatGPT API for Search engine optimisation duties, it’s important to know the pricing.

The worth for the gpt-3.5-turbo API (the ChatGPT API) is $0.002 per 1,000 tokens, which is 10x cheaper than the prevailing GPT-3.5 API.

To higher perceive what the pricing really winds up trying like, you might want to perceive how tokens work.

ChatGPT API tokens

OpenAI has a good breakdown and a useful free tokenizer device that will help you decide what number of tokens a selected textual content can be and the way the textual content is damaged down (in case you might want to scale back the variety of tokens for a immediate or response).

A number of key issues to remember:

• By default, the API can return a most of 4,096 tokens.
• Tokens are a illustration of how a lot textual content your immediate and response are. This can be a key issue, as longer prompts can shorten your response output.
• Textual content is translated into tokens and roughly breaks all the way down to round 4 characters in English.

OpenAI additionally offered this beneficial breakdown of how tokens are calculated from textual content:

• 1 token ~= 4 chars in English
• 1 token ~= ¾ phrases
• 100 tokens ~= 75 phrases

Or

• 1-2 sentence ~= 30 tokens
• 1 paragraph ~= 100 tokens
• 1,500 phrases ~= 2048 tokens

To get extra context on how tokens stack up, contemplate this:

• Wayne Gretzky’s quote, “You miss 100% of the pictures you don’t take,” comprises 11 tokens.
• OpenAI’s constitution comprises 476 tokens.
• The transcript of the U.S. Declaration of Independence comprises 1,695 tokens.

So in case you used a brief immediate to generate a 1,500-word article, it might be lower than half a cent.

Particular API use circumstances for Search engine optimisation

The API may also help with a variety of the identical Search engine optimisation-related duties because the ChatGPT internet interface, however the two have some important variations, making some duties higher for one than the opposite.

Understanding that can provide help to decide which to make use of for Search engine optimisation duties.

ChatGPT API vs. internet interface

The most important variations embody the next:

Scale and bulk duties

If you wish to combine ChatGPT with an present utility or spreadsheet, you will want to make use of the API. 

Moreover, the API can be your pal if you wish to carry out a selected operate utilized throughout a number of cases (e.g., generate meta descriptions for a number of key phrases).

Tremendous-tuning and relationship between prompts

Presently, ChatGPT’s API doesn’t help fine-tuning. When you create a number of prompts by the API, they will not have a relationship. 

You may create a system message to use to a number of prompts and responses, however OpenAI has stated that these are incessantly at present ignored by the gpt-3.5-turbo API. 

This implies when you have a process that requires a number of prompts and for ChatGPT to maintain the context of a whole dialog, you will need to use the net interface.

Character limits

The API has a token restrict of 4,096 which interprets to round 16,384 characters per interplay for every immediate and response. 

Character limits for the net interface can fluctuate, however typically, the immediate and response are restricted to round 2,048 characters, or 4,096. 

So for duties that require extra intensive prompts or extra important responses, the API can be a greater possibility. 

There are additionally extra choices for structuring prompts and duties in a means that offers you a lengthier mixed output in case you’re utilizing code slightly than one thing just like the Google Sheets integration.

Pricing 

Once more, the API is priced by utilization (and presents a free trial with $18 value of tokens), and the net interface at present presents a free model and a $20/mo. paid model. 

Instance ChatGPT API prompts

Let us take a look at particular use circumstances the place you’d need to contemplate the API over the net interface.

Title tags and meta descriptions

An apparent use case the place the API is sensible is having ChatGPT generate title tags or meta descriptions at scale.

You should use related prompts to people who work within the internet interface right here, however in case you construction them correctly and lay out your spreadsheet proper, you may take the primary immediate after which shortly apply that to a number of URLs or key phrases: 

Word that the free plan significantly is price restricted, so you will have errors the place the cells day trip, by which case you might want to delete and re-paste:

And as all the time, remember the fact that:

• ChatGPT cannot crawl the net, so it is both utilizing prior information of a URL from the coaching interval or an assumption in regards to the URL based mostly on phrases within the URL to generate strategies
• ChatGPT’s output can typically be flawed or deceptive and must be edited.

You should use this similar format for title tags. (I will have an article focusing particularly on utilizing ChatGPT to generate and replace title tags popping out quickly).

Longer content material and put up outlines

You should use the net interface in ChatGPT to create chunks of content material and descriptions fairly simply.

If you wish to make an extended article or if you are going to create a collection of outlines on totally different subjects, nevertheless, it may be a clunky expertise.

The API is smoother for these duties.

First, you may chunk off a put up you wrote into sections. Then line up the sections and pull your immediate down:

Alternatively, you would have ChatGPT generate a number of outlines that you simply then have a author (or writers) fill in:

Then, you would have the API write the content material one part at a time:

Once more, right here you would take these prompts, load them one after the other throughout the define (altering every immediate for the suitable part), after which simply pull the identical formulation throughout a number of outlines and have a variety of textual content particular to the subsections of every put up generated.

My expertise is that this helps you keep away from token limits, and even pedestrian prompts just like the one above mixed with having ChatGPT create an overview will generate higher content material than in case you ask the device to “write a weblog put up.” 

Past that, you may additional enhance content material high quality by doing issues like:

• Ask it to incorporate particular phrases (both since you need them on the web page otherwise you need to add inner hyperlinks for that phrase).
• Feed it statistics or quotes to work into particular sections of the put up. (That is significantly useful when you have a subject that requires up-to-date ways and statistics, provided that GPT-3 was not educated on current information.)
• Tweak your prompts to output the tone and formatting you need (extra on this shortly).

And, as all the time, layer on human modifying.

FAQs

There are a number of FAQ-related capabilities the API may also help with.

First off, you may generate an inventory of FAQ inquiries to be related to a weblog put up:

Subsequent, you may have the ChatGPT API reply these (once more: proceed with warning in terms of output high quality and accuracy):

Schema

You may also have ChatGPT generate schemas for you throughout a number of pages. 

On this case, we are able to apply FAQ schema to the FAQs it created for us:

Convert content material to HTML

One other cool use case for ChatGPT is to transform textual content to HTML. 

First, let’s convert our put up from textual content to HTML:

A number of issues to notice right here:

• As you may see, the headers in every part have been initially formatted with paragraph tags. I mounted this within the immediate by including, “Format the header of the part as an h2, and another headlines on this part as an h3.”
• I wasn’t in a position to mix the whole put up (which was round 1100 phrases) into one cell to be transformed to HTML, so I needed to chunk it off and gave particular directions in my immediate for every cell to verify ChatGPT did not layer within the formatting for a whole HTML doc in each cell.
• You may additionally get some wonky formatting, like extra quotes you did not count on within the output. 

As with all features of ChatGPT, hold refining your prompts and all the time examine the output.

Add inner hyperlinks

Now that we’ve got our put up in HTML, we are able to begin to do some cool issues with inner linking.

We are able to inform ChatGPT so as to add inner hyperlinks from particular phrases to particular pages anyplace within the HTML we simply generated:

If we have been making a cluster of pages, we might create guidelines particular to every web page and apply them to the related HTML.

This fashion, every part we generate is interlinked the best way we would like, the HTML is able to go, and the FAQ schema is added appropriately.

I attempted to create a rule that was somewhat extra sophisticated, asking ChatGPT to hyperlink phrases. Here’s what I added to my immediate:

• “Any time you see the phrases making and snicker inside 5 phrases of one another, create a hyperlink with these two phrases and the entire phrases in between them to standupexperience.com/make-them-laugh.”

Right here is the hyperlink that was added:

That is not what I requested for, and likewise, it did not hyperlink each occasion of stand-up as I requested it to.

I will have to refine my prompts and examine my outputs.

Outreach templates

When you’re reaching out to a number of locations for hyperlink outreach or visitor put up placements, you should utilize the ChatGPT API to create a number of outreach templates for you:

When you have totally different sorts of templates, get inventive with making use of these prompts throughout totally different outreach targets.

Utilizing the net interface and the API in tandem (a.okay.a., carry your prompts)

Two issues are true:

• The API is healthier for bigger tasks and performs many prompts concurrently.
• The net interface is incessantly higher at getting you to a superb output since you may travel with ChatGPT to provide context, assessment the output, present suggestions, and so forth.

One option to get the most effective of each worlds is to create your immediate within the internet interface after which apply it to a number of objects by way of the API.

Let us take a look at a selected instance from this put up. My inner linking immediate did not work by way of the API. It is difficult to troubleshoot by way of the API as a result of you may’t give ChatGPT suggestions or ask why the immediate failed.

Enter, immediate era by way of the net!

My typical ChatGPT course of is to: 

• Give it chunks of context.
• Verify for understanding. 
• Evaluation the output for errors and provides it extra suggestions to realize my desired outcome.

To have the ability to do that for inner linking guidelines, let’s begin with the net interface to scrub up our ChatGPT immediate.

First, I need to give ChatGPT some context. (Bear in mind: ChatGPT does not learn about its personal API!) 

I need to give it details about the API, share the HTML I am beginning with, share the immediate I used, and share the output I received after which ask ChatGPT to diagnose the problem and rewrite the immediate for me.

Let’s have a look at the way it goes:

When you do not pre-empt it, ChatGPT will repeatedly interrupt you to fireplace (incessantly irrelevant) solutions and strategies (like an keen pupil who did not do the studying).

I copied and pasted the textual content from this web page in 4 prompts, the HTML I used to be making an attempt so as to add hyperlinks to, the total Sheets operate I might used, and the output I might gotten.

Subsequent, I lastly shared the problem with the output:

After which ChatGPT mounted the immediate for me.

Nicely, it wasn’t really mounted.

ChatGPT is relentlessly well mannered even in case you’re getting a bit testy, and once I shared the immediate, it analyzed it for me:

The strategies on HTML measurement are good ones, however I used to be nonetheless getting the error:

This time, the immediate labored!

To deal with the max tokens subject, I can go to Apps Script to regulate that quantity:

Or clearly, if I am not utilizing Sheets, it isn’t prone to be a difficulty (till I hit the 4096 tokens).

Get inventive and search for options

Search engine optimisation purposes for the ChatGPT API go properly past what’s listed right here. 

When you’re looking out for tactics to make use of the platform and may get inventive you will discover many extra purposes like:

• Programmatic options: You may transcend Google Sheets to seek out thrilling and scalable makes use of for the ChatGPT API.
• Combining a number of APIs: Take into consideration the way you may have the ability to use the ChatGPT API in unison with APIs like Google Search Console, Ahrefs, Semrush or related. What issues do you need to remedy? 
• Extra environment friendly or higher workflows: Take inventory of the duties you and your group full day by day. Are there objects that ChatGPT’s API might be able to both permit you to just do as properly however extra effectively, or to enhance your work product round?

With the current launch of GPT-4, extra alternatives for leveraging the platform will possible proceed to crop up.