I’m thinking that AI applications like ChatGPT would be a FANTASTIC source of assistance for narratives. You could program a basic narrative, then type in different names, adjectives, details of encounters… bang! A great narrative in 30 seconds!

(Please don’t turn this thread into a zillion “What is AI? What is ChatGPT? replies. Do some Google-Fu if you aren’t familiar with this.)

I have avoided shops with a lot of narrative for so long, the thought hasn't crossed my mind, but I could certainly see it being useful for some.

@joanna81 wrote:

I have avoided shops with a lot of narrative for so long, the thought hasn't crossed my mind, but I could certainly see it being useful for some.

I do a fair amount of apartment and restaurant shops that have big narrative blocks (EPMS, Coyle) - I could see pre-programming ChatGPT by scanning the report, then sailing through the grind of narrative building. Perfect prose, spell and grammar-checked, every question answered for the client. I’m going to give it a shot my next apartment report.

I was thinking of that just yesterday. For the first time ever, I was at a loss for words. Usually words just pour out of me but I would definitely give it a shot if needed.

OK, so after thinking a bit, I’m going to test this out.

I’ve just downloaded the ChatGPT iPhone app named “Genie” ($8 for a week, $45 for 52 weeks. I chose one week.)

Here’s my first narrative below. I deliberately gave it a vague prompt. It reads more like a Yelp review than a genuine EPMS report, but with some editing it’s not half-bad for the “Executive Summary - Overall Experience” narrative.

= = = = = = = = =

ME: Write a positive review of a customer’s overall interaction with an apartment leasing agent.

iPhone CHATBOT:

Sure, here's a positive review of a customer interaction with an apartment leasing agent:

"I recently had the pleasure of working with [Leasing Agent's Name] at [Apartment Complex's Name] and I must say, it was a fantastic experience. From the moment I walked into the leasing office, [Leasing Agent's Name] greeted me with a warm smile and made me feel welcome.

She was extremely knowledgeable about the property and was able to answer all of my questions with ease. What impressed me the most was how responsive she was to my needs. She made sure that I was comfortable with the leasing process and took the time to explain everything to me in detail.

Throughout the entire process, [Leasing Agent's Name] was professional, courteous and patient. She went above and beyond to ensure that I found the perfect apartment that met my needs and budget.

Overall, I couldn't be happier with my experience at [Apartment Complex's Name]. Thanks to [Leasing Agent's Name], I am now happily settled into my new home. I would highly recommend [Apartment Complex's Name] to anyone looking for a comfortable and hassle-free living experience."

= = = = = = = =

It took 45 seconds for the bot to write this for me.

I then edited it, which took five minutes.

Normally this is the first narrative I write and then I branch out and do the Greeting, Qualifying Questions, Demonstration, the Closing, Property Conditions afterwards. This one narrative is the hardest for me, and usually takes me 15-20 minutes. I get bogged down in details at times (or forget important parts, like the demonstration) and have to go back and edit.

Here’s my final draft, which I’d copy/paste into the report. It’s 10 sentences, and EPMS asks for 8 or more.

= = = = = =

OVERALL EXPERIENCE

From the moment I walked into the leasing office, Sally Smith greeted me with a warm smile and made me feel welcome at The Landings Apartment Homes.

Sally was extremely knowledgeable about the property and was able to answer all of my questions with ease. What impressed me the most was how responsive she was to my needs. She made sure that I was comfortable with the leasing process and took the time to explain everything to me in detail. Sally used the Fee Sheet for The Landings as a template to guide her through explaining the entire move-in to me, from lease signing to key receipt.

Throughout the entire process, Sally Smith was professional, courteous and patient. She went above and beyond to ensure that I found the perfect apartment that met my needs and budget. For example, she listened attentively when I said that I was having knee surgery soon, and she made sure to only show me first-floor apartment homes.

I would definitely recommend Sally Smith and The Landings Apartment Homes to anyone looking for a comfortable and hassle-free living experience.

Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 05:41PM by ColoKate63.

OK, I used a slightly different prompt and this is what I got from the bot. I didn’t edit it or do any personalization whatsoever.

I think it’s important to use the word “narrative” instead of “review” when giving the chatbot instructions. I’m going to play around with the app some more and see how much personalization I can include, and time it.

The bot 48 seconds to produce the narrative, including me writing the prompt.

= = = = = = =

ME: write a narrative describing how an apartment leasing agent (Sarah) conducted a tour of amenities and a model apartment

CHATBOT: As soon as I walked into the leasing office, I was greeted by a friendly leasing agent named Sarah. Sarah was warm and welcoming, and I immediately felt at ease. She asked me a few questions about what I was looking for in an apartment and took the time to understand my needs and preferences.

After a brief conversation, Sarah suggested we take a tour of the amenities and a model apartment. She led me through the lush courtyard with its bubbling fountains and past the sparkling pool. She pointed out the well-equipped fitness center, resident lounge, and business center. Sarah took the time to explain the hours and benefits of each amenity.

As we walked, Sarah pointed out the unique features of the property, such as the dog park and the outdoor grilling areas. She also explained how the maintenance team took care of the property and its residents.

Finally, we arrived at the model apartment. As we walked through the door, I was immediately impressed by the spacious living area and the modern finishes. Sarah pointed out the features of the apartment, such as the granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, and the in-unit washer and dryer.

She took the time to show me the spacious closets and the balcony with a view of the courtyard. Sarah was knowledgeable about everything and answered all my questions with ease. As we walked back to the leasing office, Sarah asked me if I had any more questions or concerns, and I felt confident that I had all the information I needed to make a decision.

Overall, Sarah's tour was informative, engaging, and professional. She took the time to understand my needs and preferences and showed me an apartment that I could see myself living in. I was impressed by her knowledge and attention to detail, and I left feeling well-informed and excited about the possibility of living in such a fantastic community.

= = = = = = = =
I mean, that’s not too bad, right?? I would definitely personalize this narrative and toss in specific details, but not bad at all.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 05:11PM by ColoKate63.

OK, last one.

ME: write a narrative about how Fred, a car salesman, used several different closing techniques to attempt to sell me a Kia.

CHATBOT: As I walked into the dealership, I was immediately greeted by a salesperson named Fred. He was friendly and welcoming, and I could tell that he was eager to sell me a car. We talked for a few minutes, and he asked me about my needs and preferences.

After a brief conversation, Fred suggested we take a look at the Kias. He led me to the lot and showed me several different models. He pointed out the features of each car and explained how they would meet my needs. He also offered me a test drive and encouraged me to get behind the wheel.

As we walked back to the dealership, Fred asked me if I had any concerns or questions. He listened attentively to my objection to the finance rates, and suggested that I contact my own bank or credit union to see if they could offer me more favorable terms.

Before I left the dealership, Fred collected my contact information. He asked permission to follow up with me on the Kia purchase, and then gave me a polite and friendly farewell.

No, wait, THIS is the last one.

Spoiler: it’s terrible. Would require a ton of editing.

= = = = = = =
ME: write an 850 word narrative about a saleswoman using three different closing techniques to lease an apartment

CHATBOT: It was a beautiful day outside, and for Sarah, it was just another day at work. Sarah was a saleswoman at a luxury apartment complex in the heart of the city. Her job was to lease apartments to people looking for a new place to call home. Sarah was excellent at her job, and she loved it. She loved meeting new people, showing them around the complex, and helping them find the perfect apartment. And today, she had a tough customer to deal with.

The customer was a young couple, John and Emily, who had just moved to the city. They were looking for a new place to call home, and they had come to the apartment complex to check out what was available. Sarah greeted them with a warm smile and took them on a tour of the complex.

As they walked around, Sarah showed them the different apartments available. She explained the features of each one, from the high ceilings to the granite countertops. John and Emily were impressed, but they weren't quite ready to commit yet.

Sarah knew she had to work hard to close the deal. She had three different closing techniques up her sleeve, and she was determined to use them all if she had to.

The first technique Sarah used was the assumptive close. She showed John and Emily an apartment that she knew would be perfect for them. It had everything they were looking for, and she could see the interest in their eyes. She then said, "So, when would you like to move in?"

John and Emily paused for a moment, surprised by the question. They hadn't made up their minds yet, but Sarah's confidence was infectious. They looked at each other and then back at Sarah and said, "Well, we would need to think about it."

Sarah didn't let that discourage her. She simply smiled and said, "Of course, take your time. But I have a feeling this apartment won't be available for long."

The second technique Sarah used was the urgency close. She knew that John and Emily were looking for a place to live as soon as possible, so she played up the urgency of the situation. She said, "I understand you need to think about it, but we have a lot of interest in this apartment. If you wait too long, it may be gone."

John and Emily looked at each other, realizing that they didn't want to miss out on an opportunity. They turned to Sarah and said, "Can we take another look?"

Sarah smiled, knowing that she had them hooked. She took them back to the apartment and showed them around again. This time, they were more interested and asked more questions.

Finally, it was time for Sarah to use her third technique, the choice close. She said, "So, now that you've seen everything, which apartment do you think would be the perfect fit for you?"

John and Emily looked at each other, considering their options. They asked a few more questions and then finally made their decision. They turned to Sarah and said, "We want to lease the apartment we saw first. It's perfect for us."

Sarah smiled, knowing that she had successfully closed the deal. She took them to her office, where they filled out the paperwork and signed the lease.

As they left, John and Emily thanked Sarah for her help. Sarah smiled, knowing that she had done her job well. She had used three different closing techniques to lease the apartment, and it had worked. She felt proud of herself and couldn't wait to help more people find their perfect home.

In conclusion, Sarah was a skilled saleswoman who knew how to close a deal. She used the assumptive close, the urgency close, and the choice close to lease an apartment to a young couple. Her techniques were effective, and she was able to help John and Emily find their perfect home. Sarah's success was a testament to her hard work and dedication to her job.

its pretty neat and a little unnerving at the same time!

@joanna81 wrote:

its pretty neat and a little unnerving at the same time!

It’s capable of getting me over the Hump of Procrastination And Writer’s Block. I can definitely see it streamlining my hours of staring at my screen, even if I have to edit it heavily to have it fit my actual needs.

I downloaded Genie on my android device and asked it to write a few narratives about a positive experience at a telecom store. The more details I gave it regarding our interaction the better the narrative. My conclusion, I can totally see someone using this A.I. program to write Mystery Shopping Narratives.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 06:14PM by Lady Marius.

I work in a High School and we are knee deep in detecting AI final essays, and it hadn't crossed my mind once to try using it myself! I'll have to blame end of school year fatigue. I love the idea to help my redundancy in even short narratives "the food was hot and fresh, fresh and hot, freshly prepared, and hot..." The examples you shared are pretty impressive.

I’m a math teacher, so we have issues with bots solving homework problems. So frustrating!

If you are lazy and don’t personalize the ChatGPT product before entering it into the mystery shop report, you’ll probably get your report denied and may even be deactivated.

But if you’re using it to get out of a writing rut, or to get through procrastination, and you’re heavily personalizing your AI-generated narrative, I don’t see any problem.

I have a feeling that ChatGPT isn’t something that’s been considered by mystery shop providers, however.

Okay, you are having WAY too much fun with this. The responses are pretty amazing. You would still need to write something different for subsequent shops though.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

No, wait, THIS is the last one. /quote]

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 07:07PM by MSF.

@MSF wrote:

Okay, you are having WAY too much fun with this. The responses are pretty amazing. You would still need to write something different for subsequent shops though.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

No, wait, THIS is the last one. /quote]

OMG, I’ve been playing with Genie for two hours now and training it to write more specific narratives. I AM having fun!

Like:

“Write a ten sentence narrative that describes an indifferent mattress salesman interacting with a customer. The customer needs a basic queen mattress, but the salesman is not listening to her.”

I’m not going to put those out here, because I think I made my point, but the narratives get REALLY good when you plug in a lot of supporting detail.

Oh, and I discovered that with the Genie app you have the option to hit “Regenerate” and the bot will completely rewrite the narrative using different words, sentence structure, and boy THAT is cool.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 07:20PM by ColoKate63.

Yep, AI can be a wide spectrum. From helpful, to unethical, to downright evil.

This one reads like the reason the writers are currently on strike and wanting to eliminate AI writing scripts. In this case an ad for a realtor.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

No, wait, THIS is the last one.

Spoiler: it’s terrible. Would require a ton of editing.

= = = = = = =
ME: write an 850 word narrative about a saleswoman using three different closing techniques to lease an apartment

CHATBOT: It was a beautiful day outside, and for Sarah, it was just another day at work. Sarah was a saleswoman at a luxury apartment complex in the heart of the city. Her job was to lease apartments to people looking for a new place to call home. Sarah was excellent at her job, and she loved it. She loved meeting new people, showing them around the complex, and helping them find the perfect apartment. And today, she had a tough customer to deal with.
the rest has been deleted by me but scroll up to read the entire AI generated piece/.

One of the jokes going around about these LLMs is that writers will use them to turn notes into full essays and readers will use them to turn essays into notes.

The tradeoff is how much work it takes to direct the tool compared to just writing it yourself. For a long report with exacting presentation rules it does pay off to train it properly. Teach it the phrasing, feed in the variables, and let AI round it out.

For a Five Guys shop a week or two ago I asked ChatGPT to write my description for the burger. Not because it's long, but because I'd love new ways to express "The burger was cooked thoroughly with no pink remaining but was still juicy. The toppings were correctly delivered as ordered and arranged neatly in a good ratio."

The problem is, current models can't handle character counts. That requires iterations of rewriting to add or remove words. So despite asking for 150-250 characters, my result was something like 600. Just another reason it isn't worth it for short narratives.

It's the future though. Anyone who adds requirements just for the routine of it should expect that routine to get automated.

My problem is not in the figuring out what to write but in my slow typing speed so this would help in that regard. I also never seem to know what the character limitations are on a "short answer" until I exceed them by 300 characters. I do not usually do those types of jobs often enough to remember where or when they are until i run up against them.. But someday when I join the 21st century I will try a bot out.

I asked for “three sentences” or “two paragraphs.” The bot seems to work better with this type of instruction, as opposed to character count.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/05/2023 02:11AM by ColoKate63.

ColoKate, does this technology learn your writing style? Is it adaptable?

Honny,

I’ve only been on it less than 24h, but I don’t think that the AI is learning my style. However, I’m getting good at feeding it prompts like “use first person past tense” and then editing what is produced so that it’s much more like my particular style of writing.

A couple of other things I’ve discovered:

1. I can use the AI to describe a photo. So I uploaded an old photo I took of an apartment leasing office. (There’s always a question on EPMS reports about the office and lobby, and it’s annoying to write.) The bot successfully described the office layout, furnishings and decor. Same for a photo I pulled up of a model apartment. So, as long as I take of photo of something that I’m going to have to describe, I’m all set.

2. I can also have the AI describe a .jpg file. I’m working on screenshots of my online report forms, changing them to .jpg, and training the AI to pull the questions off. This may take me a few days, but - wow! If I can get a solid narrative from a combination of my answers on the Sassie or Shopmetrics website plus the prompts I feed in, it will be life-changing.

ColoKate, I am afraid you are setting the bar too high for the rest of us by having these glorious essays written and turned in to the msc. They are going to expect all of us to write a perfect book for them with endless descriptive narrative and still only pay us below minimum wage to do it. Try to dumb them down a bit so us folks depending on the same phrases our brains come up with have a chance at a 10 in future. lol

Here's why I won't trust a thing people write with online reviews...
I used ChatGPT:

I asked:
Write a positive review of a customer’s overall interaction with an apartment leasing agent named Sally in Washington D.C. including a tour of amenities and sample apartment. Indicate that a mouse appeared. Sally picked up the mouse and kissed it.

ChatGPT
I am happy to write a positive review of Sally, an apartment leasing agent in Washington, D.C.. My overall interaction with Sally was wonderful and made my apartment hunting experience an enjoyable one.

Sally was very knowledgeable about the apartments and the amenities that were available. She was able to answer all of my questions and provided me with detailed information about the community. Her enthusiasm for the property was contagious and it was clear that she took pride in her job.

During the tour of the amenities and the sample apartment, Sally was patient and thorough. She made sure to highlight all of the features that were important to me and took the time to explain how everything worked. The sample apartment was clean and well-maintained, which made it easy for me to envision myself living there.
Now, here's where things got interesting. While we were touring one of the apartments, a mouse scurried across the floor. I was a bit taken aback, but Sally quickly sprang into action. She calmly picked up the mouse and held it in her hands. To my surprise, she even kissed it on the nose before releasing it back outside!

Despite the unexpected encounter with the mouse, Sally remained professional and upbeat throughout the tour. Her positive attitude and sense of humor made the experience all the more enjoyable. I truly appreciate her dedication to her job and her willingness to go above and beyond to make sure that her clients are satisfied.

Overall, I highly recommend Sally as an apartment leasing agent in Washington D.C.. She is friendly, knowledgeable, and truly cares about her clients. I am grateful for the wonderful experience I had working with her and would not hesitate to recommend her to others.

Kissing a mouse?

Now THAT is EVIL…

@ColoKate63 wrote:

Kissing a mouse?

Now THAT is EVIL…

Unless they turn into handsome horses! (Bippetty-boppitty-boo!!)

Other than the mouse incident that ChatGTP job didn't offer any specific details, like rental rates, fees, names of the amenities toured, etc. So the person launching ChatGTP using it would have to fill those in.

You're right, though. From now on I'll be suspicious of any review that looks too... Something...

Wouldn't this make the evals less original? That does not seem like something the clients would appreciate.
I can see it being used for some evals so certain observations are always included but it can water down unique observations and experience perhaps.

I tried to get ChatGPT to say that Sally pulled out a gun and shot the mouse, but currently "animal violence" isn't allowed. Just wait until ChatGPT does evil. It will be a short chess game to end mankind. (sorry, didn't mean to get too philosophical on Cinco day )

@emm2131 wrote:

Wouldn't this make the evals less original? That does not seem like something the clients would appreciate.

I tend to pick up 5-10 of the same shops, knock them out and then do another kind altogether. I must say, by #6, #7 and #8 they all tend to read the same - without AI.

I’d just take care to edit the ChatGPT product to include a LOT of details, and carefully set up the initial inquiry to the bot. Unless you are incredibly low-effort, you should have unique narratives that are perfectly spelled and grammatically correct. The editorial staffs will probably be grateful.