🤖 ChatGPT vs Google Bard: Which is better for entrepreneurs?

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The world of AI is still moving fast. Every day a new tool, new feature, or new announcement drops on the scene. The race for the best AI assistant is on with ChatGPT and Google Bard at the forefront, so which should you use?

In this article, I won’t get into the technical intricacies of each system, that’s a topic for another day. Instead, I put both ChatGPT and Google Bard to the test where it really matters: practical business tasks.

I wanted to see which AI assistant is better at helping with small direct tasks that you might need help with in your day-to-day.

The answer might surprise you. Let’s begin.

📖 First, a bit of a backstory

ChatGPT came out first and blew everyone’s mind away, Bard was quickly released to catch up and the first release was a bit of lackluster and unfortunately also ridiculed because of a demo error. A lot has changed since then, with both tools adding multiple features that are available to all users or to some early adopters (in beta).

Let’s break these updates down:

Plugins (think of these as add-on apps): ChatGPT open their plugins “store” to all ChatGPT Plus (paying members). Google Bard has theirs available to a very small group of testers. For now, the comparison below is ignoring plugins.

Web browsing/search: Bard being built by Google was with no surprise introduced with great search capabilities, ChatGPT followed suit with a Web Browsing plugin. Both do a decent job at search but have their pros and cons. ChatGPT does better at summarizing what it finds. Bard finds better results but sometimes mixes the info up, so you have to be careful about what you read and believe.

Coding tasks: ChatGPT was great at coding from the beginning since it’s rooted in their Codex model, which powers Copilot, one of the first AI coding assistants. Google recently upgraded Bard to handle coding tasks and I must say they did a great job at it.

Memory (contextual awareness): right now, ChatGPT is much better at remembering information you gave it earlier in the conversation. Bard has a very short-term memory and loses context quickly. I fully expect Bard to catch up in this area but know that if you are working on a task that you need to build on, ChatGPT is much better to use.

Nuance and Creativity: as you’ll see in the tests below, ChatGPT takes the lead when it comes to understanding nuance and giving more creative answers.

Files: ChatGPT has a plugin called Code Interpreter which allows you to upload a file (or a zipped folder) and ask it questions about what you uploaded. It can even make modifications to the files and give them back to download. Bard as of now, does not have this capability but it is coming soon. Bard is also going to be added directly into Google Sheets, Docs and other Google productivity tools.

Images: as of this writing, ChatGPT does not have the ability to respond with images yet. Bard was recently updated to include images in responses.

Character limits: as of now, neither Bard nor ChatGPT have published their character limits for how long your question can be or how long the response is. ChatGPT does give much longer responses when needed, they get cut off but then you can click on a continue button to get the rest of the response. Bard on the other hand, does not give really long responses.

Prompt specificity and context: from all of my tests, it is quite clear that ChatGPT does a better job at understanding your question and why you would ask it than Bard does. If you ask ChatGPT the same question in 3 different ways, you will most like get a very similar response. Google Bard on the other hand can give very different answers each time, including sometimes declining to answer altogether depending on what words you use.

Mobile app: you can access both AI assistants from your web browser on your phone, but ChatGPT is the only one with a mobile app. I am sure Bard will have an app soon.

With those differences aside, I wanted to see which AI is better at handling a specific quick task that we would all use in our jobs or businesses. I’ll keep an eye on their technical differences and nuances listed above and if the two systems diverge further I’ll make sure to keep you updated with a dedicated article on that topic.

(or if you think a deep dive is already warranted, please reply and let me know.

🧐 Test prompts

To complete this test, I came up with a prompt across various business tasks to see how well these assistants do.

Here’s the list of prompts we will be using:

1. Sales and Marketing: Write a concise sales pitch for an eco-friendly home cleaning product.

2. Content Creation and Brainstorming: Generate a unique blog post idea around the theme of digital marketing trends in 2023.

3. Analysis and Research: Provide me with recent statistics and significant trends in the electric vehicle market.

4. Communication and Customer Relations: Develop a customer service script to handle customer complaints about delayed shipping.

5. Strategic Planning and Management: Suggest potential collaborations or partnerships for our business growth in the field of renewable energy.

6. Technical Assistance: Write a simple JavaScript function that validates whether a user input is a valid email address.

7. Human Resources: Suggest strategies to improve employee engagement in our remote team.

8. Customer Insight and User Experience: Design a detailed customer persona for our upcoming marketing campaign targeting sustainable living enthusiasts.

✨ ProTip: the prompts I put together above are all very valuable in running your business. Give them a try with your own company or product.

May the better AI Assistant win!

1. Sales and Marketing Prompt

Question: Write a concise sales pitch for an eco-friendly home cleaning product.

Both AIs did well with this task. ChatGPT took a much more creative approach and followed the direction better. Bard took the request further and over-delivered by giving more information: headline, feature list, CTA, benefits, etc. which is cool, and you could follow up with another prompt to get a shorter pitch if needed.

Winner: ChatGPT mainly because the answer is more creative, which is needed for a sales pitch.

2. Content Creation and Brainstorming

Question: Generate a unique blog post idea around the theme of digital marketing trends in 2023.

For this test, the results were very similar. ChatGPT took to the task on hand and came up with a much more creative blog idea meanwhile Bard took a safer approach to the blog idea but then it proceeded to write the blog post for me!

Winner: draw. Once you have the title, you would want to create the list anyways and Bard already handled that part without asking, but then again, it gave a very generic list.

3. Analysis and Research

Question: Provide me with recent statistics and significant trends in the electric vehicle market.

I knew that Bard will most likely get a better answer for this question since it involves looking up data. And not surprising it definitely gave better stats than ChatGPT.

I also turned on Web Browsing for ChatGPT to see if it would do better and it definitely improve its answer. But Bard still gave a more concise and ready-to-use list.

Winner: Bard.

4. Communication and Customer Relations

Question: Develop a customer service script to handle customer complaints about delayed shipping.

This was an interesting one, both AIs gave a very realistic conversation between a customer service rep and a customer. They both also gave tips on how to handle customer complaints.

I give the edge to ChatGPT on how it responded to the pressure from the customer. Instead of giving money back in the form of a refund, it gave the customer a discount code to use in their next purchase, which would increase sales instead of giving money back. Bard also messed up with the dates in its example.

Winner: ChatGPT

5. Strategic Planning and Management

Question: Suggest potential collaborations or partnerships for our business growth in the field of renewable energy.

Years ago, I was the CTO at a renewable energy company (that’s where I met Jessica). I was very curious to see what ideas both AIs would come up with. I must say both gave very similar ideas that are actually decent and good enough for a company to act on.

Winner: draw.

6. Technical Assistance

Question: Write a simple JavaScript function that validates whether a user input is a valid email address.

Both systems gave a similar answer. They provided a function and then an example of how to use the function. ChatGPT gave a little warning about verifying emails in addition to just doing validation of the address which is a nice security tip. But otherwise, about the same.

Winner: another draw!

7. Human Resources

Question: Suggest strategies to improve employee engagement in our remote team.

Remote work used to belong to nomads but ever since the pandemic, most companies ended up with some form of remote employees. During my time as CTO at eCapital, we had to deal with what it meant to have a remote workforce and now at Arta Finance I work remotely, so I know firsthand what it’s like to be remote.

Needless to say, I was very curious about the type of ideas both AIs would give and again they did not disappoint but also gave very similar responses.

Winner: yet another draw.

8. Customer Insight and User Experience

Question: Design a detailed customer persona for our upcoming marketing campaign targeting sustainable living enthusiasts.

When it comes to user personas you have to really try and describe a type of person that would be interested in your product or service. Both AIs did a pretty good job at painting a full picture of who would be interested in a product being offered to sustainable living enthusiasts.

Winner: sorry but we are ending with another draw!

😳 Are ChatGPT and Google Bard the same thing?

When handling quick 1 prompt tasks, both AIs did great. This doesn’t mean they are completely interchangeable as there are still differences between them when it comes to more complex tasks, additional features and stylistic preferences.

To give you a clearer perspective and help you decide which to use for which task, here is a quick list of features to compare:

1. Conversation History: Bard doesn’t currently show the details of your conversation in its history. If you tend to come back to an old conversation to look up information or ask a follow-up question, then use ChatGPT.

2. User interface: this comes down to personal preference. I like the ChatGPT interface better because I am used to it and I really like watching it type a response versus Bard’s interface, which pauses and then gives you the entire response at once.

3. Web search: if you are trying to search for information, Bard will get you better results.

4. More answers: Bard always gives you 3 answers at once so you can pick the best one for you. With ChatGPT you will have to ask it to regenerate another answer.

5. Creative content: ChatGPT wins on creativity.

6. Brainstorming: ChatGPT is a better brainstorming partner, especially given that you can go back and forth with its better history ability until you come up with the result you are looking for.

7. Quick questions and tasks: both system work just as well.

8. Use of plugins (add-ons): as of this writing, I only have access to ChatGPT Plugins, so I can’t make a recommendation until Bard plugins are opened up.

9. Prompt understanding: ChatGPT tends to understand the context behind your question better, it can tell why you might be asking a question. Bard needs more specific questions to give you a good answer. If you’re new to prompt design (don't worry, you'll be a pro after reading GPT Hacks! ✌️), ChatGPT is a better starting point.

10. Cost 🤑: to get the most out of ChatGPT you will have to sign up for their pro plan which will run you $20/month. Google Bard is completely free.

Have you tried both AIs yet? Do you like one over the other? I would love to hear your thoughts on this.

🛠️ AI tools and resources

• Secta - professional headshots using AI

• Wudpecker - bring an AI to your next meeting

• Lintrude - code reviews done by an LLM (AI)

• Mindsera - AI-powered journal

🎁 Looking for more AI tools and plugins to try? Take a look at the GPT Hacks AI Tools Directory and our Plugins Directory too!

⏮️ Catch up with articles from our archives:

• AI in Marketing: ChatGPT for Brochure Crafting 🚀

• AI’s Impact on SEO

• 🤖 ChatGPT Code Interpreter is a huge deal

• Use ChatGPT for Keyword Research and SEO

• Get ChatGPT to sound like you

• Visit the archives