Since its launch in November by San Francisco-based OpenAI, ChatGPT has taken the world by storm. The conversational chatbot can code, write essays, and even function as a search engine, among other tasks.

But this isn't some futuristic vision of what ChatGPT will do. The business world has already bought in when it comes to AI in general, and ChatGPT in particular.

“It can create anything that we thought thus far was unique to human intelligence or creativity, whether that is interacting with us in a chatbot form, whether that is generating new content, whether it's images, video,” Nina Schick, adviser, speaker, and A.I. thought leader, recently told Yahoo Finance.

Some practical, real world impacts—and caveats—by industry:

Health Care

Even before ChatGPT's release, the healthcare industry was already using chatbots to schedule appointments and assess symptoms. The advent of OpenAI's sophisticated new bot is expected to accelerate that trend, said Yair Lewis, MD, PHD, SVP of Medical at Navina.

"Generative models have the potential to perform a vast range of tasks in healthcare," he told Yahoo Finance. "They can revolutionize the way patients and clinicians interact and access information; they can provide up-to-date medical information; support clinical decision-making; and aid in medical documentation"

He added: "Additionally, these models can be used in biomedical research such as rational molecule design, in-silico experimentation, and genomic analysis."

For example, Doximity, an online network for healthcare professionals, reportedly released a beta version of a ChatGPT tool that helps doctors with administrative tasks like, for instance, drafting appeal letters to insurers. Meanwhile, ChatGPT could also occupy other roles historically filled by doctors, like diagnosing garden variety illnesses such the cold or flu. (An aside: the chatbot recently passed the U.S. Medical Licensing Examination.)

There's a big "but," according to Lewis: "The crucial point is that in order to be clinically useful, 'medical grade devices,' so to speak – these models need to be optimized for those specific tasks, and undergo extensive testing and validation," he said.

Clinicians also need to be especially concerned about cybersecurity, said Deryck Mitchelson, field CISO at Check Point Technologies. "With email being one of the biggest attack vectors, it's worth noting that it's very easy to use ChatGPT to create realistic phishing emails," he said."Within healthcare, bad actors could send out an 'urgent screening' email out to patients saying that they're at risk of XYZ and it looks very realistic."

Real Estate

In real estate, brokers have become, perhaps, the most famous and immediate professional users of ChatGPT so far. The bot's ability to write relatively convincing home listings has been widely reported.

For State Street Realty VP Broker Frank Trelles, who's based in Miami, Fla., ChatGPT's benefits aren't purely theoretical. He regularly uses the bot for chores like calculating mortgage payments, analyzing investment deals, and drafting agreements. Trelles said the technology can allow real estate brokers and agents to increase their focus on clients – not the rote work of real estate transactions.

“I'm still testing it. And every time I do I keep getting surprised. It's amazing,” he said. In industries that depend on personal contact with customers, Trelles added, "I see ChatGPT not replacing us, but just making us better."

Public Relations & Marketing

ChatGPT is particularly well-suited to tasks that involve lots of copywriting. Dara Kaplan, president and partner at Wunderlich Kaplan Communications, said that her firm has begun using AI to speed up work on press releases, brand stories and client bios.

“We are using AI technology to help us speed up the process of writing," said Kaplan. "We have a custom and proprietary form that allows for our clients to enter all the information needed on them and their business to get started."

Clients like it, Kaplan added.

"[Clients] are definitely excited, we have gotten hundreds of inbound requests on the day of the launch. Do they have questions? Sure. However, that’s why we wrote an FAQ about exactly how it will work," she said. "To be clear, we are assisted by AI to make the content creation process faster and more affordable for small businesses and entrepreneurs."

Wunderlich isn't alone. Taboola, a web advertising company, recently announced it would be experimenting with AI and is working on integrating ChatGPT onto their platforms to help generate ads.

"We believe AI technologies will revolutionize the way advertisers create and optimize their ads to drive performance, providing them with additional tools they need to succeed in the fast-paced world of online advertising," Adam Singolda, CEO and founder of Taboola said in a statement.

Customer Service

Customer service, by its nature, involves lots of repetitive text that's often formulaic. Forbes recently reported that Meta, Canva, and Shopify are all using ChatGPT’s technology to answer customer questions. The outlet also reported that Ada, a Toronto-based company that automates 4.5 billion customer service interactions, partnered with ChatGPT to further enhance the technology.

"We're going all in on using large language models to empower brands to deliver a customer experience that is far more contextual and intelligent," Ada CEO and co-founder Mike Murchison said in a statement.

Media

And then, of course, there's media. CNET, a tech journalism site, recently came under fire for using artificial intelligence to generate articles. The publication had used AI to write pieces for months with minimal transparency, as reported by The Verge. Meanwhile, Neil Vogel, CEO of Dotdash Meredith, a rival to CNET parent Red Ventures, told Axios that his site would would never generate articles written by machines.

Still, he conceded: "We actually think it's an incredible opportunity for us," he added, noting that the company has already begun to bake AI into many of its workflows, like sourcing images.

BuzzFeed also (BZFD) in January announced in a memo to its staff that it would be working with OpenAI to personalize content and improve its quizzes, according to The Wall Street Journal. On Feb. 14, BuzzFeed launched its AI-fueled quiz format, called Infinity Quizzes.

“ChatGPT has become the face of generative AI,” Thomvest Ventures Principal Ashish Kakran told Yahoo Finance. “We actually believe it has helped it move from lab to public imagination, where everyone can play with it... We think it's going to have a long-term impact. It's going to impact basically every function in every vertical and how we work will be affected."

Allie Garfinkle is a Senior Tech Reporter at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter at @agarfinks and on LinkedIn.

Dylan Croll is a reporter and researcher at Yahoo Finance. Follow him on Twitter at @CrollonPatrol.

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