The Pulse
OpenAI Cuts ChatGPT Ad Prices and Recruits Meta Veterans
OpenAI is lowering ChatGPT ad prices, hiring experienced advertising staff and courting small and midsize businesses. The Information reports that its advertiser count rose to about 60,000 in early October, while questions persist about mea
AI.info Team · Written with AI ·
“We’re building the fastest-growing ads business in the world.”
Dave Dugan, OpenAI’s vice president of global ad solutions
OpenAI is cutting ChatGPT ad prices, bringing in sales staff with experience at Meta and other platforms, and trying to win smaller advertisers. The Information reported the push on Oct. 15, 2026, as the company expands beyond the large brands and agencies it first courted. The moves arrive alongside new ad formats and measurement partnerships, but advertisers still say they lack basic visibility into where their ads appear.
Meta veterans join a growing ad team
Nearly half of the roughly 140 OpenAI employees working on advertising joined between July and September, according to Crustdata data cited by The Information. Meta is the largest source of talent. Dugan spent 12 years at Meta before joining OpenAI, while recent hires include Mitch Pilar, a 12-year Google veteran, and Andy Sinn, who spent about a decade at Meta.
OpenAI has also divided its sales staff into industry-focused teams and a separate group for ad agencies, an arrangement that resembles the structure at Google and Meta, according to people familiar with the company’s plans. The Information reported that the ad group has reorganized seven times since launching in February. OpenAI said in a statement that it is recruiting from across the industry rather than focusing on one company, and that the range of experience helps it respond to advertiser feedback.
The company is widening its sales effort from large businesses toward small and midsize firms. It is using outside service providers, including TP, Concentrix and Accenture, to sell ads and help customers set up campaigns. That effort targets the type of smaller advertiser that helped build Meta’s advertising business.
Lower prices bring in more advertisers
ChatGPT had about 60,000 advertisers in early October, up from 20,000 in late August, according to Dan Salmon, a partner at New Street Research, as cited by The Information. Sensor Tower estimates that U.S. spending on ChatGPT ads will rise 40% in October from September; the firm tracks app and advertising activity and extrapolates from samples. OpenAI’s ads had reached more than 60 countries, the report said.
Prices have fallen from the premium rates OpenAI charged some early buyers. Cole Furrh, founder of InterTeam Marketing, told The Information that a click on a ChatGPT ad costs about $5, compared with $30 to $50 on Google for the same business-software clients. Advertisers are still learning how the channel performs: most are spending test budgets of roughly 1% to 5% of annual ad spending, according to people who work directly with them.
Some agencies report stronger returns for particular clients. Filip Nakov, whose agency works with cybersecurity, AI and legal-technology companies, said clients spending $1,000 on ChatGPT ads brought in about 10 customers, compared with five from Meta and one from Google. The report also described clients putting as much as 40% of their daily ad budgets—ranging from $1,000 to $30,000—into ChatGPT. Those figures come from agency accounts, not a company-wide or independently audited comparison.
Visual ads add a new route to shoppers
OpenAI’s first ads appeared as labeled sponsored placements below ChatGPT responses, aimed at users already considering a purchase. The company is now testing a visual format designed to reach people earlier in the process. In an Oct. 5 announcement, OpenAI said it would initially test image-based ads during image generation for users on its Free and Go plans in the United States, with a first group of advertisers later in October.
OpenAI said those ads would be labeled and kept separate from the image being created, and that advertising would not influence ChatGPT’s answers. The company also announced measurement integrations and partnerships intended to help advertisers track conversions and campaign effects. The Information reported that agencies want more ways to compare ChatGPT campaigns with buys on Google, while advertisers also want more information about the conversations that trigger their placements.
Placement errors expose the trust problem
Advertisers told The Information that the system can feel opaque. “It’s a black box with no visibility whatsoever,” Farhad Divecha, chief executive of marketing agency Accuracast, said, describing the difficulty of knowing which conversations prompt an ad. Without that context, advertisers must guess how to write campaign instructions and whether their placements match their brands.
Relevance is not the only concern. In an analysis of about 187,000 ad placements, ad-tracking company Adthena found roughly one in nine ads was unrelated to the user’s question, The Information reported. A small number appeared beside sensitive queries, including an ad for push-up bras next to a question about breast cancer and a short-term lender’s ad beside a request for debt relief. OpenAI told the publication it was listening to feedback and adapting its products; those specific placements show the practical test facing its expanding ad business.