ADS IN CHATGPT: CRITEO ENTERS THE PICTURE

In February, OpenAI announced the launch of its beta advertising programme in ChatGPT — a "closed" test designed to assess how the system worked and how users responded to it.

Now they are taking things a step further, announcing agreements with advertising networks to expand the pool of potential advertisers. One of the first ad networks and platforms to join is Criteo.

Criteo is a giant in advertising intermediation, managing more than $4 billion in annual ad spend and connecting around 17,000 advertisers. With this agreement, it positions itself as one of the pioneering partners in what everyone is now starting to call “Agentic Commerce”.

That said, advertising in ChatGPT is still far from being available to everyone. Here are some of the most relevant criteria that need to be met:

-Inventory: do not assume this is exclusive inventory. In other words, campaigns cannot be planned only on ChatGPT. Within Criteo, ChatGPT will be just one more inventory source for hybrid campaigns. The algorithm will decide where to bid based on the inventory available and its RTB price.

-CPM: this is by no means positioned as a low-cost channel. The average CPM is around €50. This means that if budgets or bids are too tight, or if we require a high ROAS, the algorithm will tend to bid on cheaper channels instead.

-Investment: this is another factor that makes the opportunity relatively exclusive. A minimum investment of €50,000 is recommended to have any real chance of ads appearing in ChatGPT. In other words, the algorithm itself filters and effectively reserves this new inventory for higher-volume clients.

That said, this hybrid model through CRITEO has one advantage over going directly through OpenAI — assuming we are lucky enough to be selected for its advertiser programme. Advertising directly in ChatGPT currently requires a minimum investment of $250,000 per month, making it a very, very exclusive opportunity.

That said, for now, all of this is only viable if we are advertising in the US market. There is currently no date for availability in Europe — and it remains to be seen how EU regulators will react if and when OpenAI decides to bring this model to the region.

Remember that OpenAI has repeatedly stressed that advertisers will never have access to users’ conversations or personal data, and that responses will never be influenced by the need to show an ad. That is OpenAI’s position. But we will see how European regulators perceive it.

Likewise, any arrival in Europe will inevitably require OpenAI to rethink its pricing model — unless it can guarantee truly differentiated performance. Otherwise, attracting investment will be difficult, no matter how trendy the channel may be.

We will see! For now, however, this remains a truly exclusive opportunity. Even through the CRITEO route, it is still only accessible to a small percentage of advertisers.