ChatGPT ads have no minimum now. They buy the slot under the answer, not the answer.

OpenAI says its ad business reached a $1 billion annualized revenue run rate in less than 200 days after launch.

That is from OpenAI's own post of 31 August 2026, which also says tens of thousands of advertisers now use it.

And the entry price fell to nothing along the way. Briefs reported on 29 May 2026 that the minimum spend started at $200,000 in February, dropped to $50,000 in April, and disappeared when the self-serve Ads Manager opened in May.

So the question a small business brings to NovaTechRay changes shape. It used to be "how do we get ChatGPT to mention us?" Now it is "can we just pay for it?"

You can pay for something. It is not the mention.

Step 1: read the one sentence that decides this

OpenAI's 31 August post has a short paragraph on principles, and one sentence in it settles most of the question.

"Advertising does not influence the answers ChatGPT provides."

The same paragraph says ads are "always clearly labeled and separate from ChatGPT's answers", that advertisers do not get access to private conversations, and that users can control how their ads are personalised.

So there are two slots on the screen. The answer, and a labelled ad placement beside it.

An ad buys the second slot. By OpenAI's own account, nothing you pay touches the first.

I want to be careful here. That is OpenAI describing its own system. I could not find a published outside audit that tested it, and I would not claim one exists. But it is the stated rule, and building a plan on the opposite assumption means betting against the platform's own words.

Step 2: understand what the ad slot is matched on

The same post explains how an ad gets chosen.

"Our ads system uses the context of the current conversation to show an ad relevant to what someone is exploring." And, depending on the country and the user's settings, it may also use context from their broader ChatGPT use.

That is closer to search ads than to display. The trigger is intent, expressed in a conversation.

Which is why ads look tempting for a local business. Someone asks for a dentist who does weekend appointments, and an ad could sit right under the answer.

But look at what happens in that moment. The answer names two or three businesses on its own terms. Your ad sits underneath, labelled. If you are not in the answer, you are the sponsored alternative to the businesses ChatGPT chose.

That can still work. It is a different position, and it should be priced as one.

Step 3: price it like an auction, because it is one

There is no public rate card, and I am wary of every "ChatGPT ads cost" figure I have seen.

The reported numbers move fast. Briefs reported a $60 CPM at launch, around $25 by April, and $3 to $5 per click by May. OpenAI's August post says cost-per-click and outcome-optimised bidding now make up the majority of campaigns, and that Pixel and Conversions API are the measurement foundations.

Those are snapshots of an auction that got much bigger in between. The number you pay will be whatever the other bidders in your category pay.

So do not buy on a quoted CPC. Buy a small test with a ceiling, a tracked landing page and a conversion you already measure elsewhere, and let the account tell you the price.

Step 4: be sceptical of the success stories, including OpenAI's

OpenAI's post includes two results. It says an ecommerce advertiser reached a 3x return on ad spend over 28 days, and that a technology partner reported more than 80 percent of ad-driven ChatGPT traffic came from new customers.

Both are vendor-reported. Neither names the advertiser, the category or the spend.

That does not make them false. It makes them the kind of number every ad platform publishes at launch, selected from the accounts that went well.

I would not use either as a forecast. Your own four-week test is the only number worth planning on.

Step 5: keep earning the answer, separately

Here is what paying does not change.

What gets a business named in the answer is the same list it was before ads existed. Being findable and readable by the crawlers that feed search. Being mentioned in places the model trusts. Having your price, hours and specifics on a page a machine can read.

We have written up how much of an AI citation traces back to ordinary search ranking in how much of an AI citation is just your Google ranking, and none of that research is affected by an ad launch.

And the choice of where you publish still matters. VALORAE Media's breakdown of which platform gets your videos into AI answers is the same argument from the video side.

Step 6: where the evidence could change

I will correct this post if any of the following happens.

OpenAI's post says its next phase will introduce "additional formats" and explore "new ways for businesses to interact with consumers in more native ways in ChatGPT." Native formats are where the line between answer and ad has blurred on other platforms. If a new format places sponsored content inside the answer text, Step 1 stops being true, and I will say so here with a date.

Until then, the principle is the rule to plan on.

Step 7: decide with two questions

The decision fits on an index card.

Do you have an offer that already converts from paid search, and a way to track a click to a sale? Then a capped ChatGPT ads test is reasonable, because it is the same kind of spend.

Are you missing from the answers entirely? Then ads do not fix that, and the budget belongs on the slower work first.

A business with no mention yet sits in the second group, and the ad is tempting because the mention feels slow. It is slow. It is also the only one of the two that OpenAI says money cannot buy.

The short version

• OpenAI's ads passed a $1 billion run rate in under 200 days, per its 31 August 2026 post.
• The minimum spend went from $200,000 to none between February and May, per Briefs.
• OpenAI says ads are labelled, separate, and do not influence the answer.
• An ad buys the slot beside the answer. It cannot put you in the answer.
• Ignore quoted CPMs. Run a capped test with tracking you already trust.
• Treat vendor success stories as marketing, including OpenAI's.
• Keep the mention work going. Ads do not replace it.

Getting a business named in the answer itself is the work we do at novatechray.com.