Ads in ChatGPT signify a major transition from focusing on keyword intent to understanding user behavior. This evolution changes how we approach relevance, creativity, and performance measurement.
Currently, ads are being tested in ChatGPT in the U.S., appearing to various users across different account types. For the first time, we see advertising stepping into an AI environment designed for answering queries, which fundamentally changes the game for marketers like me.
AI has been an integral part of ad creation and planning across platforms like Google and LinkedIn for years. However, placing advertisements inside an AI that people trust to assist with thinking, decision-making, and actions is a completely new challenge. It’s not just another channel in our existing media strategy.
The primary concern for us isn’t targeting, but understanding psychology. Replicating strategies successful in search or social may lead to disappointing performance or even damage trust.
To thrive, brands must comprehend why users engage with ChatGPT, and what implications that has for capturing attention and enhancing the customer journey.
ChatGPT is a Task Environment, Not a Feed
When people use ChatGPT, they have a purpose. Whether it’s:
- Solving a specific problem.
- Refining a shortlist.
- Planning a trip.
- Writing something.
- Making sense of a complex decision.
Unlike feed-based platforms, where users passively scroll and consume content, ChatGPT users are goal-oriented.
In such a task-centered environment, behavior shifts:
- Goal shielding: Users focus narrowly on finishing tasks, filtering out distractions that don’t contribute.
- Interruption aversion: When focusing, unexpected distractions feel more annoying.
- Tunnel focus: Clarity and speed take priority over exploration.
This means gaining clicks will be more challenging than some advertisers might anticipate. If ads don’t assist users in progressing their tasks, they’ll seem irrelevant, no matter how topically aligned they might be.
Considering trust in AI is still being established, tolerance for distracting ads is particularly low.
Dig deeper: OpenAI moves on ChatGPT ads with impression-based launch
Behavior Over Search Volume: Designing a Strategy for ChatGPT
Traditionally, search volume has directed our planning.
Keywords informed us about what users sought, how often, and the level of demand competition. This framework informed both SEO and paid media strategies.
However, ChatGPT changes this model. Instead of searching for keywords, users describe situations, ask detailed questions, and pursue outcomes beyond mere information.
Without query data to optimize, our success depends on understanding:
- The task the user aims to complete.
- The journey stages they’re outsourcing to AI.
- The specific help they need at that moment.
This is where behavioral insights replace keyword demand as the foundational strategy.
Transitioning from Keyword Intent to Behavioral Targeting
Instead of centering our plans around queries, we should focus on behavior modes, representing the mindset of users when they turn to ChatGPT.
We can consider these modes as follows:
- Explore mode: Users seek inspiration or shape a perspective.
- Ads here should ignite ideas, offer options, or reframe the problem.
- Reduce mode: Users aim to narrow choices effectively.
- Ads should clarify differences, simplifying decisions.
- Confirm mode: When users want reassurance, trust trials such as reviews or guarantees matter most.
- Act mode: Users aim to complete the task, so ads that eliminate friction, like clear pricing, will succeed.
These modes correspond with recognized human drivers in search behavior: forming perspectives, informing, reassuring, and simplifying. ChatGPT condenses these moments into one interface.
Dig deeper: What AI means for paid media, user behavior, and brand visibility
In ChatGPT, Relevance is About Utility
The key shift is that relevance in ChatGPT is not merely about a match but about functionality.
An ad can align with a category but still fall short if it doesn’t help users with their tasks. Anything creating extra work or that distracts from goals feels frustrating in a task environment.
High-performing ads are likely to act less like traditional ads, and more like:
- Tools.
- Templates.
- Guides.
- Checklists.
- Shortcuts.
- Decision aids.
Such ads integrate seamlessly into user workflows.
Generic brand ads, mere awareness messages, and content serving as detours are likely to underperform.
Dig deeper: Your ads are dying: How to spot and stop creative fatigue before it tanks performance
Helpful Content Bridges Channels
The assets that create compelling ChatGPT ads—guides, frameworks, and reassurance-focused content—do more than boost paid performance. They enhance authority for SEO, earn media coverage for digital PR, and strengthen brand trust across social and owned channels.
Here, silos can break performance.
Paid media teams cannot create “helpful ads” in isolation while SEO focuses on authority, PR works on trust signals, and brand teams shape voice independently. AI-driven discovery blends these signals.
The best-performing ads may rely on:
- Brand voice for consistency.
- Trusted voice from reviews, experts, or validation.
- Amplified voice through media coverage and authority.
The line between advertising, content, and credibility is increasingly blurred.
Rethinking Measurement
Evaluating ChatGPT ads purely on click-through rates risks missing their broader influence. These ads might sway decisions without triggering immediate clicks, aiding in brand recall or re-entry through different channels.
More significant indicators might include:
- Shortlist inclusions.
- Brand recall.
- Assisted conversions.
- Branded search increases.
- Direct traffic improvements.
- Conversion boosts further down the line.
This underscores the need for cross-department collaboration. If performance spans the customer journey, so too must measurement and accountability.
Dig deeper: AI tools for PPC, AI search, and social campaigns: What’s worth using now
Winning Brands Master Behavior
This is not just a new ad format; it’s a shift in behavior. Brands that succeed will deeply understand:
- What people use ChatGPT for.
- Journey stages being shifted to AI.
- How to support these moments without losing trust.
We should revisit jobs-to-be-done thinking, mapping actions leading up to a purchase, inquiry, or commitment, and identify where AI reduces effort, uncertainty, or complexity.
This approach empowers us to ask, not simply, “how do we advertise here?” but “how can we be genuinely helpful when it counts most?”
Adopting this mindset will not only shape performance in ChatGPT but influence the broader future of AI-led discovery, where understanding behavioral intent will surpass the old focus on keywords.
Inspired by this post on Search Engine Land.
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