How to advertise on ChatGPT step by step

ChatGPT ads went from a managed pilot to a self service auction in a matter of months, and most of what is written about them online is older than the product. The current process is ordinary: an eligible company, a verified business, a bid, and creative that survives a policy review. The only genuinely hard part is the first word of that sentence.

Who is eligible to open an Ads Manager account?

Eligibility follows the legal entity that will advertise and be billed, which must be based in a country OpenAI lists as available, currently 56 of them [1]. The country selected when the advertiser account is created cannot be changed later [2].

That single rule decides everything downstream, and it is the one most owners discover after they have already created an account. Your ChatGPT login country does not override it, and creating an account from a country that is not listed only places you on a notification list rather than giving you access [1]. The current list by region is kept on the ChatGPT ads availability page with the date it was read.

What does a ChatGPT ad cost per click?

OpenAI states no minimum spend for self service, bills by impression or valid click through a relevance weighted second price auction, and recommends starting at a maximum bid of $3 to $5 per click [3]. What you actually pay per click is decided by that auction rather than by a rate card.

Treat the recommended bid as a starting point for reading the market, not as a budget. Ads show to ChatGPT users on the Free and Go plans [3], so the audience is broad and the value of a click varies enormously by what you sell. The sensible sequence is a small deliberate test, a read of what a converting click actually costs you, and only then a budget decision.

How does an agency get invited into the account?

The advertiser creates its own account first, then invites the agency in as a user. OpenAI does not support an agency creating an advertiser account on a client’s behalf, and each advertiser needs an account of its own [2].

That is the correct shape, and it is the shape we run. The account, the billing and the entity stay yours. We are invited into it, and the automation writes, tests and optimises the campaigns from inside your account, which is exactly how our ChatGPT ads service is structured for every client on the retainer. The retainer covers that work and never covers your ad spend or your ad account fees.

If your country is not on the list, the route is different and it is covered in full in ChatGPT ads from a country that is not listed. If you also run ads on the ordinary platforms, the same policy first discipline applies there through ads automation.

To have the entity, the account and the first campaigns set up for you, book a call. Retainers are on pricing, and the rest of these questions sit on the answers hub.

Sources: OpenAI’s Ads Manager Availability, Ads Manager Beta Account Setup and Ads in ChatGPT basics pages, read 2026-09-21 and recorded in the Grey Manager keyword research round one.