ChatGPT ads have been open to Canadian advertisers since spring 2026. In September, we launched our first test for a B2B client: a cost-per-click campaign, a budget of about $40 a day, and close tracking of traffic quality. Here's how we built the campaign, our first numbers, and where this channel fits in a digital advertising strategy.
| Your question | Our short answer |
|---|---|
| Can you advertise on ChatGPT in Canada? | Yes. Ads have been shown to Free and Go plan users since April 16, 2026, and the self-serve Ads Manager is available in beta. |
| What budget for a first test? | We started with about $40 a day for four weeks, using cost-per-click bidding, without touching budgets on other platforms. |
| How do you target users? | With contextual hints that describe the conversations you want to reach. They are neither exact-match keywords nor demographic profiles. |
| What results after the first few days? | A CTR of almost 2% and a CPC under $2. |
| Does it replace Google Ads? | No. ChatGPT Ads works mainly during the research phase; Google Ads captures purchase intent that's already been expressed. |
| Which businesses should advertise on ChatGPT? | B2B or B2C companies with technical or competitive products that buyers research and compare before purchasing. |
| Should you get started now? | Yes, for a controlled test with a dedicated budget and GA4 tracking ready from the very first click. |
Why we tested ChatGPT advertising in fall 2026
Every new ad platform opens a short window. Costs aren't set yet, competition is still limited, and early advertisers learn faster. We wanted to measure that window with real data rather than comment on other people's announcements.
A channel open to Canadian advertisers since spring
OpenAI launched its advertising pilot in the United States on February 9, 2026. Ads arrived in Canada on April 16, 2026, for Free and Go plan users. On May 5, OpenAI opened a self-serve Ads Manager in beta, with cost-per-click bidding and new measurement tools.
Source: New ways to buy ChatGPT ads, OpenAI, May 2026
Source: ChatGPT Ads 2026: What It Is and How It Works, Deeploy, August 2026
In practice, the ad appears as a card labelled as sponsored, placed below ChatGPT's answer. It is not inserted into the answer itself. OpenAI states that advertisers receive neither users' conversations nor their personal information.
Ads also have no influence on the answer a user receives.
Key stat: In the week ending July 3, 2026, an ad accompanied 53.6% of ChatGPT responses measured in Canada on the Free and Go plans, compared with 51.0% in the United States. That puts Canada among the markets most exposed to this new ad format.
Source: ChatGPT Ads Hit 51% of US Replies, Live in 6 Nations, Tech Insider, 2026
Why advertising on ChatGPT made sense for a specific audience
Because ChatGPT ads are served based on users' prompts and conversations, we could target specific, technical topics and reach a well-defined audience.
Example: A business owner researching a CRM software solution could see an ad for data storage options.
Test context: a B2B client, a technical product, a modest budget
For confidentiality reasons, we're not naming the client. It's a B2B SMB that sells technical products to professional buyers, in both French and English. The test runs on a dedicated, additional budget: it takes nothing away from existing campaigns.
Our B2B client sells technical products with a long sales cycle. Their buyers tend to ask open-ended questions before contacting a supplier. For example: how do you compare two technologies? Which equipment fits my situation? How much does an upgrade cost?
We had already analyzed the client's traffic sources, and they were receiving organic traffic from ChatGPT.
The platform reaches their potential buyers earlier in the research process than Google does.
The test had to answer one specific question: is ChatGPT traffic qualified, or is it mostly curiosity?
Why a technical product makes a good test case
A technical product triggers specific questions before purchase. That's exactly the kind of conversation where a relevant ad becomes useful.
With a long decision cycle, ChatGPT helps buyers think things through and find information in a niche sector, where information can be hard to find.
Campaign settings
- Duration: four weeks, from September 16 to October 16, 2026
- Budget: $1,300 for the month
- Bidding: cost per click (CPC)
- Languages: one ad group in French and one in English
- Measurement: traffic and conversions tracked in GA4
What we consider a success
We're not judging this test on lead volume. With one month of delivery, volume would be too low to draw a conclusion. Instead, we measure traffic quality: engagement, time on site, pages per session, calls and form submissions.
| Metric | Starting target | Our reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| Impressions | 5,000 to 15,000 | Enough volume to read the data |
| Click-through rate (CTR) | Above 0.5% | Minimum ad relevance threshold |
| Clicks | 180 to 250 | Based on a CPC of about $5 |
| CPM | $35 | Based on available industry studies |
| Average CPC | $3 to $5 | Above $7, we adjust the contextual hints |
Source: Ursa Marketing internal data, campaign plan, September 2026.
Sources: ChatGPT Ads and ChatGPT Ads: What Advertisers Need to Know in 2026
How we set up our ChatGPT ad campaign, in brief
Setting up a ChatGPT Ads campaign looks a lot like what we do on other platforms, with a few differences that change your habits. We'll cover the full setup in a dedicated guide. Here's what you need to know.
A simple, bilingual structure
OpenAI's Ads Manager has three levels: campaign, ad group and ad. We created a single campaign with two ad groups (French and English) and three ads per group. This structure keeps the data readable despite a modest budget.
Source: ChatGPT Ads Manager: How OpenAI's Self-Serve Platform Works, WebFX, August 2026
Contextual hints instead of keywords
This is the biggest change. On ChatGPT, you don't target exact keywords or interests. You write contextual hints: natural-language phrases that describe the conversations where your ad should appear.
Take a fictional example. A window manufacturer would write "commercial window replacement" or "energy efficiency in an industrial building." They wouldn't describe a profile like "property manager aged 35 to 54."
Warning: Beyond geography, you don't control who sees the ad. Hints describe a conversation topic, not a person. A hint that's too broad attracts the merely curious; a hint that's too narrow generates almost no impressions.
Short ads where every word counts
The format is very constrained: a short headline, a one-line description, a square image and the landing page URL. Our ads had at most 25 characters for headlines and 50 characters for descriptions. We built each one around a single product benefit, with the product name in the headline.
Pro tip: Write your ads as the logical next step after an answer to a specific intent, not as a slogan. The person just asked ChatGPT a question. An ad that extends their thinking is more likely to earn the click.
Tracking ready before the first click
We chose CPC bidding over conversion optimization. That option was too new, and our conversion volume too low for the algorithm to learn. Every click was tracked with UTM parameters, which isolates ChatGPT traffic in a dedicated GA4 segment. To get precise tracking and reliable data, the OpenAI Pixel and tags were installed in the client's Google Tag Manager.
Source: ChatGPT Ads 2026: What It Is and How It Works, Deeploy, August 2026
Our first ChatGPT advertising results after a few days
These numbers are preliminary. The test ends on October 16, 2026, and we'll publish the full results in a dedicated article. Still, they give a first read on what this channel can deliver for a B2B SMB.
Early numbers vs. our targets
| Metric | Four-week target | Results to date |
|---|---|---|
| Impressions | 22,000 | 38,009 |
| CPM | $35 | $24.37 |
| Clicks | 255 | 654 |
| Click-through rate (CTR) | Above 0.5% | 1.72% |
| Average CPC | $3 to $5 | $1.39 |
| Spend | About $1,275 | $868.93 |
Source: Ursa Marketing internal data, September 16 to October 7, 2026.
Overall CTR is 1.72%, more than three times the 0.5% threshold we set. The $1.39 average CPC is well below the expected $3 to $5 range, which allowed us to generate 654 clicks for $869.
On the conversion side, the platform reports 16 conversions at a $54.31 CPA, something we didn't expect this early in the test.
The gap between languages is also worth watching: the French ad group shows a 2.08% CTR and a $1.01 CPC, compared with 1.06% and $2.71 for the English group.
Competition is likely lower in French on the platform, as shown by a $21.99 CPM in French versus $28.42 in English.
What traffic quality tells us
In GA4, the ChatGPT segment shows a 32% engagement rate and an average session duration of 34 seconds, with 1.1 pages per session. These numbers are lower than the site average (43% engagement, 2.5 pages per session), but comparable to the same client's Performance Max campaigns, which show a 32% engagement rate and 1.4 pages per session.
The difference comes down to conversions: 6 form submissions and calls recorded over the period (vs. 16 conversions reported in ChatGPT), for a 1.2% conversion rate, lower than the Google Performance Max campaign (2.7%). That's a volume we didn't expect to reach with a $40-a-day test budget.
What we're watching closely
- Conversion rate stability: 6 conversions out of 483 sessions is encouraging, but too early to confirm a trend.
- The gap between languages: The French group costs 2.7 times less per click. We'll see whether the gap narrows as the algorithm gathers data, or whether it reflects a market reality.
- The winning ad: With three ads per group, we're identifying the product benefit that drives the most qualified clicks.
- Post-click behaviour: A strong CTR followed by a high bounce rate signals a mismatch between the ad and the page, meaning low-quality traffic.
Expert insight: "I'm very surprised by the early results and the number of conversions. We'll keep monitoring the results closely for the rest of the test." Simon, Digital Marketing Strategist, Ursa Marketing.
ChatGPT Ads vs. Google Ads vs. LinkedIn Ads: what role for each?
ChatGPT Ads doesn't replace the platforms you already use. It covers a different moment in the buyer journey. The table below summarizes where each one fits in a B2B digital advertising strategy, based on our experience.
| Criteria | ChatGPT Ads | Google Ads | LinkedIn Ads |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buyer journey stage | Research and consideration | Expressed intent, often close to purchase | Awareness and targeted prospecting |
| Targeting logic | Contextual hints and geography | Keywords, audiences and precise geography | Job title, industry and company size |
| Main format | Text and image card below the answer | Text, Shopping, Video and Display ads | Sponsored content, video and native lead gen forms |
| Measurement | Pixel, Conversions API, aggregated reports | Mature ecosystem connected to GA4 | Insight Tag and lead gen forms |
| Maturity | Beta, new features added monthly | Mature platform | Mature platform |
Where ChatGPT Ads stands out
The channel reaches buyers while they're thinking things through, at a moment when they're actively looking for an answer. Competition remains low in 2026, which leaves room for SMBs. OpenAI is also shipping features at a steady pace: conversion-based bidding and geographic exclusions have been available since late July 2026.
For now, ads are displayed one at a time. Users can only see one ad at once, which gives advertisers a degree of exclusivity.
Source: ChatGPT Ads Manager: How OpenAI's Self-Serve Platform Works, WebFX, August 2026
Where it still falls short
Targeting remains less granular than on other platforms. Custom audiences also require at least 25,000 matched users, a high bar for a B2B SMB.
The platform also doesn't show the prompts and questions users asked (at least for now). So you can't really tell which request triggered your ad.
We don't recommend the platform for businesses targeting office workers. More and more companies provide paid plans, which keep their employees' conversations ad-free.
Source: ChatGPT Ads Countries: Where You Can Run Them in 2026, IOquery, June 2026
Should you invest in ChatGPT advertising now?
Our short answer: yes for a controlled, closely monitored test; no for an overhaul of your media mix. The channel is promising, but its features change every month. It all depends on your product, your sales cycle and the strength of your measurement.
Beyond our own test, businesses with niche products tend to perform better on this platform thanks to highly specific intent.
Source: LinkedIn posts, June 2026
Businesses that should test now
- B2B companies whose customers compare options for a long time before contacting a supplier, and who have little time to find one.
- Manufacturers and distributors of technical products that raise a lot of questions.
- Professional services firms, where each contract has a high value.
- Organizations that already have reliable GA4 tracking and an up-to-date CRM.
Signs you should wait
- Your overall budget doesn't allow for a dedicated test amount.
- Your current campaigns lack conversion tracking.
- Your industry is in one of OpenAI's restricted categories.
- Your customers are likely to have a paid ChatGPT plan. As a reminder, users on paid plans don't see ads.
What a ChatGPT advertising agency brings to the test
The platform can be set up in a few hours. The real value lies in the preparation: well-crafted contextual hints, ads tailored to the format, and measurement that separates real prospects from casual visitors. That's where a ChatGPT ads agency saves you time and budget.
A young channel worth a test, not a gamble
Advertising on ChatGPT is no longer reserved for big American brands. It already reaches a large share of Canadian users while they're thinking about their purchases. Waiting for the channel to mature means leaving the first learnings, and the lowest costs, to your competitors.
In 2026, the businesses that win on this channel won't be the ones that spend the most. They'll be the ones that show up with solid measurement, ads designed for the conversation, and the patience to read data that's still young. Our full results will follow at the end of October, along with a detailed setup guide.
A well-run test doesn't require a big budget or a strategy overhaul. Above all, it requires rigour. Want to know how ChatGPT ads can fit into your digital advertising strategy? Let's talk about your project and build your test together.
ChatGPT ads FAQ
How much does it cost to advertise on ChatGPT?
The self-serve Ads Manager has no minimum spend. At launch, OpenAI recommended a starting bid of $3 to $5 per click for CPC campaigns. For our B2B test, we planned about $40 a day for four weeks. That's enough to spot trends, but not to draw a definitive conclusion.
Can advertisers read my conversations with ChatGPT?
No. OpenAI states that advertisers receive neither users' conversations nor their personal information. Performance reports are aggregated. Advertisers see impressions, clicks and conversions, but never the content of the conversations.
What's the difference between ChatGPT Ads and Google Ads?
Google Ads Search campaigns target keywords typed into a search engine, often when purchase intent is clear. ChatGPT Ads targets the context of a conversation, using hints written in natural language. This type of placement is closer to Google Display placements. In our experience, the two complement each other: ChatGPT feeds the research, Google captures the demand. We don't recommend moving a high-performing Google Ads budget to ChatGPT.
How do you measure ChatGPT Ads campaign results?
Add UTM parameters to every landing page URL and create a dedicated segment in GA4. Then install OpenAI's Pixel or Conversions API to track key actions. Finally, compare those conversions with your CRM to keep only real prospects.
Does ChatGPT advertising replace GEO?
No, the two work together. Advertising buys a spot below the answer for the length of the campaign. Generative engine optimization (GEO) aims to get your business cited in the answer itself, over the long term. A brand that ChatGPT already cites also makes its ads more credible.