What it means for your advertising
People now ask these tools the questions they used to type into a search engine, often in more detail: who to hire, what to buy, how to fix something. The answer usually appears in full, so fewer people click through to websites. This is sometimes called zero-click search.
Most AI search tools run on a large language model, software trained on a vast amount of text to understand a question and write a reply. The reply can mention businesses, but you can't pay to change what it says.
That leaves two ways to be seen: paid placement, such as a sponsored card beside a ChatGPT answer, and earning a place in the answers themselves, known as AEO or GEO.
An example
A café owner asks ChatGPT which UK roasters supply wholesale beans. The answer explains what to look for and names a few options. Java Roasters can appear beside that answer with a sponsored card, and may be named in the answer itself if enough reputable sites write about it.
Java Roasters is a fictional business, and its figures are illustrative.
How we handle it
We run paid advertising in AI search on ChatGPT, where your ads sit beside the answer and are labelled Sponsored. Earning a place in the answers themselves is organic work, which we don't sell. When you advertise with us, our experts can review your site and suggest improvements that help there too (see GEO and AEO). Our ChatGPT advertising page covers the paid side.