How should marketers justify adding ChatGPT ads to the media plan?

A premium price tag needs a different lens

ChatGPT advertising has arrived with the kind of pricing that will make plenty of marketers pause.

Reported UK CPMs of around £45 place it well above more familiar digital channels, at roughly four times the cost of Meta and six times that of Google Display. On a standard media plan, that makes ChatGPT look like a premium, and potentially risky, addition to the mix.

But a straight CPM comparison misses the point.

Marketers are not simply buying another impression; they are buying a different moment of attention.

This is not passive media

Unlike Meta, where brands are trying to stop a scroll, or Google Display, where they are often competing for visibility in a passive browsing environment, ChatGPT places brands inside an active decision-making context.

Users are doing much more than consuming content. They are asking questions, comparing options, narrowing choices and working through problems. That changes the quality of the impression.

A consumer asking ChatGPT for help choosing a travel destination, comparing business software, understanding mortgage options or finding the right insurance product is already in a consideration mindset. They are much closer to a decision than someone passively seeing a banner ad or being interrupted in a feed.

This is why traditional CPM benchmarking can be misleading. The question is not simply whether ChatGPT is more expensive than existing channels. It is whether the context, intent and attention justify a different valuation.

The strongest early case is in high-consideration categories

For some brands, the answer may be yes.

The strongest early case is likely to come from high lifetime value and high research categories. Financial services, travel, B2B, education, automotive, insurance and complex consumer technology are all areas where people already use AI tools to simplify decisions.

These are categories where being present at the point of recommendation could carry more value than another low-cost impression elsewhere.

CPC buying makes the test easier to justify

The commercial model is also moving quickly. OpenAI’s reported shift towards CPC buying, with early bids in the $3–5 range, gives performance marketers something more familiar to work with. It moves the conversation from paying for visibility to paying for engagement.

That matters because one of the biggest barriers to early adoption has been accountability. Premium CPMs are hard to defend without clear evidence of downstream value. CPC buying creates a clearer testing framework.

There should be a test-and-learn approach

That does not mean brands should rush in without discipline.

ChatGPT ads should not be treated as a scaled performance channel yet. The smarter approach is structured test-and-learn: tightly defined categories, clear audience hypotheses, controlled budgets and measurement frameworks that go beyond last-click attribution. The key questions should be:

What types of prompts or decision moments are relevant to our category?

What role could we credibly play in those conversations?

What creative assets do we need when the user is looking for reassurance rather than interruption?

What would success look like beyond a click?

Creative needs to earn credibility

Creative built for ChatGPT cannot simply be repurposed from search or social. The user is not looking to be entertained, interrupted or aggressively sold to. They are looking for a useful answer. In this environment, credibility matters more than attention-grabbing. That means claims need to be clear, proof points need to be strong, and landing experiences need to match the promise made in the ad. Brands need to be ready for a more interrogative user journey, especially as formats such as “Ask ChatGPT” allow people to question an ad rather than simply click it.

When users can interrogate the ad, weak claims get exposed

This could become one of the defining differences of AI advertising. In traditional digital media, the ad talks at the user. In conversational environments, the user can talk back. They can ask why a product is recommended, compare it with competitors, challenge the claim or seek alternatives. That raises the bar for brands, it also creates an opportunity. Brands with clear differentiation, strong proof, useful content and well-structured product information are better placed to perform in AI-mediated environments. Brands relying on vague messaging or thin claims may find the format less forgiving.

The market is already taking it seriously

The broader market signals are also hard to ignore. Partnerships with major agency groups suggest this is not being treated as a speculative side project. The infrastructure around buying, planning and optimisation is starting to form. That does not make ChatGPT ads a must-buy for every advertiser today, but it does make them difficult to ignore. The real advantage is early learning

The right question is not “is the CPM too high?” It is “what would we need to learn now to be ready when this becomes easier to buy, measure and scale?”

As with previous platform shifts, the advantage may not go to the brands that spend the most first. It will go to those that learn fastest.

For UK marketers, the immediate opportunity is to identify where conversational AI already intersects with the customer journey. If users are asking AI for help in your category, then the media plan needs to account for that behaviour.

ChatGPT ads may not yet be a core line item for every brand. But for considered, high-value and research-led categories, they are becoming a serious test case.

The brands that approach the channel with discipline now will be better placed when adoption accelerates.

Want to show up when consumers are actively considering their next move?

Get in touch to explore how your brand can build visibility, credibility and competitive advantage in AI-powered search and discovery.