https://gnosly.com/feed/ads/Business Intelligence Console and Prediction Algorithms3839<p>Excerpt from <a href="https://ecommerceresearch.org/chatgpt-ads/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Can Advertising Fund Free AI? Evidence from ChatGPT's International Advertising Rollout</a>, a study made by Researchers Maximilian Kaiser and Christian Schulze</p><p>The researchers analyzed nearly 10 billion visits across 1,898 websites over 60 weeks, comparing markets with ChatGPT ads against an ad-free European control group.</p><p><strong>Context:</strong></p><p>Advertising could keep AI assistants free and make ChatGPT a Google Search competitor if advertisements do not devalue the product and justify its price. This study tests both conditions during ChatGPT's staggered international rollout, with the European Union untreated, using data from 1,898 online shops selling $16 billion annually. </p><p>The introduction of advertisements moderately reduces the volume but not the conversion of organic ChatGPT referrals, a proxy for product value. However, paid ChatGPT visits perform worst among major channels, offering less than a sixth of the value for money of paid Google Search. Current performance is not sufficient to finance free access costs.</p><h3><strong>Findings</strong>: </h3><p><strong>(1) After the introduction of ads, organic ChatGPT referrals fell by about 6 to 8%.</strong></p><p>Volume changed by −5.9% over the first 13 post-launch weeks (95% interval −12.6% to +1.2%). Allowing for ChatGPT's faster usage growth in North America than in Europe moves the estimate to −7.2% to −8.4%.</p><p><strong>(2) Visitors who still arrived converted as before.</strong></p><p>Organic ChatGPT conversion changed by −0.02 percentage points from a 2.21% pre-launch baseline (p = .648).</p><p><strong>(3) Paid ChatGPT visits generated less value for advertisers than paid search.</strong></p><p>In US traffic, a paid ChatGPT visit generated $0.89 in revenue per session against $2.45 for a paid Google Search visit, a 64% shortfall. Paid ChatGPT visitors converted at 0.37% versus 1.17%.</p><p><strong>(4) Actual prices are more than six times the parity price compared to Google Search</strong>.</p><p>At paid search's rate of return, a paid ChatGPT click is worth about $0.26. The largest publicly known account paid $1.72 per click. </p>https://ecommerceresearch.org/chatgpt-ads/0.00202026-11-04T06:11:37.444474+00:0045ecommerceresearch.orgchatgptaiadsgoogle3752IMAGE/media/content/3839/20261104-ai-ads-perf-1.png20261104-ai-ads-perf-1.pngpng2026-11-04T06:20:38.648986+00:00