ChatGPT being criticized for poor ad integration

OpenAI's ChatGPT advertising test launched in early February is encountering a "hasty" and "chaotic" start. According to minutes from an expert conference call released by UBS on February 23, an industry expert managing a digital advertising budget of about $800 million bluntly stated that the ChatGPT advertising experience is "worse than Google, Meta, and even Snapchat's early days." Currently, ChatGPT advertising has a minimum spending threshold of $200,000, limiting participants to large advertisers. Although it covers clients in various industries such as furniture retail, automotive, luxury goods, all budgets come from experimental spending by businesses, with no substantial impact on Google search advertising. There are obvious shortcomings at a technical level: the advertising system lacks performance data tracking capabilities, lacks CRM integration which leads to inability to dynamically update inventory status, and relies entirely on manual operation for placement. The bidding mechanism is also primitive - determining ad display priority based only on relevance rather than a combination of "price+relevance," resulting in some users seeing irrelevant ads. The commercial performance is mixed: sponsored recommended ad CPM reaches $60, although higher than the industry average, it is still reasonable compared to Google search; however, the average conversion rate is less than 0.5%, making the cost per click around $12, and the return on investment is difficult to sustain. Experts predict that the ChatGPT advertising platform will need 6-12 months to improve its basic functions, and the minimum participation threshold is expected to gradually decrease as the system matures. However, in order to challenge Google's dominance in search advertising, OpenAI still needs to make breakthroughs in core capabilities such as precise targeting, automation tools, and performance measurement.