Addressability is moving beyond pure context with OpenAI’s ChatGPT ads platform.
Entrepreneur Juozas Kaziukėnas, who has access to ChatGPT’s self-serve ad platform, reported on LinkedIn:
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“Coming next to OpenAI ads: custom audiences. Advertisers will be able to upload raw or hashed emails and phone numbers to use as audience filters for campaigns. They could then use those custom audiences to only show ads to select users (enables, for example, retargeting) or exclude users (enables, for example, hiding ads from existing customers). No lookalike audiences yet, but that’s what FB/Meta brought next after first introducing custom audiences. The feature is currently in a gated rollout.”
Read more — and see the entire screenshot — on LinkedIn. (May 14)
From tipsheet: Assuming custom audiences are rolled out broadly, conversational ads are becoming increasingly programmatic.
This marks a strategic shift as OpenAI accelerates its effort to build advertising into a meaningful business.
Allowing audience retargeting in its free and $8 “Go” version of ChatGPT is light years beyond the misgivings executives — namely CEO Sam Altman — had expressed about advertising in ChatGPT less than a year ago.
The addition of audience retargeting speaks directly to the feedback OpenAI is receiving from marketers, agencies and ad tech platforms. Simultaneously, OpenAI must balance these targeting capabilities with user trust. Still, most consumers are already accustomed to audience retargeting across the open internet and inside walled gardens.
The next major question is whether OpenAI eventually expands beyond uploaded audiences into lookalikes, modeled conversion optimization or broader identity graph partnerships. That could also create a new channel for identity platforms such as LiveRamp.
At that point, ChatGPT ads begin looking less like an experimental conversational format and more like a fully-fledged programmatic media platform.
LLMs & CHATBOTS
Developments
- 2028: Two scenarios for global AI leadership (May 14) – Anthropic
- OpenAI is reportedly preparing legal action against Apple (May 14) – TechCrunch
- Universities Are Betting Big on AI — and Some Are Already Cashing In (May 14) – The EDU Ledger
BRANDS
Meta ad revenue projections
“Meta is expected to earn $240 billion from advertising this year, growing over 22.3% year-over-year and outpacing global social-media ad growth, according to a new forecasting report from WARC Media. In 2025, Meta’s ad business grew 22%, reaching $196 billion in revenue. For 2026, WARC forecasts a slightly higher growth rate, which the media company anticipates will dip down to 12% in 2027.” (May 14) – Colin Kirkland, reporter, MediaPost
Read: “Meta 2026 Ad Forecast: Approaching A Quarter Trillion Dollars” (May 14) – MediaPost
PLATFORMS
Adform’s agent-accessible platform strategy
Independent ad tech platform Adform announced that it was going “all-in” on an agentic future by making much of its platform stack available to agents.
CTO/CPO Jochen Schlosser of Denmark-based Adform said in a release, “While much of the industry is releasing limited, handcrafted agentic use cases, Adform is going all-in by making the full breadth of the FLOW platform available through the agent of your choice. This is not a concept or a future promise. It is a live setup with more than 800 capabilities across the entire campaign lifecycle.”
The company said that the new updates will allow “clients to connect directly to Adform FLOW, including its integrated DSP, Ad Server, DMP, and ID Fusion, through the AI tools of their choice.”
Read: “Adform Opens Full-Stack Infrastructure for Agentic Advertising” (May 14) – ExchangeWire
From tipsheet: Adform is treating MCP less like a chatbot feature and more like infrastructure exposure. By opening up its platform stack to AI agents, Adform is positioning itself to remain a critical orchestration and execution layer in an agentic advertising future.
Related: “Upfronts 2026: Agentic, outcomes and fandom are this year’s buzzwords” (May 14) – The Trade Desk’s The Current
PLATFORMS
Amazon says no more Selling Partner API fees
Continuing its strategy of creating efficiencies for commerce/ad tech companies — many of which are AWS customers — Amazon has decided against instituting fees for a critical API feed.
Previewing her article on LinkedIn, Adweek’s Kathryn Lindstrom wrote:
“Last fall, Amazon told third-party ad tech companies they’d have to pay to use its Selling Partner API starting this year. That spooked a lot of smaller vendors that rely on the API — and many scrambled to try to optimize requests. This week, Amazon made a U-turn, telling tech developers in an email that it was scrapping the fees altogether.”
Read more on LinkedIn. (May 14)
Read: “Amazon Scraps Planned API Fees After Backlash From Tech Firms” (May 14) – Adweek (subscription)
From tipsheet: Amazon continues to reduce friction for ad tech and commerce partners. See recent news regarding DSP fees, RTB Fabric and open-sourcing of Dynamic Traffic Engine.
LLMs & CHATBOTS
OpenAI turns on the spigot for ChatGPT ads
Demand-side platform StackAdapt opened access to ChatGPT advertising to all of its clients this week as OpenAI continues expanding ChatGPT’s conversational advertising business.
Digiday’s Krystal Scanlon reports that OpenAI is in a race to get demand into the platform, writing that “OpenAI is building the ad tech stack it’s currently borrowing.”
Read: Ad tech is lining up behind OpenAI (it’s been here before) (May 13) – Digiday (subscription)
On LinkedIn, OpenAI Head of Global Ads Solutions David Dugan pointed to the Digiday article and wrote:
“Our ChatGPT ads platform has new news on a constant basis. My colleagues and I had a great week in London meeting with our close agency partners and their clients in advance of our UK alpha launch in the coming weeks. I’m deeply grateful for their energy, wisdom, and spirit of partnership.”
Read more on LinkedIn. (May 13)
From tipsheet: Presumably, other known partners (the agency holding companies, Criteo, Pacvue, Kargo and Adobe) are opening up access to ChatGPT ads as well.
The next partnership milestone will be the entry of even larger demand partners such as AppLovin and The Trade Desk. But the opportunity may still lack the scale, tooling and performance proof required for that tier of demand.
And then there’s Scanlon’s larger point: ChatGPT’s self-serve ads platform is being built in parallel. OpenAI is simultaneously trying to accelerate demand while reducing dependence on intermediaries. Expansion into international markets is another demand catalyst for OpenAI’s ad business.
We’re still waiting to hear credible case studies around conversational ad performance. That’s a major ‘shoe’ yet to drop. Are these ads outperforming traditional search ads? Comparable? Worse? The market still doesn’t know.
Related: “Marketers put up guardrails as AI agents reshape programmatic buying” (May 14) – Digiday
AGENCIES
Quote: AI turns clean rooms into intelligence infra
WPP Global President, Data and Technology Solutions, Lauren Wetzel, was making the AI case for brands in a post on LinkedIn.
Wetzel joined WPP when data clean room InfoSum was acquired by the agency holding company in 2025. Today she’s Global President, Data and Technology Solutions at WPP.
She wrote yesterday:
“There’s an important distinction between data and intelligence. And the difference is exciting and empowering for brands.
Data alone is valuable, but limited. Intelligence results from collaboration across many datasets, where AI effortlessly connects vast, complex signals in ways we simply weren’t able to before.
If you think about the AI assistant you use most. Chances are, it performs best because it has accumulated context over time from the different bits of information you’ve given it.
This same concept should excite brands, especially those that feel they don’t have much data. Through data collaboration, they’re empowered to build always-on data ecosystems (private data networks) that turn decentralized signals from across their brand, media, and data partners into live intelligence.”
Read more on LinkedIn. (May 14)
From tipsheet: Clean rooms are evolving from privacy infrastructure into intelligence infrastructure thanks to AI.
GOVERNANCE
New campaign data standards from IAB
The IAB released new campaign data standards for public comment that could have implications for machine readability and interoperability.
The trade organization said the new “1.0” standards are part of “Project Eidos,” an initiative meant “to modernize and streamline key elements of the digital advertising ecosystem.”
Angelina Eng, VP, Measurement Center, IAB said in a release, “Different naming conventions, misaligned classifications, and siloed datasets make it hard to reconcile data, slowing down reporting and pulling focus away from analysis and optimization. These standards are about creating a common language so the industry can move faster, reduce friction, and get to more meaningful insights.”
Read: “IAB Releases Campaign Data Standards 1.0 for Public Comment” (May 14) – press release
More: “Campaign Data Standards 1.0 for Public Comment by June 14, 2026” – IAB
From tipsheet: Standardized campaign data may become foundational infrastructure for agentic advertising. AI agents, interoperable workflows and machine-to-machine campaign execution all depend on consistent, machine-readable data structures across platforms and partners.
SEARCH
Google AI search query reporting changes
- Google Quietly Alters Search Terms Reporting For AI Queries In Google Ads (May 14) – Search Engine Journal
- “In Advanced Search Experiences The Search Terms That You Are Seeing In Your Search Query Report Might Not Be The Search Query At All!” (May 12) – Andrew Higman, CEO of Adsquire on LinkedIn
- About ad group and asset group prioritization within a Google Ads account – Google Ads Help
PEOPLE MOVES
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Former Diageo retail media lead Roger Dunn joins Thrad as Chief Commercial Officer (May 14) – LinkedIn
MORE
- AI Visibility Index: Personal Care & Beauty Leaders & Movers, April 2026 (May 14) – eMarketer
- Emerging technology trends brands and agencies need to know about (May 14) – Ad Age (subscription)
- Opinion: “The AI Chat Ad Frontier: What LLMs Change About Brand Safety And Control” (May 14) – Kevin Gentzel, Global President, Channel Factory on AdExchanger
- Opinion: “The End of the Martech Stack.” (May 14) – Jonathan Mendez on his personal blog
- As AI reshapes discovery, the checkout may become the brand experience (May 14) – The Drum (sponsored)