Somewhere right now, your ideal franchise candidate is asking ChatGPT about your brand. And as of last month, you can pay to show up in that conversation.

ChatGPT launched its self-service ad platform for all US businesses on May 5. With a minimum daily spend of just $25 and CPCs as low as $3-5, it’s already one of the biggest advancements in paid media in years.

We’re testing ChatGPT ads. We’re excited about them. And we think you should be too.

But here’s the catch. Half of the marketing agencies rushing to add ChatGPT Ads to their services are going to run them exactly like their Google PPC playbook. And that instinct is going to waste a lot of money. Your money.

Here are three things franchise brands should understand before taking the leap.

1. Your Next Franchisee Is Already in ChatGPT

Buying a franchise is one of the most considered purchases a person can make, and for many investors, the initial research phase now takes place inside an LLM chat window.

In fact, Franchise Business Review recently published a guide to help prospects evaluate opportunities using AI tools. The guide advises uploading franchise disclosure documents (FDDs) directly into LLMs like Claude, ChatGPT, and Perplexity to compare brands more effectively. The practice has become so commonplace that some franchise attorneys have issued warnings against relying too heavily on AI during the due diligence process.

Now, by the time a serious candidate visits your franchise development website, a lot of their research has already been done. The real question is what you’re doing to make sure your brand is part of that conversation.

2. This Is Not Google PPC With a Shiny New Logo

If your agency tells you they’ve got ChatGPT ads all figured out, run. The best ones are testing, experimenting, and maybe even scoring a few early wins. But the platform is still brand new, and anyone claiming they have the playbook will be hard-pressed to deliver real results.

The truth is, ChatGPT Ads play by their own rules:

  • There’s no keyword bidding. Unlike conventional PPC campaigns, you don’t build keyword lists with match types and negatives. Instead, you provide the system context hints about the types of conversations where your brand belongs and let ChatGPT decide when to surface your ad.
  • There’s no visibility into the prompt. You can’t see what someone actually typed to trigger your ad, and you never will. OpenAI keeps conversations private from advertisers and reports back only aggregated views and clicks, which changes how campaigns are optimized.
  • Auction bids are weighed differently. Bids are weighted by context relevance, so a sharp, well-built ad on a modest bid can beat generic content with a serious budget behind it.

Your old paid search instincts still matter, but they’re a smaller piece of the puzzle than they were before.

3. ChatGPT Ads Are One Tool, Not Your Whole Strategy

Right now, ChatGPT Ads only appear for users on the platforms free and Go tiers. Users on Plus, Pro, Business, and Enterprise plans still receive an ad-free experience, which means no amount of ad spend will ever put your brand in front of them.

So how do you reach the prospects who never see an ad? You earn your way into the answer itself. When someone on a premium tier asks ChatGPT to recommend a franchise in your category, you still want to be the brand it names. That’s where generative engine optimization (GEO) comes in.

When you combine ChatGPT Ads with a strong GEO strategy, the math works in your favor:

  • GEO extends your organic reach to all of ChatGPT’s 1 billion monthly users
  • ChatGPT Ads provide a paid boost to help your brand win competitive queries

When you pair ChatGPT Ads with an effective GEO strategy, you maximize your chances of appearing where your prospects are actually doing research.

What to Look for in a ChatGPT Ads Partner

Be excited about ChatGPT Ads. (We certainly are!) Just be sure to look for an agency that treats ChatGPT Ads as a new piece of your larger AI visibility strategy, not a standalone initiative.

Here are two questions to ask when vetting potential marketing partners:

  1. Are they testing ChatGPT Ads yet?
  2. Are the people running those ads in the same room as the people handling your GEO strategy?

If the answer to either question is no, you already know what needs to change.

Elysium Marketing Group is a full-service agency where our paid and organic marketing experts work in sync, testing channels like ChatGPT Ads in real time for our franchise clients. If that’s the kind of partner you’re looking for, let’s talk.