OpenAI Adds Verified Business Profiles and AI Agents to ChatGPT

OpenAI introduced Businesses in ChatGPT in beta on Tuesday, letting companies claim verified profiles and launch AI agents that answer questions from the chatbot's users, Quartz reported. The company says 1.2 billion people use ChatGPT each week — a massive audience that businesses can now reach directly inside the app.

Through a tool called Business Hub, companies can claim their organization, manage their information, and view insights on how people engage with them. Reuters confirmed the launch, noting that OpenAI is initially rolling out Business Agents to eligible e‑commerce and online service businesses in the U.S.

After claiming a business, eligible organizations can build, test, and launch an agent. When a business appears in a model response, users can open its ChatGPT profile and, if an agent exists, start a conversation to ask follow‑up questions about its offerings. The agent conversation is labeled and separate from the user's original ChatGPT conversation, and distinct from ChatGPT's independent answers, according to OpenAI.

Businesses can sponsor their agent and use it as the destination for ChatGPT Ads. Sponsored placements are labeled and kept separate from ChatGPT's own responses. OpenAI withholds users' conversations and agent chats from businesses — a privacy line that keeps the feature from becoming a surveillance tool.

Business Hub gives verified businesses 28 days of aggregated activity, including mentions, website clicks, and discovery topics — the common themes in conversations where a business's website is cited. The insights appear only when conversations or interactions meet certain thresholds, per Quartz.

³ framed the launch as ChatGPT becoming "just a little bit more like Google" — a consumer discovery engine where businesses control how they appear. OpenAI has given no details on its verification process beyond what VP of Monetization Benji Shomair told journalists Monday: "There are multiple verification methods that we use for different types of business in different markets," TechCrunch reported.

For e‑commerce builders, the most concrete integration is Shopify. Shopify merchants can connect their store from Business Hub or directly from the Shopify admin, letting product data — including pricing and availability — flow into ChatGPT, according to Quartz. Enterprise customers and advertisers can also work with an OpenAI representative to get set up.

This follows OpenAI's September test of Sponsored Agents, which let users who tapped an ad open a dialogue with an AI agent backed by the advertiser, involving select U.S. advertisers. OpenAI also retired an earlier ChatGPT shopping effort in March that used commission fees and a checkout cart — the new model is agentic conversation, not a cart.

The launch signals OpenAI's bet that AI agents will become the front door to commerce. For developers and freelancers who build Shopify stores, e‑commerce tools, or customer‑facing services, Businesses in ChatGPT creates a new distribution surface: a verified profile and an agent that can answer customer questions without a human in the loop.

It's also a new SEO‑like battleground. The discovery topics metric mirrors what Google Search Console tells site owners about queries — except now it's about how often ChatGPT cites your business. For builders who understand both search and agentic AI, that's a wedge into a channel that's still early and uncompetitive.

The downside: Business Agents are currently limited to eligible U.S. e‑commerce and online service firms, and OpenAI hasn't shared a public roadmap for broader access. OpenAI said it plans to extend the feature to more markets and categories and build tools for organizations with more complex needs.