Contextual Ads for ChatGPT

ChatGPT-style advertising is sponsored routing near an answer-mediated decision moment. Contextual Ads Protocol defines the machine-readable trust and offer layer beneath that surface.

The shift

Answer engines compress the commercial funnel from search, compare, trust, decide, click, buy into ask, compare, decide, route. That route can be organic, sponsored, affiliate, product-feed based, or transaction-ready. The trust problem is deciding which offers are safe to surface without behavioral surveillance.

Current contextUse the user's present task and semantic context, not cross-site behavioral profiles.

Verifiable sponsorExpose sponsor identity, domain control, and trust lineage before an offer appears.

Clear separationSponsored routes must be labeled and separated from organic answers.

Agent-readable objectMake the offer inspectable through metadata before it becomes visible in a conversation.

Canonical offer object

{
  "type": "agent_ad",
  "version": "0.1",
  "sponsor": {"name": "Example Brand", "domain": "example.com", "verification": "dns|did|fcs"},
  "offer": {"title": "Example offer", "category": "software|commerce|finance|travel", "url": "https://example.com", "pricing_model": "cpc|cpa|flat|affiliate|unknown"},
  "context": {"intent_tags": ["compare", "buy", "evaluate"], "semantic_coordinates": ["agent-commerce", "checkout", "privacy-safe"], "negative_contexts": ["health", "politics", "children"]},
  "trust": {"tracking": "none|aggregate_only", "pii": false, "behavioral_profile": false, "lineage": "verifiable"},
  "disclosure": {"label": "Sponsored", "separation_required": true}
}

Protocol surfaces

Start with agent-ad.json, then inspect agent-discovery.json and trust-resolver.json. Governance and neutral registry surfaces live at agent-ads.org.

Positioning

contextual-ads.ai is a trust-preserving ad and offer protocol for AI-mediated discovery. It is compatible with the answer-engine advertising paradigm; it does not claim integration with OpenAI, ChatGPT, Google, Perplexity, Anthropic, Microsoft, or any specific platform.