Ask ChatGPT for “the best running shoes for flat feet” or “a good accounting tool for a small shop” and watch what happens. It doesn’t just hand out advice anymore. It names brands, links to their websites and compares them side by side, often before the person has opened a single search result.
For years, getting found online meant two things: ranking on Google and keeping your Google Business Profile tidy. Both still matter. But a growing share of buying research now happens inside AI conversations, and until recently, businesses had no official say in how they showed up there. That changed on 10 November 2026, when OpenAI launched Businesses in ChatGPT in beta.
Quick answer: Businesses in ChatGPT is a beta feature from OpenAI that lets owners claim their business through Business Hub, verify it, keep their details accurate, and see how often ChatGPT mentions them and sends people to their website.
At tsh.media, a big part of our AI search work is studying which brands AI assistants recommend, and why. So we went through OpenAI’s announcement, its setup guide and the early hands-on reports to put together this plain-language guide. You’ll learn what the feature is, who can use it right now, how to claim and verify your listing step by step, and what you can do today to get mentioned more often, even if your business isn’t eligible yet.
What Is Businesses in ChatGPT?
Businesses in ChatGPT is OpenAI’s new way for companies to connect with the 1.2 billion people who use ChatGPT every week. Think of it as an owner’s desk inside ChatGPT. You can’t buy your way to the top of an answer here. What you can do is give ChatGPT accurate facts about your business and see how people find you.
The feature has 3 parts
1. Business Hub: claim and manage your profile
Business Hub is the dashboard where you claim your business, prove you own it and update its details. Once your identity is verified, your profile can show a verified badge, which tells people the information comes from the business itself.
2. Insights: see how people engage with you
The insights screen shows how often ChatGPT mentions you, how many people view your profile and how many click through to your website. It also shows “discovery topics”, the common themes in conversations where your website gets cited.
3. Business Agents: let customers chat with your brand
Eligible businesses can set up a Business Agent. A shopper comparing two products can open a separate, clearly labelled chat with your brand and ask follow-up questions. The agent answers using the product information and instructions you supply.
Who can use it right now?
This is a beta, so access is limited. Here’s where things stand as of November 2026:
- You need a ChatGPT account, and you must own the business or be authorised to represent it.
- Local stores and restaurants can currently claim only an existing listing in the US.
- Eligible online businesses may be able to add a listing that doesn’t exist yet, starting with their website.
- Business Agents are starting with eligible e-commerce and online service businesses in the US.
For Indian businesses, the takeaway is simple. If you sell online, open Business Hub and check what it offers you. If you run a local shop, clinic or restaurant, you may not be able to claim yet, but the groundwork you lay today decides how well you show up when access widens.
How ChatGPT Finds and Shows Businesses
Before you claim anything, it helps to understand where ChatGPT’s knowledge about your business comes from. Claiming a profile is one input, not the whole picture.
Your website and the wider web still do the heavy lifting
When someone asks a buying question, ChatGPT pulls from websites, reviews, articles and other public sources, then cites the pages it relied on. If your website explains what you sell clearly, and trusted sites talk about you, you’re far more likely to be named. This is the core of AI search visibility: being the source an assistant trusts enough to quote.
Your profile adds verified facts on top
A claimed profile gives ChatGPT information straight from you: your description, website, contact details and, for online stores, your product catalogue with prices and stock. OpenAI says this helps people explore products and services using the most accurate and up-to-date details. In practice, it reduces the chance of an assistant repeating an old price, a closed branch or a product you no longer sell.
It looks a lot like a Google Business Profile, with one key difference
If you’ve managed a Google Business Profile, much of this will feel familiar: claim, verify, update, check the numbers. The difference is the setting. On Google, people scan a list of results. In ChatGPT, they’re in a conversation, and the assistant often recommends just a few names. Fewer slots means accuracy and reputation count for more.
We’ve written about how this shift is already changing traditional rankings in How Google’s AI Search Results Are Reshaping Organic SEO Performance, if you want the bigger picture.
How to Get Your Business Listed on ChatGPT: Step by Step
The whole process takes six steps: find your business, verify it, wait for approval, confirm your identity and then update your details. Here’s the full flow at a glance.
Watch a quick video guide to understand how business owners can claim, verify and manage their business listings on ChatGPT.
Before you start: what you’ll need
A smooth business listing on ChatGPT starts with a little preparation. Keep these ready:
- The right ChatGPT account. Use the account that will manage the business long term, not a throwaway login. Inviting teammates or an agency later can depend on it.
- One way to prove you’re connected to the business. That could be the business phone number, a business email address, access to your website’s DNS settings or the matching online store.
- Identity documents. OpenAI says you may need a government-issued ID, your business registration details and proof that you can represent the business.
Step 1: Open Business Hub
Sign in to ChatGPT and select Business Hub from the sidebar. You can also go directly to chatgpt.com/business-hub.
Step 2: Search for your business and start the claim
Search for your business by name and select the matching listing. Click Get started, then confirm which ChatGPT account will manage the profile.
A few things can happen here:
- Your business isn’t listed. Eligible online businesses may be able to create a profile, starting with their website.
- You see “Contact support”. The listing is locked, so you’ll need to reach OpenAI’s support team.
- Someone else has already claimed it. Use the ownership dispute option in Business Hub and share evidence that the business is yours.
Never claim a different business as a stand-in for yours. The listing must match the business you represent.
Step 3: Verify your claim
Business Hub only shows the verification methods available for your listing. You’ll see one or more of these four.
1. Verify with your business phone
Choose a text message or an automated call to the business number on the listing, then enter the code you receive.
2. Verify with your business email
Select Get code, check the business inbox and enter the code.
3. Verify with your website domain
ChatGPT shows you a TXT record. Add it to your domain’s DNS settings, give it some time to update, then return and select Verify domain. If you don’t manage your own DNS, ask your web developer or hosting provider; it’s a five-minute job for them. Our website development team handles this for clients regularly.
4. Verify with your online store
Shopify merchants can select Connect Shopify and log in. This verifies the claim and can share your catalogue, prices and stock in one go. You can start from Business Hub or from the ChatGPT app in your Shopify admin.
Step 5: Confirm your identity
An approved claim gets you in the door, but not much further. Before you can publish profile changes, connect a product feed, see insights or create an agent, the person managing the listing must pass a separate identity check run by OpenAI’s verification partner. Select Verify on the overview screen and submit the requested documents. Your verified badge appears once this check is approved.
Step 6: Update your business information
Now review every field: your description, website, contact details and, for online stores, your products. Treat it like the front page of your business, because for many people, it will be.
A note for businesses working with an agency
If an agency manages your marketing, the owner should claim the business first and then add the agency from Business Hub, using the agency’s own ChatGPT account. Never forward a claim invitation or share your login. That’s exactly how we set things up for tsh.media clients.
After You Claim: Managing Your Profile and Reading the Numbers
Claiming is a one-time job. Getting value from the ChatGPT Business Hub is ongoing, and it comes down to three habits.
Keep your information current
Every time your hours, prices, offers, or product range change, update your profile. Online stores can upload a product feed with prices and stock levels, while Shopify merchants can connect their store so the catalogue syncs automatically. An outdated feed is worse than no feed, because the assistant may recommend something a customer can’t actually buy.
Read your insights the right way
The insights screen gives you four numbers worth watching:
- Mentions: how often ChatGPT referenced your business or website in answers.
- Profile views: how many people opened your business profile.
- Website clicks: recorded clicks on links to your site. OpenAI notes that a click doesn’t confirm an actual visit or a sale, so match this against your own website analytics.
- Discovery topics: the recurring themes in conversations where your website is cited. If you sell kids’ furniture and a top topic is “space-saving beds for small flats”, that tells you what people associate you with.
Two things to keep in mind. First, insights are shared in aggregate and only appear once there’s enough activity to protect user privacy, so a new or small business may see blank charts for a while. Second, OpenAI says it doesn’t share users’ chats with businesses, including conversations with Business Agents. You’ll see patterns, not individual questions.
Set up a Business Agent if you’re eligible
For eligible US ecommerce and online service businesses, a Business Agent works like a well-trained sales assistant. It’s built from the instructions and product feed you provide, and conversations with it are labelled and kept separate from the main chat. You can’t plug in your own outside chatbot. Before you switch it on, decide who owns the agent’s content: approved product details, return and delivery policies, and the questions it should not answer.
Listing vs Workspace: Don’t Mix Up These 2 Products
Search for ChatGPT for business and you’ll find two very different things with confusingly similar names. One puts your company in front of customers. The other gives your team a shared AI workspace.
ChatGPT Business (called ChatGPT Team until August 2025) is a paid subscription for organisations. It gives your staff a shared workspace with central billing, admin controls and access to features like projects, custom GPTs and deep research. It needs at least two paid seats, and OpenAI says it doesn’t train its models on your workspace data.
The business listing feature, on the other hand, is about how customers discover you inside ChatGPT. You don’t need a paid plan, an ads account or an enterprise agreement to claim an eligible listing.
|
Factors |
Business listing (Business Hub) |
ChatGPT Business plan |
|
Purpose |
Help customers find and trust your business |
Help your team work with AI |
|
Who uses it |
Owners, marketers, agencies |
Employees inside your company |
|
Cost to start |
No paid plan needed to claim |
Paid per seat, minimum two seats |
|
What you get |
Profile, verified badge, insights, Business Agents (eligible businesses) |
Shared workspace, admin controls, privacy commitments |
|
Main benefit |
Visibility and accurate information in answers |
Productivity and collaboration |
Many businesses will end up using both, but you can claim your listing without ever buying a workspace plan.
How to Get Discovered More Often in AI Answers
A claimed profile tells ChatGPT who you are. Whether it actually recommends you depends on what the rest of the internet says. Improving that is what marketers now call generative engine optimization (GEO): shaping your content and reputation so AI assistants understand, trust and cite you. Here’s what works.
1. Answer real customer questions on your website
Assistants quote pages that answer questions directly. Write service and product pages in plain language, add a short FAQ to each, and state the basics clearly: what you offer, who it’s for, where you operate and what it costs.
2. Keep your facts identical everywhere
Your business name, address, phone number, hours and prices should match across your website, Google Business Profile, social media pages and directories. When sources disagree, assistants either pick the wrong version or skip you.
3. Earn mentions on sites people trust
Reviews, press coverage, industry roundups, comparison articles and genuine forum discussions all shape how AI describes you. Encourage happy customers to leave detailed reviews that mention what you did for them.
4. Help machines read your pages
Add structured data (schema markup) for your organisation, products, FAQs and reviews. Also check that your robots.txt file doesn’t block OpenAI’s search crawler, OAI-SearchBot. If the crawler can’t read your site, your pages can’t be cited.
5. Use discovery topics as a content brief
Once your insights start showing, look at which topics you’re cited for and which ones are missing. If you sell office chairs and “chairs for back pain” never appears, that’s your next guide, comparison page or video.
6. Track clicks next to your own analytics
Compare ChatGPT’s click numbers with your website analytics and enquiry data. Over a few months, you’ll learn which topics bring buyers rather than browsers.
If you’d rather have specialists handle this, our AI SEO services focus on getting brands cited in AI assistants and AI-powered search results.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
The feature is new, but the early slip-ups are already easy to spot. Save yourself the trouble.
- Claiming with a personal or throwaway account. If that person leaves, you could lose easy access to your profile. Use an account tied to the business.
- Stopping after the claim is approved. Without the identity check, you can’t edit your profile, connect products or see insights. Finish the job.
- Treating clicks as sales. A recorded click isn’t a confirmed visit, let alone a purchase. Always cross-check with your own analytics.
- Ignoring your social profiles. Instagram bios, LinkedIn pages and Facebook details are part of the public record AI reads. Outdated or inconsistent social pages send mixed signals. If your social presence needs a refresh, working with a social media marketing agency in India that understands search can help keep everything aligned.
- Waiting for eligibility before doing anything. Your website content, reviews and consistency take months to build. Start now, so you’re ready when the claim button appears for your category or country.
How tsh.media Helps You Show Up in AI Answers
Getting listed is the easy part. Getting recommended takes a steady mix of good content, clean technical setup and a reputation that holds up wherever AI looks. That’s the work we do every day at tsh.media.
As an SEO company in India with a dedicated AI search practice, we help brands:
- Claim and set up their profile the right way, including domain verification and team access.
- Audit how AI assistants describe them today, and fix the gaps in their website and listings.
- Create content built to be cited, from FAQ-rich service pages to comparison guides.
- Add structured data and fix crawl issues that stop AI tools from reading their pages.
- Track mentions, discovery topics and clicks alongside real enquiries and sales.
Final Thoughts
Businesses in ChatGPT is still a beta, and for many Indian businesses, the claim button isn’t live yet. But the direction is clear. AI assistants are becoming a place where people find, compare and choose brands, and OpenAI has now given businesses an official seat at that table.
The brands that win won’t be the ones that rush to claim a profile and forget it. They’ll be the ones with clear websites, consistent information and a reputation worth quoting. Start building that now, and you’ll be ready the moment your listing goes live.
Ready to get your brand recommended by AI? Get a free growth plan from tsh.media, and we’ll show you how your business appears in AI answers today, and what it will take to be the name they recommend.
FAQs
1. Is it free to list my business on ChatGPT?
Yes. You don’t need a paid ChatGPT plan, an ads account or an enterprise agreement to claim an eligible listing. You only need a ChatGPT account and a way to prove you own or represent the business.
2. Is it worth getting ChatGPT for business?
Yes, getting your business listed on ChatGPT can be worthwhile. It creates another opportunity for customers to discover your brand through AI-powered search, improves your online presence, and helps your business stay prepared for the evolving digital landscape.
3. How do I verify my business on ChatGPT?
Open Business Hub, find your listing and choose an offered method: a code by text or call, a business email code, a DNS TXT record on your domain, or connecting your Shopify store. Then complete the identity check.
4. Can businesses in India claim a profile on ChatGPT?
Access is limited during the beta. Local stores and restaurants can currently claim only existing US listings, while eligible online businesses may be able to add a profile. Indian businesses should check Business Hub directly for availability.
5. What are discovery topics in ChatGPT insights?
Discovery topics are common themes across ChatGPT conversations where your website is cited. They show what people associate your business with, and they help you spot gaps worth covering with new pages, guides or product information.
