On 10 November 2026 OpenAI launched Businesses in ChatGPT in beta, a programme that lets companies claim their listing inside ChatGPT, keep their details up to date and see how often their website appears in answers. The entry point is Business Hub (chatgpt.com/business-hub), a dashboard that feels a lot like Google Business Profile and Search Console rolled into one.
For an online store the appeal is obvious. According to OpenAI, ChatGPT has 1.2 billion weekly users, and a growing share of product searches now starts as a conversation with an assistant. Until now a brand had no way to correct what ChatGPT said about it or to see how much traffic it was sending. Business Hub covers both, and it also lets you upload your catalogue with prices and availability.
This guide explains how to claim an ecommerce store, including from outside the US, what to prepare beforehand, how each verification method works and which data you get afterwards. It is a beta, so some steps and button labels may change over the coming weeks.
What is ChatGPT Business Hub?
Business Hub is the area of ChatGPT where a company claims its profile, verifies it and manages it. From there it can:
- Edit key business information, such as the category, description, contact details and shipping and returns policies.
- Add a product feed with prices and availability.
- View aggregated insights on mentions, website clicks and discovery topics.
- Create a Business Agent, an assistant that answers customer questions inside ChatGPT (US businesses only for now).
When a brand appears in a ChatGPT answer, users can tap it to open its profile. That profile is what you manage from Business Hub.
It is easy to confuse with ChatGPT Business, which is a paid plan for teams. You need no paid plan to claim your store (any ChatGPT account works, including a free one), and no ChatGPT Ads account or Enterprise agreement either.
Can a store outside the US sign up yet?
Yes. According to OpenAI, any eligible business located in a country where ChatGPT is available can claim its profile, Europe included. Eligibility depends on industry, location and OpenAI's verification and integrity checks, and OpenAI does not publish a fixed list of countries or eligible categories for the programme.
Two caveats matter for brands based outside the US:
- Business Agents are limited for now to US ecommerce and online service businesses. A store elsewhere can claim its profile but cannot publish its agent yet.
- Physical shops and restaurants can only claim listings that already exist in the US. If your brand has high-street stores outside the US, for now you can claim the online business only.
| Business Hub feature | Ecommerce outside the US | Ecommerce in the US |
|---|---|---|
| Claim and verify the profile | Yes | Yes |
| Edit information and policies | Yes | Yes |
| Upload a product feed | Yes | Yes |
| Mention and click insights | Yes | Yes |
| Claim physical stores | Not yet | Existing listings only |
| Business Agent | Not yet | Yes |
What do you need before you start?
Having this ready stops the claim from stalling halfway:
- A company ChatGPT account rather than a personal or borrowed one. The account that claims the business becomes its admin and is the one that invites the rest of the team later.
- A way to prove the business is yours: access to your domain's DNS, the business phone line, a company email address or your Shopify store.
- A government ID and the company's registration details (legal name, registered address and tax ID) exactly as they appear in official records.
- Your current shipping and returns policies, open in another tab.
A practical tip is to copy the legal name, address and tax ID from an official document into a note and paste them from there. Typing them from memory is the most common way an old address slips in, which usually slows the review down.
How to claim your ecommerce store, step by step
1. Open Business Hub and find your business
Sign in to ChatGPT with the company account and open Business Hub from the sidebar. You can also go straight to chatgpt.com/business-hub. Type your brand name exactly as it appears on your website and check that the listing you select really is your business.
If your online store does not appear, you will see an option to create it at the top of the results. The builder asks for a contact phone number and email (both optional), a category, a short description and your shipping and returns policies.
2. Start the claim and confirm the account
In the claim window, ChatGPT summarises what claiming the business gives you. Click the button to get started, check that the account shown is the one that should manage the profile and continue. Continuing means accepting the Businesses in ChatGPT terms, so read them first. If you are asked how customers usually reach you, choose online store.
3. Verify that the business is yours
Business Hub shows the verification methods available for your business. We cover them in detail in the next section. Pick one and complete it.
4. Wait for OpenAI's review
The claim goes through three stages: received, in review and decision reached. OpenAI emails the result to the account address and uses the same route if it needs more information. There is no official turnaround time. In one test published on launch day, approval came through in just over two hours, though this may vary. While the claim is pending you can cancel it.
5. Verify your identity with Persona
On top of proving the business is yours, OpenAI asks the person managing it to verify their identity through Persona, a third-party verification provider. We cover it further down because everything else depends on it.
6. Complete your profile and connect your catalogue
Once both approvals are in, you can edit the profile, upload your products and view your insights.
Which verification method should you choose?
Not every method appears for every business. Business Hub only shows the ones that apply to you, but these are the four OpenAI supports:
| Method | How it works | When to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Domain (DNS) | Add a TXT record to your domain's DNS. It expires after 24 hours. | If you control the DNS or your tech team can add the record straight away |
| Shopify | Connect the store from Business Hub or from the Shopify admin | If you sell on Shopify, it is the fastest route |
| Company email | A code sent to an address on the brand's domain | If you have a mailbox on your own domain |
| Phone | A code by text or call to the business number | If the store's public number is a direct line |
For an ecommerce brand, domain verification is usually the cleanest option because it ties the profile to the website ChatGPT cites. Business Hub generates a TXT record with a type, a name and a value, which you add to your domain's DNS through your provider (or send to whoever manages it). You then return to Business Hub and click the button to verify the domain. The record expires after 24 hours, so do it in one sitting. If you have already verified your site in Google Search Console via DNS, the process is almost identical.
If you sell on Shopify, connecting your store is the fastest route. You can do it from Business Hub or from the Shopify admin and, according to OpenAI, it speeds up verification.
Phone verification sends a code by text or call to the business number. Use a direct line, as switchboard extensions tend to cause problems.
What is Persona verification and why does it matter?
Persona is the service OpenAI uses to check the identity of the person claiming the business. It asks for a government ID and the company's registration details, which must match official records.
Until Persona approves the verification, you cannot publish profile changes, view insights or create an agent. Submitting your details is different from being approved, so those features stay locked until you receive confirmation. While the review is in progress you can cancel the submission if you got something wrong.
One detail deserves special attention. If you created a new profile, it goes live as soon as verification is approved, and a published profile cannot be deleted, unpublished or hidden, even through OpenAI support. Before submitting, take your time to check the name, description, category and policies. An unpublished draft can still be deleted.
How to complete your store's profile
The editable fields depend on the type of business, but for an online store they usually cover the category, description, website, contact details, logo, photos and shipping and returns policies. OpenAI reviews every change before publishing it, and updates can take a while to show up in the profile or in answers.
ChatGPT also draws on sources beyond the profile, which is why consistency matters most. A few guidelines for ecommerce brands:
- Use the same short description as on your website, your Google Business Profile and your social channels. If every source says something different, ChatGPT has to pick one.
- Write a factual description: what you sell, who it is for, where you ship from and how long delivery takes. Brand adjectives add little for an assistant looking for facts.
- Copy your shipping and returns policies exactly as they appear on your website, with the same timeframes and conditions.
- Review the profile whenever your shipping terms, return windows or contact details change.
How to upload your product catalogue
The product feed is what lets ChatGPT show your items with the right price and stock level. It works separately from the profile: the feed only carries product data and does not create or update the business listing.
If you sell on Shopify
According to OpenAI, eligible products from Shopify stores are already available in ChatGPT through Shopify Catalog. Connecting your store from Business Hub or from the Shopify admin links that catalogue to your verified profile. The ChatGPT app for Shopify is listed as free.
An automatic connection does not mean your data is in good shape. ChatGPT will show whatever is in your catalogue, so check titles, descriptions, variants, images and stock before you connect it. If your product pages are incomplete or your titles do not describe the item well, now is the time to tidy up your Shopify store's catalogue.
If you use WooCommerce, PrestaShop or another platform
You can upload a CSV file of your products or link to a feed hosted on your server. Either way, the file must follow the required fields in OpenAI's product feed specification. There are extensions for WooCommerce, PrestaShop and Magento that generate this feed and refresh it on a schedule, which is better than uploading a CSV by hand.
Whatever the platform, update frequency is what counts. If a shopper sees a price or availability in ChatGPT that does not match your website, they will most likely abandon the purchase.
What insights does Business Hub give you?
Once Persona verification is approved, the insights tab shows aggregated data for the last 28 days:
- Mentions: for an online business, a mention counts each time ChatGPT references your website in an answer.
- Clicks through to your website from ChatGPT.
- Discovery topics, the most common themes in conversations where your website appears.
OpenAI only shows these figures once there are enough conversations, so a smaller brand may wait a while before seeing data. It does not share users' conversations, exact prompts, competitor data or anything about other AI assistants.
That is why it pays to cross-check these insights against your own analytics. In GA4, ChatGPT traffic usually arrives as a chatgpt.com referral, although some visits from the mobile app can lose that information and show up as direct traffic. OpenAI recommends comparing Business Hub figures with your sales and traffic to gauge how much the channel really contributes.
How to give your team or agency access
The person who claimed the business is its admin and can add teammates or give an agency access to manage the profile. Everyone signs in with their own ChatGPT account, so do not forward your claim invitation link.
If you manage several brands, each one is claimed separately. OpenAI does not yet offer a tool to claim or update profiles in bulk.
What Business Hub does not do
Claiming your profile helps keep your information accurate, but OpenAI is clear that it does not guarantee more visibility, better placement or more sales. ChatGPT keeps making its own recommendations, and advertising does not influence them either.
For an ecommerce brand, mentions depend on ChatGPT citing your website, so the foundation is still a crawlable site with complete product pages, useful content and no robots.txt rule blocking OpenAI's search crawler (OAI-SearchBot).
At the end of the claim process, ChatGPT may offer you ad credit and an upgrade to the ChatGPT Business plan. Both are separate products you do not need for your profile. If you later decide to test ads in ChatGPT, it makes sense to assess them within your ecommerce paid media strategy, applying the same real-margin criteria as every other channel. Also look out for the OpenAI marketing emails checkbox, which comes ticked by default.
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to claim my ecommerce store in ChatGPT Business Hub? Nothing. At launch, OpenAI does not charge for claiming the profile, verifying it, managing your information, uploading a product feed or viewing insights. You need no ChatGPT Ads account and no paid plan. Advertising is a separate product.
Can I claim my store if I am not based in the US? Yes. Any eligible business located in a country where ChatGPT is available can claim its profile, including in Europe. What remains US-only for now is Business Agents and claiming listings for physical stores.
What should I do if my store does not appear when I search for it in Business Hub? Try the exact name your website uses. If it still does not appear and you are an eligible online business, you will see an option to create the profile. If the listing shows an option to contact support, it is locked and you need to request access. If someone else has already claimed it, you can dispute ownership from the listing's menu and verify your identity with Persona.
How long does OpenAI take to approve a claim? OpenAI gives no fixed timeframe and emails you each decision. In tests published on launch day, approval came through within a few hours. If you verify by domain, bear in mind that DNS changes can take time to propagate and that the record expires after 24 hours.
Does claiming my profile make ChatGPT recommend my brand more often? Not necessarily. OpenAI states that claiming a business does not guarantee more visibility or more sales. It keeps your information accurate and lets you measure mentions and clicks. Recommendations depend mainly on ChatGPT finding and citing your website.
Can my agency manage my ChatGPT profile for me? Yes. The admin who claimed the business can give an agency access from Business Hub. Each agency member signs in with their own ChatGPT account. Ideally the claim itself should come from an account owned by the brand, so ownership does not depend on a third party.
Claiming your store in Business Hub takes very little time, but what ChatGPT ends up saying about a brand depends mainly on its website and catalogue: clear product pages, visible policies, reliable stock data and a site AI assistants can read without friction. At STRAT we build that foundation through Shopify store development and optimisation, so any new channel, ChatGPT included, pulls accurate information from day one.
