On November 10, 2026, OpenAI launched Businesses in ChatGPT, a way for owners to claim their business inside ChatGPT, correct its details and see how often ChatGPT shows it to people. It does for ChatGPT roughly what Google Business Profile does for Google. One difference matters more than the rest: your business may already have a ChatGPT listing you never created, and until you claim it and verify your identity, you can't change a word of it. ChatGPT describes you with whatever it finds.
What did OpenAI actually launch?
It's called Business Hub, and it sits in the ChatGPT sidebar. From there you can search for your business, claim it, and once you're verified, update its details and see basic numbers on how people find you in ChatGPT.
It's a beta, and OpenAI is rolling it out in stages. The bigger feature in the announcement, a "Business Agent" that answers customer questions for you, is limited for now to ecommerce and online service businesses in the US. For a local business, the part that matters today is the profile.
The reach is real. OpenAI says 1.2 billion people use ChatGPT each week, and BrightLocal's 2026 survey found 45% of US consumers had used AI to get a local business recommendation in the past year.
Is ChatGPT becoming the new Google Business Profile?
For ChatGPT, yes.
Until now, ChatGPT had no place where an owner could tell it anything directly. It built its picture of your business from what it could read: your website, your directory listings, your reviews on Google, Yelp, Facebook and the rest. Your Google profile was the closest thing to an official record, and it was built for Google.
Now ChatGPT keeps its own record. TechCrunch put it plainly: the new profiles make ChatGPT "just a little bit more like Google."
That doesn't make your Google profile less important. Google is still where most local searches happen, and a well-kept Google profile still feeds a lot of what AI tools read about you. What's changed is that ChatGPT no longer depends on Google, or anyone else, to decide who you are. It has its own listing for that now, and you're responsible for it the same way.
What happens if I don't claim my ChatGPT profile?
ChatGPT keeps talking about you anyway.
OpenAI's own instructions say local stores and restaurants can currently only claim an existing US listing. In other words, the listing exists before you show up. OpenAI hasn't said exactly where the details on an unclaimed listing come from, and even after you claim one, its help page says "ChatGPT may also use other sources" when answering questions about your business.
When I looked up my own business in Business Hub, the listing was already there. It had my business name, address, phone number and website, and nothing else. All four are public on my Google profile and my other listings. No description, no services, nothing about who I work with. That's the starting point for a lot of owners: ChatGPT knows where you are and how to reach you, and very little about what you do.
The rest comes from the sources ChatGPT already reads: your website, your listings and your reviews. If your hours are out of date on one site, your category is vague on another and your website never says which cities you serve, ChatGPT picks a version. An unclaimed profile is ChatGPT filling in the blanks with its best guess.
There's a second risk. If someone else claims your business first, you'll have to go through OpenAI's dispute process to get it back. It's easier to get there first.
Why does identity verification matter so much?
Because claiming your business doesn't give you control of it.
The claim itself is quick. You verify your connection to the business with a code sent to your business phone or business email, a record added to your website's domain settings, or your Shopify store. OpenAI reviews the claim and emails you a decision.
Then comes the step that matters. Before you can publish any change to your business information or see any insights, you have to pass an identity check through a service called Persona. You may need a government-issued ID, your business registration and proof that you're authorized to represent the business. The blue verified check only appears after that check is approved.
So a claimed but unverified profile is still ChatGPT's version of your business, not yours.
Two practical notes:
Do this one yourself. It's your identity being checked. Once you're verified, you can add teammates or an agency in Business Hub, using their own ChatGPT accounts.
Match your official records exactly. OpenAI says the business name, address and any registration or tax number you submit should match your official records. If your listings say one name and your state filing says another, sort that out first.
What can I change once I'm verified?
According to OpenAI's help page, a verified owner can update the website, business description, product or service category, logo and policies, and add a cover photo and other optional details. OpenAI reviews changes before they go live, and they can take time to show up in answers.
Write the description the way you'd explain your business to a customer at the counter: what you do, who it's for and where you work. Plain words beat clever ones here, because the description is now something ChatGPT can repeat.
Will claiming my profile get me recommended more?
No, and OpenAI says so directly. Claiming your business "doesn't guarantee increased visibility" or give you control over ChatGPT's independent recommendations. Advertising doesn't influence those answers either.
What claiming does get you is accuracy and a window. Once you're verified, Business Hub shows your mentions, website clicks and discovery topics for the past 28 days. For a local business, a mention counts every time ChatGPT shows a result for your location, even if nobody clicks. For most owners, that will be the first real number they've ever had for how often ChatGPT puts them in front of someone.
Who gets recommended still comes down to the same things it did last month: listings that say the same thing everywhere, reviews that keep coming and a website that says plainly what you do and where. I wrote about that in more detail in how ChatGPT decides which local business to recommend.
What should I do this week?
Look yourself up. Sign in to ChatGPT, open Business Hub from the sidebar and search your business name. Note what the listing says. If you see "Contact support," the listing is locked and you'll need OpenAI's help to get access.
Claim it. Pick the verification method that works for you: business phone, business email, your website's domain or Shopify.
Finish the identity check. Have your ID and business registration ready, and make sure your name and address match your official records.
Fix the basics. Website, description and category first. Write it for a customer, not a search engine.
Check everything else. ChatGPT still reads your Google profile, Bing, Yelp, Facebook and your website. If they disagree with each other, your new ChatGPT profile won't save you.
If you can't find your business at all, that tells you something too. It's a beta, eligibility depends on your location and type of business, and OpenAI plans to expand to more markets and categories over time. Check back, and in the meantime make sure everything ChatGPT can already read about you is right.
If you want to know what ChatGPT says about your business today, and what to fix first, the Free Online Presence Assessment covers it, along with your Google profile, your reviews and your website. I review every one personally.
Mariano Alvarez is a Business Growth Consultant in Costa Mesa, CA, working with local service businesses across Orange County. His work focuses on organic authority: building the kind of online presence that earns trust before a customer ever picks up the phone.
