AGL-Hakuhodo (AdGlobal360), a member of Hakuhodo International, has announced the integration of ChatGPT Ads into its digital paid media strategy as it looks to build capabilities around advertising in AI-led discovery environments.
The Gurugram-based agency said the move will complement traditional keyword-based advertising with conversational intent matching. Through OpenAI's Ads Manager, AGL-Hakuhodo plans to structure campaigns around user prompts and real-time context, enabling brands to engage consumers while they are actively looking for solutions or evaluating options.
As part of the initial rollout, the agency will pilot campaigns for select enterprise clients and allocate a portion of experimental media budgets to OpenAI Ads. It plans to scale investments based on the availability of ad inventory and campaign conversion benchmarks.
The first phase will focus on five sectors—automotive, education, real estate, consumer packaged goods (CPG), and banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI)—where the agency sees potential for conversational discovery to influence high-consideration purchase journeys.
According to AGL-Hakuhodo, advertising within ChatGPT can provide brands with an opportunity to reach consumers during active decision-making rather than conventional passive browsing. The agency said conversational intent signals can help brands build more relevant experiences and drive qualified traffic.
The agency also highlighted the separation between paid placements and ChatGPT's organic responses. It said advertisers do not have access to individual conversations or personal data through the advertising format.
"We see conversational advertising as a discipline to build from the ground up. For our clients, that means two commitments: mapping real conversational context to genuinely useful, high-converting experiences, and tying every campaign back to their own first-party data, so incrementality and return are clear from the outset," said Rakesh Yadav, founder and CEO, AGL-Hakuhodo.
He added, "We aim to set the benchmark for Generative Engine Marketing in India, and to ensure the spend that moves here is measured and accountable."
The agency plans to develop proprietary Intent Frameworks and prompt-mapping methodologies to connect conversational intent with relevant landing-page experiences. It also intends to integrate OpenAI's Pixel and Conversions API with clients' existing first-party measurement systems, including Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and marketing mix modelling (MMM), to build full-funnel attribution and assess incrementality and blended return on ad spend (ROAS).
AGL-Hakuhodo said the strategy is aligned with Hakuhodo's Sei-Katsu-Sha philosophy, which focuses on understanding consumers as whole individuals and creating marketing experiences around their needs and context.
Established in 2009 and headquartered in Gurugram, AGL-Hakuhodo provides technology-led marketing and digital transformation services. The company currently has eight branches globally and a workforce of more than 1,100 professionals. AGL joined the Hakuhodo International network in 2020.
