Perplexity has paused accepting new advertisers because it rethinks how advertisements match into its AI search expertise, signaling a change in its monetization push.

At Promoting Week in New York Metropolis, Jessica Chan, head of writer partnerships at Perplexity, stated that the corporate shouldn’t be “taking any new advertisers,” and that advertisements aren’t at present on the roadmap for Perplexity’s AI browser, Comet.

The transfer comes after the August departure of advert gross sales head Taz Patel, signaling a shift from Perplexity’s earlier plan to scale its advert enterprise past the U.S. In December, Perplexity added The Independent, LA Times, and Blavity to its Perplexity’s Writer Program that pays publishers when content material seems subsequent to advertisements. On the time, Chan cited worldwide partnerships as key to Perplexity’s development.

Perplexity launched its advert providing last year and started testing campaigns with brands together with Certainly, PMG, Common McCann, and Entire Meals Market. These early campaigns let manufacturers sponsor follow-up questions in search outcomes.

“That also exists at this time, however we didn’t wish to inundate our person expertise with a ton of advertisements in a single day,” Chan stated through the panel. “We’re persevering with to scale it very thoughtfully and methodically—in all probability not on the scale all people’s hoping for.”

She additionally famous that manufacturers are rethinking the best way to spend their budgets. Chan stated many advertisers are transferring away from performance-focused, conventional search and in direction of top-of-funnel model consciousness—an space Perplexity could pursue down the road.

Perplexity didn’t reply to request for added remark past Chan’s feedback at Promoting Week.

Perplexity

Promoting seems to make up solely a small portion of Perplexity’s income. Final yr, the corporate generated simply $20,000 in advert income out of $34 million in whole income, in line with The Information.

As Perplexity reassesses its advertisements ambitions, questions stay about how a lot income its mannequin is definitely driving for publishers.