In my work as Senior Partner at BuzzTheory, a B2B revenue marketing agency, I spend a lot of time helping technology companies adapt to changes in how their buyers find and evaluate them.
When generative AI emerged in 2023, we initially approached it as a new search channel. Much of our attention naturally centered on improving visibility, just as it had for years with our search engine optimization (SEO) practice. Does the company show up in AI-generated answers? How is it described? Which competitors appear alongside it? What is the company’s share of voice? What can we do to improve the results?
If you’ve been working through those same questions, I get it. AI visibility is an urgent and unfamiliar challenge. And to be clear, that work matters. If buyers cannot find your company through the AI tools they use, you may never make it into consideration. Unlike traditional search results, there’s no page 2 or 3 for buyers to turn to.
But as my team and I dug deeper into B2B buyer use of AI, another question became harder to ignore: What are buyers using AI to do after they find potential vendors?
That question also sits at the center of my work as co-founder and editor-in-chief at the AI Revenue Institute (AIRI), where we’re researching how B2B buyer use of AI is changing the way revenue is generated and retained.
After all, buyers don’t make purchasing decisions based on search alone. They need to identify the right criteria, understand technical information, compare potential solutions, assess risks and make a case to other stakeholders. We wanted to know whether AI was becoming part of those purchasing processes, too.
B2B buyers use AI throughout vendor research and evaluation
AIRI surveyed 521 B2B professionals actively involved in researching, evaluating, recommending or approving business purchases to understand how they use AI in the purchasing process.
The results show that B2B buyer use of AI is expanding from vendor discovery to decision support. This is one of five major shifts we identified in AIRI’s B2B AI Buying Behavior Survey Report, “The AI-Powered B2B Buyer Has Arrived.”
Here’s how that’s showing up in the real world:
B2B buyers use AI to challenge preferences and expand their options
Buyers reported using AI to surface weaknesses or risks in a preferred vendor or vendor shortlist, discover alternatives they might have missed, and fill gaps in what to look for when selecting a provider.
Together, these activities show that buyers are using AI to challenge their initial preferences, learn more about their options and prepare for formal vendor evaluation.
62% of B2B buyers fact-check sales claims with AI;
54% build comparison matrices
Our survey also found that buyers are using AI for tasks that go well beyond gathering basic product information. Among the buyers we surveyed:
62 percent use AI to fact-check specific sales claims against public sources.
54 percent use AI to build side-by-side pricing or feature comparison matrices.
Buyers also reported using AI to learn or verify evaluation factors, check user reviews, review security and compliance documentation, summarize technical information, build business cases, and review requests for proposal (RFPs).
These uses show AI becoming part of how buyers judge vendor credibility, compare shortlisted options and conduct formal evaluations.
B2B buyers reinvest AI time savings in broader, deeper vendor evaluations
Most buyers said AI saves them time during vendor evaluation. But they aren’t necessarily using that time to reach a decision sooner. Many are reinvesting it in exploring more vendor options and focusing attention on more strategic or important purchases.
Why it matters: Sellers have less influence and face more scrutiny
AIRI’s findings about buyer use of AI for decision support point to two different challenges for sellers.
The first challenge is that buyers can use AI as an “advisor” before they engage potential vendors. AI can help them determine what to look for, identify alternatives and prepare for a formal evaluation. By the time a seller enters the conversation, the buyer may already have established the criteria, requirements and competitive field.
Historically, sellers often had an opportunity to educate buyers early, help define the problem and influence the requirements or specifications. As buyers shift more of that work to AI, sellers may have less opportunity to shape the evaluation before it begins.
The second challenge arises after a seller is already under consideration. Buyers are using AI to surface risks in preferred vendors and shortlists, review RFPs, interpret technical and security information, compare features, and examine sales claims.
In this scenario, AI adds another layer to the buyer’s vetting process. Sellers should expect their offerings, documentation and claims to face AI-assisted scrutiny in addition to the reviews buyers already conduct.
For revenue leaders, the combined implication is significant: sellers may have less influence over how an evaluation is framed and face more scrutiny once the evaluation is underway.
What you can do: Ensure you show up in AI answers to hold up in AI-assisted evaluations
Being visible and discoverable when B2B buyers use AI-assisted search remains essential. But in a zero-click buying scenario, your company may not know it’s being evaluated or have an opportunity to influence the buyer directly. Buyers and their AI tools may rely on the information they find before, during or even without seller engagement. That information must help buyers understand your company and stand up to scrutiny.
Enlist your SEO, answer engine optimization (AEO) and generative engine optimization (GEO) experts to help you clear the discovery hurdle. But when buyers use AI to educate themselves, compare options and vet vendors, your company’s response cannot be left solely to the digital marketing team.
Bring together your entire revenue team, including marketing, sales, product, customer success, communications and technical departments, to consider two questions:
What information will buyers and their AI tools encounter if no seller is present to educate them or shape the evaluation?
Are your company’s claims supported by clear, credible evidence buyers can access and verify through third parties?
Your immediate goal isn’t to anticipate every possible AI-assisted buying scenario, but to recognize that AI-assisted decision support is a cross-functional revenue challenge and begin coordinating a strategy.
Together, as a team, you must ensure that buyers can find clear, credible information about your company, even if you’re unaware an evaluation is underway. That’s how your company goes from simply showing up in AI-generated answers to holding up throughout AI-assisted evaluation, which affects all of your revenue operations, no matter how buyers discovered or were introduced to your company.
Editor’s Note: The expansion of buyer use of AI from vendor discovery to decision support is one of five major shifts uncovered in AIRI’s research. Get the full report to learn how these changes are affecting B2B purchasing and what they mean for revenue generation and retention.
Download the full AIRI B2B AI Buying Behavior Survey Report, “The AI-Powered B2B Buyer Has Arrived,” to explore all five shifts and the complete findings.