Positioning and messaging
October 11, 2026 · 8 minute read · Growth Marketing Partners
The first sales call used to be where you made your case. For most B2B buyers it is now where they check a decision they have largely made. 6sense’s 2025 Buyer Experience Report found that 94% of buying groups have ranked their preferred vendors before they first talk to a seller, and that they buy from that early favourite 77% of the time.
That changes what positioning has to do. It is no longer enough for your message to land well in a demo. It has to make you the favourite before anyone from your company is in the room.
AI became the front door. In G2’s April 2026 survey of 1,076 software buyers, 51% said they now start research with an AI chatbot more often than with Google, up from 29% a year earlier. The shortlist is increasingly whatever the AI names.
More people decide. Forrester’s 2026 research puts the typical purchase at 13 people inside the buying company and 9 outside it: consultants, peers, analysts. Each of them forms a view of you without you.
Buyers check the AI. The same Forrester research finds buyers use AI as a starting point, then validate what it says with peers, experts and the vendors themselves. Being named by the AI gets you considered; being confirmed by people they trust gets you picked.
In AI answers. When a buyer asks for the best tools in your category, for their size and industry, are you named, and is what the AI says about you accurate? AI tools repeat the clearest, most specific description they can find. If your own site is vague, they will describe you using someone else’s words, or not at all.
In the places people check. Review sites, peer communities, analyst notes and partner listings are where buyers go to confirm what the AI told them. Thin or outdated profiles cost you at the moment of validation.
On your own site. Buyers who arrive have usually already formed a view. Your site has to answer the specific questions they still have, quickly: who it is for, what it replaces, how pricing works, what it integrates with, and what proof exists.
1. Own one clear, narrow claim. Write the one-sentence answer to “what is it, and who is it for?” in your buyers’ words, and use it everywhere: homepage, profiles, sales decks and partner listings. Consistency is what gets repeated.
2. Publish the specifics. Specific facts get cited; adjectives don’t. How pricing works, who you are not for, the integrations you support, the numbers behind your results. If a buyer has to book a demo to learn how you price, the AI will send them to a competitor who explains it.
3. Answer the questions buyers ask AI. Your sales calls and win-loss interviews already tell you what they are. Turn the most common ones into clear, answer-first pages.
4. Earn proof from other people. Reviews, customer quotes with numbers, analyst mentions and partner pages are what buyers use to check the AI. Ask happy customers to say what they say to you, in public.
5. Arm the whole buying group. The champion is one of many. Finance, security and IT each need their own answer, written for them, not a longer version of the pitch.
6. Measure it every month. Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini the 25 to 50 questions your buyers ask. Track how often you are named against competitors, and whether what they say about you is right. That is your share of the shortlist.
Start by finding out where you stand. Our free AI shortlist snapshot checks the questions your buyers ask across the main AI tools, and shows who gets named and what is said about you. If the answer is not you, the fix starts with positioning: choosing the segments you win and the words that make you the obvious pick. That is the work behind our segments and positioning service.
6sense. 2025 B2B Buyer Experience Report
G2. New G2 Research: Half of B2B Software Buyers Now Start Their Research With AI Chatbots (April 2026)
Forrester. The State of Business Buying, 2026, as reported by Digital Commerce 360
More figures, each linked to its source, are on our benchmarks page.
Next step
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