Forrester has outlined five key forces that it expects will significantly impact B2B marketing, sales, and product strategies by 2026. The research highlights a transition in enterprise priorities as artificial intelligence reshapes business processes, introduces new operational risks, and changes how companies establish trust with buyers.
Influencer spending
According to Forrester, 75% of enterprise B2B organisations are projected to increase their budgets for influencer relations over the next two years. As B2B buying processes become more complex and involve large buying networks, businesses are turning to external influencers such as analysts, subject matter experts, and industry luminaries for independent insight.
Companies are responding to a broader buying signal environment by investing in ways to track and analyse external commentary, social amplification, and endorsements. These efforts are aimed at boosting credibility and influencing buyers during critical decision-making stages.
AI risk exposure
The growing reliance on generative AI brings with it significant downside risks. Forrester predicts that ungoverned use of generative AI in commercial applications will cost B2B companies more than USD $10 billion by 2026. The report identifies a surge in unregulated and experimental use of AI-enabled sales tools, combined with slow development of user skills, as key contributors to future enterprise losses. These losses could result from falling share prices, legal settlements, and regulatory fines due to AI-related errors and incidents.
Seventy-five percent of sales representatives report using AI-enabled sales tools, while half of B2B marketing decision makers say their organisations are already experimenting with or actively deploying generative AI. The current lack of controls, coupled with rapid technology adoption, leaves companies exposed to substantial financial risk.
Trust in expertise
As generative AI makes information more abundant in the buying process, Forrester expects human expertise to regain importance. Buyers are expected to increasingly seek validation from experts to verify information and resolve complex queries. Customer interactions with product experts, already highly trusted in post-sale support, are likely to become more prominent earlier in the sales journey.
Forrester anticipates that human knowledge will act as a key counterbalance to the limitations of AI, particularly where nuanced judgement and tailored insight are required.
Agent-driven negotiation
By 2026, one in five B2B sellers will encounter buyers' procurement teams using AI agents to negotiate contract terms. These agents are designed to handle negotiations at scale, leveraging data and analytics to secure discounts, streamline payment terms, and enforce compliance with policies and entitlements across multiple suppliers.
Supplier interfaces, which have traditionally relied on static price lists and standardised checkout processes, will begin to integrate agent-ready negotiation tools to accommodate automated bargaining by buyers' digital agents.
Automated payments
Forrester also predicts that AI agents will account for one-third of B2B payment processing within two years. This trend builds on the automation initially brought by robotic process automation, but AI agents now offer more advanced and autonomous transaction management capabilities. Technology vendors including Basware, Coupa, HighRadius, and Ramp are already deploying AI agents to support corporate expenditure management and streamline B2B payments.
"Seventy-five percent of enterprise B2B companies will increase budgets for influencer relations… organisations will increase their buying signal universe to include external conditions and influencer activity - surfacing cues such as commentary, social amplification, and third-party endorsements," said Forrester
