The new face of influence for building trust, elevating content and AI search visibility for B2B brands
93% of B2B marketers rate their influencer marketing programs effective. Less than half call them very effective. The new rules of discovery mean there is no second place and that gap decides which brands get found, trusted and chosen. This report shows you how to close the gap and where the future of B2B influence is headed.
Building trust with B2B buyers is one of the most important factors for success. Buyers trust recognized experts and peers before they trust brands. Now that trust does double duty: the same expert voices that persuade buyers are the signals AI search engines and LLMs use when deciding which brands to surface and cite.
Most B2B marketers see this change but few are acting on it. Our research for the fifth edition of TopRank Marketing’s B2B Influencer Marketing Report finds that while 86% of marketers recognize that AI visibility is important, only 21% have made it part of their programs.
AI chatbots are now the top influence on B2B software shortlists, and a majority of B2B software buyers start their research with an AI more often than with Google. How B2B brands get discovered has evolved and the impact of influence on the new face of AI and search discovery means B2B marketing needs to evolve with it.
This report is your new benchmark for influence in B2B marketing from the evolving role of creators in B2B to the impact of influence on AI visibility to what’s in store for the future.
With the new report for 2027 you’ll get:
- Benchmark data from 400+ senior B2B marketers to see how your program compares
- Expert insights from leading minds and voices in B2B marketing
- The Influencer Content Marketing Maturity Model, plus a link to score your program
- The Best Answer Marketing (BAM) Action Plan: Practical steps you can execute, with or without an agency
- The traits that separate “very effective” programs from everyone else
More Findings Inside:
- Very effective programs are nearly 3x more likely to run always-on engagement
- They are also significantly more likely to leverage durable content formats like podcasts (37% vs 19%), research reports (35% vs 22%) and newsletters (38% vs 25%)
- The widest performance gap of all: AI search integration (49% vs. 27%)
- Programs with strong AI visibility report nearly double the revenue attribution
The gap between leaders and laggards in the B2B marketing world is widening. Sign up to get notified when this new report is ready so you can see where you stand, and how to close the gap before it’s too large to fix.
