5 Ways Software Companies Can Win in the Age of AI

The B2B software world is changing fast, and AI is at the center of it all. It’s reshaping how businesses operate, how software is bought and sold, and how we all get work done. 

At G2, we’re seeing this firsthand with an explosion of AI categories, vendors, products, and features in our marketplace. In fact, we’ve added over 2,000 AI products over the past year alone! 

AI has disrupted the buying journey -- starting with research and discovery

But AI isn’t just affecting innovation. It’s disrupting every stage of the software buying journey, including the way businesses go to market to adapt to new buying behaviors and preferences. Findings from our G2’s 2025 Buyer Behavior Report, based on survey responses from over 1,000 software buyers globally, underscore this shift. 

Take, for example, how AI has changed the way buyers conduct research. As of April 2025, nearly 8 in 10 respondents said AI search has changed how they conduct research, with 29% noting they now start research through large language models (LLMs) more often than Google. I suspect these percentages have grown since then and will continue to rise. 

However, AI search isn’t only relevant for the research phase. We also see it playing a crucial role in influencing short lists and purchasing decisions. GenAI chatbots and peer review sites are among the most influential sources, ranking above market research firms and vendor websites. 

5 keys to winning in the age of AI

So, what does it take to win in this AI-first world? Based on what we’re observing in the market and how AI is rapidly evolving, I see five key areas where businesses need to focus.

Companies prioritizing these five core areas will thrive in the age of AI.

1. Ensure your product is discoverable for buyers via traditional SEO and now GEO (AI-driven discovery)

As mentioned earlier, buyers' search methods have changed. In addition to showing up with traditional SEO tactics, it’s important to also optimize for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) to show up in the LLMs buyers are increasingly starting their searches on. We’re making this a priority at G2, too – ranking among the top 10 sources on both ChatGPT and Perplexity, according to a recent Profound study.

2. Enable buyer self-service with AI assistants

We’ve long seen the shift to the self-serve buying journey, where buyers conduct research on their own accord and arrive at a decision before they have even engaged a salesperson. While vendors should already be enabling this through customer-voice-led content on review sites like G2, they can take it a step further with AI. Automating parts of the customer journey can foster a more streamlined experience, while creating efficiencies for your customers and your organization.

3. Embed AI to streamline US and workflows across your product suites

Our research shows that half of enterprise buyers switched to software with better AI. With the rise of AI-first startups, buyers have more options than ever and will churn for better AI functionality. This means more competition and a greater risk of customer churn for existing vendors. It also means there’s a big opportunity to infuse AI into your solutions — enhancing existing products by making them faster, more real-time, and more efficient. 

4. Deliver faster ROI with AI assistance

AI isn’t just for innovating your products, it can also be leveraged for customer onboarding, support, and success. By optimizing, and better yet, automating these important processes, you can accelerate the value customers get from your software. With rising competition and the need to deliver value and ROI as quickly as possible, inserting AI into these customer processes to eliminate friction is a no-brainer. 

5. Embrace usage and outcome-based pricing for AI

Generative and agentic AI are reshaping pricing models, challenging the traditional SaaS paradigm of seat and module-based annual subscriptions. As buyers expect AI to drive automation and agents replace human labor, customers want more flexible models aligned with their ROI based on their actual usage and business outcomes.

According to our 2025 Buyer Behavior Report findings, more than one in three buyers now prefer variable pricing models. Some pay based on API calls, others are billed by agentic actions, and a growing segment opts to pay strictly for measurable outcomes. 

How G2 is leading the way

As the world’s largest software marketplace, G2 aims to be the most trusted data source in the age of AI for informing software buying decisions and go-to-market strategies. Let’s explore some of our AI-powered innovations helping us realize this vision.

With the introduction of G2.ai, buyers can begin their software search with a natural language prompt and discover the best fit through an AI prompt-driven exchange. This approach accelerates the often tedious and complex research process, facilitating easy collaboration among colleagues.

Following our acquisition of unSurvey, we introduced a new AI-powered conversational review collection method, making leaving a review as easy as any voice-to-text experience — with an AI moderator guiding users along the way to share their authentic feedback. For buyers, this means access to deeper, more meaningful insights to inform purchasing decisions. For sellers, this means greater insights to improve their product offerings and experience. 

Also stemming from our unSurvey acquisition, AI-led custom market research will help companies gain actionable insights through conversational AI-led interviews tailored to their specific needs, industry, buyer persona, and more. With this solution, companies can access tailored, human-like insights in days—not months—with exclusive access to respondent pools of millions of G2 users and external panels.

Our new AI-assisted review collection via customer calls and meetings enables vendors to turn customer conversation transcripts into high-quality, pre-filled G2 reviews that are ready for review, approval, and publication. This capability eliminates the need for manual reviewer outreach while reducing the time required to submit a review, all while maintaining review quality and improving submission rates and speed.

As AI reshapes the B2B software landscape, G2 is committed to empowering the entire technology ecosystem with the data and knowledge required to achieve strategic success and sustainable growth. We’ll do this by offering a wealth of user insights and real-time data that not only address the needs of today's buyers, sellers, investors, and consultants but also anticipate the demands of tomorrow. 

Embracing what's next

In my view, the future is one where we have buying agents talking to selling agents. Perhaps one day, even a complex process like selecting the best enterprise software for your business, and buying it, could be done by agents, almost in real time.

AI is truly reshaping operational foundations, erasing deep-seated limits that have constrained growth and impact for hundreds of years. The future of software is here, and it’s powered by AI.