Research shows half the buying committee consists of "invisible buyers" (e.g., C-suite, procurement) that sales can't access but who hold veto power. Marketing's primary ABM role is to build brand trust and familiarity with this hidden cohort to prevent them from killing a deal due to unfamiliarity with your solution.

Buyers now use AI to arrive with a full research dossier on your product, pricing, and competitors. This changes the GTM role from persuading customers with clever messaging to enabling their decision-making. The new focus is helping buyers quickly experience your product's value on their own terms.

Generic use cases fail to persuade leadership. To get genuine AI investment, build a custom tool that solves a specific, tangible pain point for an executive. An example is an 'AI board member' trained on past feedback to critique board decks before a meeting, making the value undeniable.

Investor Stacy Brown-Philpot advises that to win large enterprise deals, an AI startup must create a solution so compelling it beats the customer's internal team vying for the same budget. The goal is to access the core 15% budget pool, not the 1% 'play money' budget.

AI is a 'hands-on revolution,' not a technological shift like the cloud that can be delegated to an IT department. To lead effectively, executives (including non-technical ones) must personally use AI tools. This direct experience is essential for understanding AI's potential and guiding teams through transformation.

Selling foundational AI isn't a standard IT sale. It requires a dual-threaded process targeting the CTO, who builds the agents, and the CRO, who must monetize them. The key is educating the CRO to shift from selling seats against IT budgets to capturing value from larger headcount and outsourced labor budgets.

While historically a difficult approach, top-down CEO sales is currently highly effective for AI companies. Boards are pressuring CEOs to be "AI forward," which creates immediate budget and a willingness to buy, even before a clear ROI is established. This makes selling to the C-suite a viable go-to-market strategy.

When selling to senior technical leaders, do not assume the conversation will be about technical vision or features. A CTO at a top 50 company was more concerned with how a new technology would affect thousands of workers and how the vendor would support that transition. The human and organizational impact often outweighs the technology itself.

The future of technology sales, particularly AI, is not about selling infrastructure but about solving specific business problems. Partners must shift from a tech-centric pitch to a consultative approach, asking 'what keeps you up at night?' and re-engineering customer processes.