By Nick Nelson

As a marketer, one of your biggest fears is losing control.

Control of the message. Control of the conversation. Control of your own brand identity.

That’s what makes the rise of generative AI as a pivotal force in the B2B buyer’s journey so ominous. While we never have complete control over how our content is discovered and consumed, our ability to have any control at all is at stake as decision-makers increasingly turn toward automated, algorithmic messengers for comparing solutions and evaluating vendors. You might have noticed, but these generative engines — slick as they may be — are prone to getting the facts wrong!

Welcome to the misinformation crisis. We’re only getting started.

Ready or not, here AI comes

A recent report from Responsive found that 80% of global B2B tech buyers use generative AI as much as traditional search when researching vendors, with nearly a quarter (22%) saying they use it more.

At the same time, over 90% of US consumers express concern over AI spreading misinformation. And according to Forrester’s Buyers’ Journey Survey 2025, 19% of business buyers said the inaccurate or misleading results from AI systems made them less confident in their purchase decisions.

Alas, despite recognizing the pitfalls, decision-makers aren’t turning away from LLMs anytime soon: Forrester’s data found that “95% of B2B buyers plan to use generative AI in at least one area of a future purchase, and over half say it led them to consider more or different vendors while saving them time in their purchase process.”

B2B marketers can’t stop the insatiable adoption of AI tools like the ones used to create the image for this blog post. But we can play a role in helping these tools provide better information, as well as equipping buyers with resources beyond what AI can generate to make decisions more confidently.

Taking control of your brand story in the age of AI search

Is AI lying about your brand? When I ask the question, I don’t mean it nefariously — the robots don’t know any better. When asked a question, LLMs will quickly retrieve whatever information they are able to find and rapidly vet.

If they can’t find the info from you, they might pull it from a third-party site or (gulp) competitor. If they can’t find the info at all, they might hallucinate it. Studies show that popular generative AI platforms hallucinate between 2.5% and 8.5% of the time, and for some models the rate exceeds 15%.

This misinformation crisis demands that B2B marketers focus on three things:

• Understanding your current AI footprint and opportunities
• Optimizing for visibility and accuracy in LLMs
• Offering magnetic experiences and resources outside of AI platforms

Understand your current AI footprint and opportunities

Before you can improve how your brand appears in generative AI engines, you have to understand where you are today.

Right now, most marketers lack visibility into how their brand, products and competitors show up in AI overviews and conversational search. Generative systems …read more

Source:: Top Rank Blog