I recently helped a client build a case study about their work with their top client. At the end of the conversation I asked the question I always ask: why do you keep working with them?
He answered in one word. “Relationships.”
So I asked what that meant.
He told me my client was more a friend than a vendor. He said it felt like my client was his representative, someone on his side getting his projects over the finish line. Out of all his other vendors, only one other brought that same level of effort to his jobs.
Then he got specific. My client showed up before there was any work, to help shape the project so it could be created efficiently and affordably. And he volunteered for additional efforts that weren’t directly billable but brought tremendous value.
I have been thinking about that conversation ever since, because of what I found when I built this year’s State of Sales report.
What I expected to find
In just about every State of Sales I have put together, a new arrival joined the leaderboard of lead generation efforts. One year it was LinkedIn. Another year, Facebook. Then Twitter, Instagram, TikTok. Each was a technology innovation, and each time the question was the same: is this the one that changes how people win business?
With chatbots, agentic AI and every other form of automation arriving this year, I fully expected the next entry to be one of them, and to land in the top five.
I went looking. It isn’t there.
What the data says
- HubSpot’s State of Marketing 2026 surveyed more than 1,500 marketers. For B2B, the top channels by return on investment were website, blog and SEO (30.2%), email marketing (23.6%) and paid social (23.3%). Chatbots appear in none of the rankings. They show up once, on a list of channels where some brands plan to increase spending. That is an intention, not a result.
- Reddit and SurveyMonkey’s Hidden B2B Journey 2026 surveyed 1,200 U.S. business decision-makers. 73% said they trust peer recommendations when evaluating a purchase. 39% said they trust AI chatbots. Only 18% use chatbots during B2B research, and the top complaints were inaccurate information (41%) and conflicting information (40%).
- 6sense’s B2B Buyer Experience Report found that the winning vendor was already on the buyer’s Day One shortlist 95% of the time, and 85% of buyers had prior experience with the vendor they chose.
I want to be fair about this. AI is everywhere: HubSpot found 86.4% of marketing teams now use it. That is exactly the point. When everyone has the tool, the tool is not the edge. Automation can help you follow up faster. It does not create the thing a buyer is looking for when they decide who to call.
I also can’t speak for every industry. This is what the research shows for B2B buying, and it matches what I hear when I talk to real people every week. Nobody has told me they chose a professional because of a chatbot. They tell me who introduced them.
So what is the edge?
Which brings me back to the client who said “relationships.”
I asked what it meant, and he described something that cannot be automated. Here is what I took from it.
- Relationships mean investment. It is not asking questions guided toward your own agenda. It is bringing more to the table because you care about the outcome your client experiences.
- It looks like a client experience that guides them to the best solution for them, regardless of whether it is yours right now.
- It looks like introducing value before they recognize the need. My client showed up before there was work. That is why he was invited into the project, not just bid against it.
- It looks like doing more than your competition. The non-billable efforts were not on an invoice. They were why the client said only one other vendor brought the same level of effort.
- And it can’t be faked. A client can tell when you are working an agenda and when you are working for them.
Notice what the 6sense numbers describe. The winner was usually already on the shortlist before the first conversation, and most buyers had prior experience with the vendor they chose. That doesn’t happen because of a campaign. It happens because someone invested before there was a deal.
Three questions to try this week
Pick one client or partner you value, and ask yourself:
- Where could I show up before there is a project? What could I help them think through, price or plan before they need to hire anyone?
- What is one thing I could do that is not billable, but would be worth a lot to them? Small is fine. An introduction, a checklist, an hour of your thinking.
- Where would I point them to the best answer, even if it isn’t mine? That is the moment they decide whether you are on their side.
None of this needs software. It needs attention, and a little generosity with your time.
See what the research says about being the first call
The State of Sales 2026: Professional Services Edition tests this year’s research against what I hear in rooms every week, and tells you what to do about it. 40 pages, including the First-Call Test and a six-move 2027 playbook.
Download the report: [LINK HERE]
Sources: HubSpot, The top marketing channels of 2026 (State of Marketing 2026, 1,500+ marketers), https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/marketing-channels. Reddit and SurveyMonkey, The Hidden B2B Journey 2026 (1,200 U.S. business decision-makers), reported by Search Engine Journal, March 10, 2026, https://www.searchenginejournal.com/b2b-buyers-trust-peers-over-ai-chatbots-report-finds/569261/. 6sense, 2025 B2B Buyer Experience Report, https://6se
