By Ellie Victor, Co-CEO
AI can generate a compelling brand story in seconds. It can analyze competitors, generate positioning alternatives, and even simulate how buyers might respond.
But finding a position in the market that customers believe, leaders embrace, competitors can’t easily copy, and your product can deliver on is an entirely different challenge.
The executives behind the research
We surveyed 26 senior B2B technology executives across enterprise software, AI and data, cybersecurity, and related sectors.
Respondent profile
- 38% CMOs
- 23% CEOs, including founders and chairs
- 12% COOs
- 27% other senior leaders (7), including VP Marketing, SVP Product, Data & AI, VP & GM, VP Sales, and principal, advisor, and board roles
The research explored how executives make positioning decisions, build leadership alignment, and evaluate the role of AI versus human buyer research.
We surveyed 26 B2B tech executives and conducted 16 follow-up interviews. We also asked ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini to simulate responses, first without knowing the respondents’ profiles and then with their titles and industries.
The results were revealing. AI came surprisingly close to predicting how executives would answer multiple-choice questions, but was less successful at anticipating the nuanced insights, unexpected perspectives, and depth of discussion that emerged from our one-on-one interviews.
The clearest finding was about trust. Executives overwhelmingly trust real buyers over AI-generated insights when making positioning decisions.
We surfaced three lessons for companies navigating positioning in the age of AI.
1. AI Can Make You Sound Like Everyone Else
AI is a remarkable brainstorming partner. Ask it to generate ten positioning statements, explore new categories, or analyze competitors, and you'll have plenty to work with before your coffee gets cold.
The problem? Your competitors have access to the same tools.
Leaders are worried that AI could steer companies toward the middle, where they aren't differentiated enough. AI is trained to recognize patterns, but great positioning often requires breaking them. As one sales leader put it, "Anybody can get a C+ now. To get an A is really hard."
And then there’s AI slop the flood of generic, AI-generated content that erodes credibility rather than building it.
Consider how many technology companies promise to make businesses smarter, faster,, or more innovative. Now look at your industry and the positioning of your five biggest competitors.. How interchangeable are your claims? And which company, if any, truly stands apart? Could you swap their logos without anyone noticing?
What to do: Use AI to simulate buyer reactions, sharpen research questions, analyze responses, and identify patterns. Then put your most consequential positioning ideas in front of actual customers and prospects.
Don't just ask which message they prefer. Explore why they believe it, what they question, and what would make them reconsider an existing choice.
AI can make research faster and more focused. Human evidence makes the conclusions more credible.
2. Human Evidence Matters More Than Ever
When asked which sources gave them the greatest confidence in positioning decisions, every respondent ranked existing customers and prospects ranked highest. AI-generated buyer insights consistently ranked at the bottom.
When AI-simulated and human interviews reached different conclusions, 85% said they would trust the humans.
And when presented with a choice between the speed and savings of AI-generated insights and the cost of validating with real buyers, 96% chose real-buyer validation.
Why such a strong preference?
Because predicting an answer isn't the same as understanding what makes someone believe it.
In our executive interviews, participants described insights that emerged from probing unexpected comments, emotional motivations, and changing buyer needs. These are precisely the discoveries that can transform an ordinary product description into compelling positioning.
Disagreements between AI predictions and human responses could be especially valuable. Rather than dismissing those differences as errors, investigate them. They may reveal assumptions worth challenging.
What to do: Use AI to simulate buyer reactions, sharpen research questions, analyze responses, and identify patterns. Then put your most consequential positioning ideas in front of actual customers and prospects.
Don't just ask which message they prefer. Explore why they believe it, what they question, and what would make them reconsider an existing choice.
AI can make research faster and more focused. Human evidence makes the conclusions more credible.
3. The Value of Positioning Isn't Just Clarity. It's Collective Conviction.
Even the most differentiated, customer-validated story can fail if the organization doesn't believe in it.
Believability is built when the entire organization is aligned around what makes the company different. The product delivers what marketing promises. Sales reinforces the same story. Leadership makes decisions consistent with the positioning. Customers experience what they've been told to expect.
“CEO time, not CEO sign-off. If the CEO delegates positioning, it doesn’t stick. They have to be in the room for the hard tradeoffs, because those tradeoffs are company strategy, not marketing copy.”
Our research revealed a telling disconnect. While 92% of executives personally viewed positioning as core business strategy, only 68% believed their leadership teams shared that view. Competing opinions and priorities were among the biggest alignment challenges.
One respondent captured the solution in five words: "CEO time, not CEO sign-off."
One CMO described the breakthrough in his company's positioning process. It wasn't the campaign slogan. It was the moment the leadership team understood how their category, differentiation, and proof fit together, and began reinforcing that story throughout the organization.
He subsequently heard the same core narrative in conversations with prospective customers and in onboarding for new sales representatives.
What to do: Make positioning a leadership team sport, not a marketing presentation. Get the CEO actively involved from the start, and engage the entire leadership team throughout the process. Put competing ideas on the table, including executives' own favorites, and test them with real customers and prospects. Encourage healthy debate, use market evidence to make the tough tradeoffs, and build commitment to the chosen direction. Then make sure every team understands its role in delivering on the promise.
Because alignment isn't everyone repeating the same tagline. It's everyone delivering on the same promise. Don't measure success solely by whether everyone approves the final presentation. Look for evidence that the positioning guides decisions, shapes conversations, and influences how the company operates.
The Real Test of a Brand Story
AI has dramatically lowered the cost of creating a compelling story. But making people believe it remains a higher bar.
The opportunity isn't to choose between AI and humans. It's to use AI to explore more possibilities, real buyers to establish credibility, and leadership to turn a differentiated promise into a shared commitment.
After all, the best brand story isn't simply one people remember.
It's one they believe, and a company can deliver.