Go-To-Market Strategy Gets New Tools From G2’s Rollout
G2 rolled out a new suite of go-to-market tools this week aimed at helping software companies reach buyers earlier in the research process. The announcement leans on findings from G2’s own 2026 Buyer Behavior Report: out of every 100 B2B software buyers, 82 now start their research inside an AI chatbot long before a salesperson enters the picture.
If you sell software, or anything with a considered buying process, that stat should reset how you think about your funnel. Buyers are making up their minds before your sales team even knows they exist, and G2 just built a set of tools aimed squarely at that gap.
The New Tools, Broken Down
The first, G2 Audiences, takes verified signals about who is actively researching software and pushes them into ad platforms such as The Trade Desk, DV360 and Amazon DSP, so account-level campaigns run on real behavior rather than a guess. The second, Verified Leads, works on a pay-per-lead basis: founders pay only for introductions to researchers who are genuinely evaluating options, complete with budget and decision-maker context attached.
On top of that, G2 expanded its review collection tools with personalized requests sent through Gmail and LinkedIn, added Model Context Protocol access for internal AI workflows, and opened a public beta called Agent Evaluations that independently benchmarks enterprise AI agents head to head.
| Tool | Function |
|---|---|
| G2 Audiences | Turns research signals into targeted ad campaigns |
| Verified Leads | Pay only for introductions to real researchers |
| Review Collection | Automated outreach through email and social inboxes |
| Agent Evaluations | Independent testing of enterprise AI agents (beta) |
Why Early-Stage Founders Should Care
You do not need a massive marketing budget to feel this shift. Buyers researching your category on their own, using AI tools instead of Google, means your brand either shows up in that research or it does not exist to them at all. This is the same pressure driving AI search optimization for B2B brands, and it is only accelerating.
G2’s CMO Alex London put it plainly, saying buyers are “shortlisting faster and expecting more proof.” That is a warning for any founder whose sales process still assumes a slow, relationship-led sales cycle. The proof now has to exist before the first call, not during it.
What to Actually Do About It
Start by auditing what a buyer sees about you before they ever reach out. Check your reviews, your comparison pages, and whatever an AI chatbot says when someone asks it to compare you against a competitor. If you do not know the answer, that is the first gap to close this month.
Next, invest in getting genuine customer proof out into the world early, not after a deal is already close. Tools like G2’s Verified Leads exist because buyers want evidence before a conversation, so treat customer acquisition tracking as something that starts the moment a prospect first researches you, not the moment they fill out a form.
Reviews Are Doing More Work Than You Think
The review collection upgrade is easy to overlook next to flashier AI features, but it may matter just as much. Founders can now trigger outreach for a fresh review straight from a customer’s email or social inbox, on top of collecting reviews live at events and syncing everything into HubSpot, which turns proof-gathering into a routine habit instead of a quarterly scramble before a board meeting.
Founders often treat reviews as an afterthought because they feel slow and unglamorous compared to a product launch. That instinct is backwards now. Every review is training data for the AI tools your next buyer is already using to make a decision, so a steady stream of fresh, specific reviews compounds in a way a one-time push never will.
The Risk of Ignoring This Shift
Gartner research has reached a similar conclusion from a different angle, finding that AI is reshaping B2B buying even as human sellers still close what researchers call a confidence gap. Buyers will use AI to shortlist you, but a real person often still needs to close the sale.
The founders who lose here will not be the ones without a sales team. They will be the ones whose product looks invisible during the research phase, because nobody built the proof points an AI tool needs to recommend them in the first place.
What to Watch This Quarter
Watch how quickly Agent Evaluations gets adopted, since a standardized way to benchmark AI agents could quickly become a trust signal buyers expect before they even take a sales call. Also watch your own marketing spend allocation this quarter, since intent-based tools like G2 Audiences work best when paired with a budget that can actually act on the signal in real time.
Frequently Asked Questions About G2’s New Tools
What is G2 Audiences used for?
It turns verified research signals into ad campaign targeting on platforms like The Trade Desk and Amazon DSP, so budget goes toward people actively evaluating software instead of a broad guess.
How does Verified Leads differ from a typical lead list?
It is a self-serve, pay-per-lead tool that connects vendors with software researchers who are actively evaluating options, including budget and decision-maker data.
Why does G2 say buyers are shortlisting faster?
Its 2026 Buyer Behavior Report put the number at 82 out of 100 B2B buyers opening an AI chatbot before anything else, which compresses the traditional, slower sales cycle.
