What percentage of the buying journey do B2B buyers complete before contacting sales?

Today’s B2B buyers complete roughly 70% of their buying journey, researching the problem, comparing options, and building a shortlist, before they ever contact sales. That figure comes from 6sense’s 2023 B2B Buyer Experience Report, which surveyed 934 buyers and found buying groups don’t engage a seller until they’re about 70% of the way through. That means your content, not your reps, carries the first 70% of the sale. If you don’t have clear, credible material answering buyers’ questions at each stage, you’re invisible during the exact window when they’re forming their shortlist — and you only get into the conversation late, if you get in at all.

Here’s what that shift means for how you sell.

Why the journey moved

Buyers used to call a vendor to learn about a category. Now they’d rather research on their own — through search, peers, review sites, communities, and increasingly AI answer engines — and only talk to sales once they’ve largely made up their mind. It’s not that reps stopped mattering; it’s that buyers do the education themselves first and bring reps in for the final third. By the time they raise a hand, they’ve already formed opinions, built a shortlist, and often picked a favorite.

What buyers do in that 70%

Self-directed and largely invisible to you, buyers spend the first two-thirds:

• Identifying the problem — figuring out what’s wrong and whether it’s worth solving.
• Exploring solutions — learning what categories and approaches exist.
• Comparing options — building a shortlist and weighing vendors against each other.

All of that happens before a form gets filled out. If you’re not present and credible in those stages, you’re not on the shortlist when it forms.

The implication: content is your early sales team

If 70% of the journey happens before contact, then your content is your sales team for the first 70%. Every question a rep would answer on a first call — what’s the real problem, what are the options, why you, what does it cost to do nothing — needs a credible answer a buyer can find on their own, at the stage they’re asking it. Teams that publish that material get shortlisted. Teams that don’t get discovered late, as an afterthought, if at all.

What content is needed, and where

Map content to the stages buyers actually move through:

• Problem-aware — content that names and frames the problem, so buyers realize it’s worth solving.
• Solution-aware — content explaining the category and approaches, so you shape how they evaluate.
• Vendor comparison — comparisons, proof, and differentiation, so you win the shortlist.

Answer the real questions at each stage, in the buyer’s language, and you show up during the 70% instead of after it.

Why this rewards being findable

Here’s the part that’s changed most recently: buyers increasingly research through search and AI answer engines, not just by browsing your site. That means being findable and citable — showing up when someone asks Google or ChatGPT “what’s the difference between X and Y” or “best way to solve Z” — is now part of carrying that first 70%. If your content isn’t answering those questions where buyers ask them, a competitor’s is.

The bottom line

Buyers finish most of their journey before they ever talk to you, so the first 70% of the sale is won or lost on your content, not your reps. Answer buyers’ real questions at every stage, where they’re actually searching, and you earn a place on the shortlist that forms long before anyone fills out a form.

Want content that carries the first 70%?

Building the content that answers buyers’ questions at every stage — and gets you shortlisted before sales is ever involved — is the heart of a modern go-to-market motion. The 20 Must-Haves for B2B Growth guide shows you how, in 90+ pages.

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Frequently asked questions

What percentage of the buyer journey happens before contacting sales?

Roughly 70%. Today’s B2B buyers research the problem, explore solutions, and build a shortlist largely on their own, only contacting sales for the final 30% of the journey — by which point they’ve often already formed a preference.

Why do B2B buyers research so much before talking to sales?

Because they can. Search, peer networks, review sites, communities, and AI answer engines let buyers educate themselves without a sales call, so they prefer to do the early work independently and bring reps in only once they’ve narrowed their options.

What does this mean for my content strategy?

Your content has to do the job a rep used to do for the first 70% of the journey — answering buyers’ questions at each stage, in their language, where they’re searching. If it doesn’t, you’re not on the shortlist when it forms.

If buyers self-serve, do I still need sales reps?

Yes — reps still win the final third, where trust, negotiation, and fit get decided. What’s changed is that reps now enter later, into a decision that’s already partly formed, so the content that shaped that decision matters more than ever.

How do I get in front of buyers during that 70%?

Be findable and credible where buyers research: search results, AI answer engines, review sites, and industry communities. Publish content that answers their real questions at each stage, so you show up during the self-directed research instead of after it.

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