Enterprise software buying is starting to shift under our feet.
For now, most purchases still flow through human buyers: procurement teams, IT leaders, budget owners. But if you zoom out, a new pattern is emerging. Recommendation engines are influencing decisions. Procurement workflows are embedding AI. And in the not-so-distant future, software agents may begin to make, or at least strongly guide, enterprise purchases.
This blog explores what happens when machines, not humans, sit in the buyer’s seat – and how marketers can evolve to meet this moment. Shout out to Brett Queener for another thoughtful Substack post, and the inspiration for this blog.
The Slow Fade of Sentiment
Today, great marketing tells a story. It builds trust through narrative, use cases, and emotional resonance. But software agents won’t be swayed by storytelling or design. They’ll buy based on logic, not love.
In this world, product decisions aren’t made in quarterly reviews. They’re made constantly, based on performance data and real-time benchmarks. Metrics like uptime, cost-per-seat, integration quality, and ROI will be the new headlines. Why? Because agents won’t skim your product page for bolded value props. They’ll parse your API for proof.
The shift is already underway:
- Procurement platforms are adding AI layers to evaluate vendors.
- Usage-based renewals are increasingly driven by hard data.
- Internal systems are surfacing recommendations based on telemetry, not marketing
It’s not just coming; it’s already happening. Slowly, quietly, pervasively.
Humans Today, Agents Tomorrow
Let’s break down how this evolution might unfold over the next decade:
Short-term (1–3 years): Expect more hybrid systems. Humans still make the call, but with strong nudges from automated recommendation engines. AI will streamline repetitive tasks and surface vendor options, but the final decision remains human.
Mid-term (3–10 years): In transactional or low-risk categories—like infrastructure tooling or cost-saving utilities—agents may start making autonomous decisions. They’ll be trusted to buy within defined parameters, using real-time data to justify each choice.
Long-term (10+ years): Even complex buying processes will see automation. Full autonomy might still be rare for strategic, high-stakes purchases, but agents will heavily influence shortlists, vendor scoring, and renewal decisions. The trust layer will shift from people to systems.
What Happens When Machines Start Buying?
As this shift unfolds, enterprise marketing strategies will need to change—radically. Here’s what that might look like:
Procurement becomes hyper-efficient
Decision-making compresses. Software agents can evaluate thousands of variables simultaneously and adjust in real time. Procurement delays shrink. Renewal cycles speed up. The bureaucracy of buying starts to evaporate.
Narrative takes a back seat
When agents are making the call, stories don’t close the deal. Data does. That doesn’t mean storytelling dies, but it becomes table stakes. The core pitch must translate into machine-readable proof: performance dashboards, certifications, uptime metrics, integration benchmarks.
Trust and transparency get redefined
When an agent makes a bad call, who’s accountable? The algorithm? The vendor? The team that trained the model? This opens a new frontier in procurement ethics and governance. Vendors will need to prioritize explainability and build frameworks for human override.
Vendor strategy gets rewired
Selling to agents means being visible to agents. That means being listed and well-scored in procurement platforms, cloud marketplaces, and buying ecosystems. It also means structuring your marketing around real, provable performance not aspirational messaging.
The New Marketing Playbook: From Storytelling to Signaling
If your product’s value can’t be measured, it may not be bought.
As software agents start to play a bigger role in procurement, marketers face a clear challenge: translate brand value into structured, machine-readable proof—without losing the human resonance that still matters today.
This doesn’t mean abandoning narrative. It means reinforcing it with data that machines can act on and humans can trust.
Here’s how to start:
- Dual-path messaging: Every value prop should be legible to both a human and a machine. “Faster onboarding” becomes “40% reduction in time-to-value, measured via customer telemetry.” Narratives still matter—but they must be backed by quantifiable, verifiable proof.
- Agent-ready proof infrastructure: Marketing needs to surface real-time metrics like uptime, API latency, usage benchmarks, and certifications. These signals will shape how automated systems evaluate vendors. The proof already exists—it’s just often buried.
- Visibility in machine-mediated ecosystems: If you’re not present in procurement platforms, cloud marketplaces, and review engines, you’re invisible to agents. The best narrative in the world won’t matter if you’re not in the system. Showing up – correctly formatted, well-tagged, and performance-validated – is the new baseline.
We’ve started framing this shift for our enterprise software clients with a simple rule: You’re not just selling to people anymore. You’re selling to the systems they trust.
TL;DR: What You Should Take Away
Software agents are starting to shape enterprise purchases – and their influence will only grow.
These agents don’t buy based on storytelling. They buy based on structured, provable data.
Marketing must evolve: part storyteller, part signal architect.
Helping clients navigate this shift is a must for any serious marketer over the coming years.