A company can tell prospects that it provides excellent service, understands its industry and delivers better results than its competitors. The problem is that its competitors can say exactly the same things.

For B2B buyers conducting more of their own research, claims are easy to find. Evidence can be considerably more valuable. That makes the experiences of existing customers an increasingly important marketing resource.

B2B Buyers Are Doing More Research on Their Own

The B2B buying process continues to shift toward independent research. Gartner reported in 2025 that 61% of B2B buyers preferred an overall buying experience without a sales representative. Buyers favored digital self-service when gathering general information and learning about potential solutions.

AI is accelerating that behavior. In a subsequent 2026 Gartner study, 45% of B2B buyers reported using generative AI during a recent purchase, primarily to gather information about vendors and products. Buyers consulted an average of seven information sources during the purchasing process.

This creates a challenge for marketers.

When buyers are researching independently across numerous sources, how does a company establish credibility before a salesperson ever enters the conversation? One answer is to give buyers evidence from people who have already experienced what the company is selling.

Customer Evidence Answers a Different Question

Traditional marketing usually answers: What can our company do?

Customer evidence answers: What happened when someone like me chose this company?

That distinction matters. Forrester notes that customers play an important role within B2B buying networks because buyers seek opinions and experiences from peers facing similar challenges and pursuing similar goals. Its research places industry peers among buyers’ five most trusted sources. (Forrester, 2025)

Another 2025 study illustrates the opportunity. UserEvidence surveyed 811 B2B buyers, sellers and marketers and found that buyers ranked case studies and testimonials among their most trusted forms of evidence. Yet 36% of marketers had produced two or fewer customer stories during the previous six months.

Stop Asking Customers Only Whether They Were Happy

A useful customer story needs more than praise.

Consider the difference between: “They were wonderful to work with.” and information that explains:

The first gives you an endorsement. The second gives you insight into how customers buy. That information can become useful well beyond a case study.

Customer Interviews Can Improve Your Positioning

Marketers frequently develop positioning from inside the organization. They interview executives, salespeople, product teams, and other stakeholders to determine what makes the company different. Those conversations matter, but customers see the organization from another perspective.

Ask several customers why they selected your company and patterns may emerge. Perhaps customers repeatedly mention something your marketing barely discusses. Maybe a feature the company considers critical rarely comes up. Perhaps customers describe their problem using entirely different terminology. Or the reason customers remain with the company is different from the reason salespeople believe they stay.

Those observations can influence messaging, content strategy, sales assets, and even product decisions. Instead of asking customers to validate your positioning after it has been created, their experiences can help create it.

Customer Stories Can Also Support AI Discovery

AI systems depend on information they can find and interpret. That makes detailed, accessible content increasingly valuable. Video is part of that information environment.

Recent research from Ahrefs found that YouTube accounted for 5.6% of all URLs cited in the Google AI Overviews dataset it analyzed. YouTube represented 18.2% of cited URLs that did not rank within Google’s top 100 traditional search results for the same keyword. Other studies have reached different percentages, which is an important reminder that AI search is developing quickly and citation behavior varies considerably among platforms.

The broader opportunity is more durable. Customer experiences can provide the kind of specific context generic marketing content often lacks. A detailed story might explain the industry, problem, solution, circumstances and result in one piece of content. That gives both human buyers and AI systems considerably more context than a statement such as “we deliver exceptional solutions.”

One Customer Conversation Can Become Much More Than a Case Study

Capturing a customer story does not have to result in one asset. A substantive customer interview can become:

• A video case story
• A written case study
• Short social videos
• Customer testimonials
• Website content
• Email content
• And so much more

The important part is collecting the complete story first. Once the source material exists, marketers can determine which portions belong in which channels.

Build Customer Stories Into Your Marketing Process

Instead of waiting, make customer stories an ongoing process.

Start by identifying the business goals and positioning you need to substantiate. Then determine which customers have experiences related to those areas. The first conversation does not need to be an expensive video production. A short recorded interview may be enough to discover whether a larger story exists.

Over time, this creates a library of customer evidence that marketing and sales can use when buyers ask, directly or through AI, why they should believe what your company says.

Want to Hear More About Building Marketing Around Customer Stories?

In this episode of Confessions of a Mad Marketer, BNP Media CMO Ben LeDonni sits down with Ian Garlic, Founder of Video Case Story. Ian discusses:

• The mistake that changed his approach to video marketing
• Why companies should collect customer stories before developing their messaging
• How his goals, positioning, stories framework works, and what AI search could mean for video and YouTube

Sometimes the information needed to improve the next marketing campaign is already available. You just have to ask the customers who experienced it.