Metric Monday: Longer Validation Phase, More Time to Influence??

Hey all,

Happy Monday!

Our head of research @Kerry wrote about a really important distinction re: one of the findings in this year's buyer experience research. This year, we found that the Selection Phase (the part of the buying journey where buyers form their shortlist, set their preferences, and identify the vendor they’d most like to buy from) has been compressed - what took 70% of the buying journey for years, has reduced to ~60% of the journey in 2025.

That shift means sellers are getting pulled into the Validation Phase earlier (the part of the buying journey where the preferred vendor must prove the choice is safe, implementable, and justifiable to the wider buying group). Instead of being involved in about 30% of buyers’ processes, they’re now involved in closer to 40%. It sounds like a bigger window to influence the decision… but it isn’t.

Even though buyers spent more time with sellers this year than they have historically, it didn’t meaningfully change the outcome. Buyers still purchased from their Selection Phase favorite in nearly 8 out of 10 cases — as they have in prior years.

Buyers’ earlier engagement is largely driven by questions around AI features (now in ~90% of products/solutions) and economic uncertainty pushing teams to move faster and secure budget while they have it.

Despite the longer Validation Phase, the outcome still hinges on the Selection Phase favorite. If you’re not buyers’ number-one choice going in, more time later unfortunately doesn't change the result for most purchases.

Kerry writes thoughtfully about it, and I encourage you to give it a read!