For years, the path to winning a new customer was predictable. A prospect searched Google, visited a few websites, built a shortlist, and eventually spoke with a salesperson.
Today, that journey is changing. Instead of searching, buyers are asking AI.
"Who specializes in premium folding cartons?"
"Which print provider has experience in pharmaceutical labels?"
"Who is known for sustainable packaging?"
The first salesperson your customer meets may no longer work for your company - It may be ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or Perplexity.
That matters because AI doesn't simply return a list of websites. It recommends companies. And if your business isn't part of that recommendation, you may never make the shortlist.
This shift is happening faster in B2B than many people realize. According to Forrester, B2B buyers have adopted AI-powered search at three times the rate of consumers, and AI has become the leading source buyers use when discovering new solutions. Nearly every business buyer now uses generative AI somewhere in the buying journey—from researching suppliers and comparing vendors to analyzing RFPs and building business cases.
Why is B2B moving faster?
Because business buying involves nuance.
A consumer might ask, "What's the best pizza near me?"
A packaging buyer asks, "Who specializes in premium folding cartons, has experience in healthcare packaging, supports variable data printing, and can manufacture in North America?"
Traditional search queries return links, but AI synthesizes answers. That's a fundamental shift in how customers discover suppliers.
Printing has always been a trust business. Customers aren't simply buying printed products - they're trusting you with product launches, brand reputation, compliance, and deadlines. That hasn’t changed, but in the age of AI, what has changed is how trust is discovered.
The Three shifts every PSP should understand.
1. AI is becoming the first salesperson in the buying journey.
Before a prospect visits your website or contacts your sales team, they've often already asked AI to compare suppliers, explain technologies, summarize capabilities, and identify specialists.
The first sales conversation is increasingly happening without you - buyers are arriving with opinions already formed.
The companies AI recommends begin the conversation with an advantage. The companies it doesn't recommend may never have the opportunity to compete.
2. AI builds confidence differently than search engines did.
Google ranked webpages, but AI evaluates confidence.
Early in the buying journey, AI behaves much like a trusted industry advisor. It doesn't rely solely on what companies say about themselves. Instead, it looks for corroboration across multiple trusted sources.
Forrester notes that answer engines place greater weight on off-site authority than traditional search, favoring authentic voices, customer stories, expert content, guest articles, speaking engagements, reviews, forums, and other third-party validation.
That means your website is no longer your only storefront.
- Your Dscoop presentations.
- Customer success stories.
Every one of these contributes to what AI understands about your business.
Collectively, they become evidence for trust.
This is where the Trust Flywheel begins. Every customer success story creates another opportunity to share expertise. Every piece of expertise earns third-party validation. Every independent mention strengthens AI's confidence in recommending your business, creating more opportunities to win customers—and more success stories to fuel the cycle again.
3. Once you're on the shortlist, AI starts quoting you.
The role of your website changes as buyers move deeper into their evaluation.
Early on, AI asks, "Can I trust this company?"
Later it asks, "Can this company answer my questions?"
That's where your own content becomes critical.
The richer and more useful your content, the more likely AI can use it to answer increasingly detailed buyer questions. Forrester argues that answer engines reward organizations that create rich, customer-centered content addressing buyers' questions throughout the buying journey—not just at the top of the funnel.
The opportunity for PSPs is significant.
This isn't about chasing another algorithm or replacing good SEO. It's about recognizing that buyer behavior has changed. AI is rapidly becoming the interface through which customers discover, evaluate, and build confidence in potential suppliers.
The companies that succeed won't be the ones with the largest budgets, rather than the ones that are easiest for AI, and therefore buyers, to understand and trust.
If you'd like to learn how your organization can strengthen its digital trust signals, complete our short industry survey and join us for our July 27 Dscoop webinar (11 AM CST):
How to Become the Company on AI's Shortlist
How Print Service Providers Can Build Trust Before Buyers Ever Visit Their Website
We'll explore how AI actually evaluates suppliers and share practical strategies for building both the off-site authority and on-site expertise that influence AI recommendations.
Because in the age of AI, the question isn't simply whether customers can find your website.
It's whether AI is confident enough to recommend your business.
HOW DO YOU MEASURE UP?
Take our industry survey here.
"How Discoverable Is Your Print Business in the Age of AI?"
Source: Forrester Research. How to Stand Out in a Zero-Click World: Master AEO, Build Influence, and Earn Trust. 2026.
