The State of AI in Sales
The State of AI in Sales
A strategic guide for go-to-market leaders - takeaways from HG Insights' report
This is a special Wednesday edition of The GTM Newsletter by GTMnow - read by over 52,000 revenue professionals weekly to stay up-to-date on go-to-market and scale their companies and careers. GTMnow is the media brand of GTMfund - sharing go-to-market advice from the top 1% of revenue operators including the 350 executives behind the fund, news, and our viewpoints from working with hundreds of portfolio companies.
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The Next Generation of Sales AI in 2025: A Guide for Go-to-Market Leaders
The sales world is buzzing with change, and at the center of it all is one unstoppable force: AI. For go-to-market leaders - whether you’re a Director of Sales, VP, or on the front lines, the message is clear - embrace AI or risk being left behind.
Over the past decade, sales and marketing has seen an explosion of new technologies, growing by 9,304% since 2011 to over 14,000 MarTech apps. Just between 2023 and 2024, the field grew by 28%. As we move toward 2025, the next phase of this market evolution is clear: AI-driven sales and marketing tools are taking the spotlight. This growth isn’t just coming from new AI-native startups; even the big players are doubling down, upgrading their offerings with powerful AI capabilities.
Gartner predicts that by 2028, 60% of seller work will be executed by Generative AI technologies. The applications are vast: from sales insights and conversational chatbots to automated pipeline nurturing. Today, nearly every sales intelligence vendor has some kind of AI strategy - or at least mentions AI on their website. AI is here, and it’s transforming how we sell.
HG Insights has created a comprehensive 32-page report that dives deep into the rapidly evolving world of sales and AI. It covers the adoption of Generative AI (GenAI) in sales, highlights key sales tech leaders, and provides an in-depth analysis of the top 75 trending Sales AI tools reshaping the landscape. GenAI, which generates data or content similar to human creation, is leading this charge by leveraging patterns from massive datasets to produce text, images, and even audio and video.
This report is jam packed with data and insights that are incredibly valuable for GTM leaders. We know time is precious, so we went through and extracted the key highlights and takeaways that you need to know - let’s get into it.
Key highlights
As there are a variety of Sales use cases, Sales AI tools have been divided into 11 categories in this report. All categories existed before AI and are being optimized and enhanced with the addition of AI capabilities.
The adoption of sales and GenAI products
Key insights below, including an important reminder on AI's role in enhancing human potential.
“Sales AI is not just about automation; it’s about augmenting human potential. AI is still in it’s early days. Collectively, we’re only scratching the surface of what’s possible. Our team is eager to keep pushing the boundaries. I’m excited to see how AI will continue to add significant value in the Sales and Marketing space.”
- Dave Kennett (Founder and CEO, ReplayzIQ)
— GenAI adoption among companies using sales products
Among companies using both GenAI and Sales tools, 91% have used GenAI for one year or more, 63% for two years or more, and 50% for three years or more.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT, launched in November 2022, coincides with the recent increase in adoption.
Despite the growth, GenAI adoption is still low overall, with only 1.4% of companies in HG’s database using these tools, highlighting that most companies are still exploring rather than fully integrating GenAI.
— Adoption by company size
Larger companies are leading the way in adopting both Sales and GenAI products. Among enterprises with 10,000+ employees, 14.5% use both, compared to just 0.3% of small businesses with fewer than 50 employees.
Adoption trends are similar when looking at company revenue. 18.6% of companies with $5 billion or more in revenue use both Sales and GenAI tools, while adoption in companies earning less than $50 million is below 1%.
The top 75 sales AI tools
There are thousands of AI tools, so to help you better navigate the market, HG Insights aggregated all 75 listed Sales AI tools and included the descriptions from their websites in the full report.
Something that particularly caught our attention is that 64% of the listed AI companies have 10 employees or fewer. This highlights how quickly small, agile teams can innovate in the AI space, rapidly developing solutions that challenge established industry giants and disrupt the market.
Summary
Some of the standout key takeaways:
AI adoption is accelerating: 91% of companies using both Sales and GenAI tools have been doing so for at least a year, yet overall adoption remains low at just 1.4% of companies. This shows that while AI is making waves, there’s still massive room for growth.
Bigger companies are leading the charge: 14.5% of companies with over 10,000 employees are using both Sales and GenAI tools, compared to only 0.3% of small businesses with fewer than 50 employees. Similarly, 18.6% of companies earning over $5 billion are leveraging AI, while adoption among companies with less than $50 million in revenue remains below 1%.
Small, agile teams are disrupting the market: A surprising 64% of the top 75 AI companies have 10 employees or fewer. This rapid innovation cycle shows how small teams are challenging established giants and reshaping the AI landscape with fresh, cutting-edge solutions.
AI is redefining sales from end to end: From prospecting and lead scoring to personalized engagement and sales coaching, AI is not just automating tasks - it’s fundamentally transforming how sales teams work and driving significant performance gains.
The future is generative: By 2028, Generative AI is expected to handle 60% of seller tasks, according to Gartner. The rise of tools like ChatGPT has marked a shift in how companies think about sales engagement, pipeline management, and customer interactions, making AI integration a critical strategy for staying competitive.
Market explosion: The Sales and MarTech landscape has grown by over 9,300% since 2011, fueled by the surge in AI-driven solutions. This rapid growth isn’t slowing down, with a 27.8% increase in new technologies between 2023 and 2024 alone.
“Now, more than ever, it’s clear that AI is not here to take your job, especially if you embrace it. Becoming an AI power user is a surefire path to success in today’s world.”
- Manisha Raisinghani (Founder & CEO, SiftHub)
There’s still an AI adoption advantage, but that won’t last forever. All signs are pointing towards embracing AI and leaning into its adoption, without fear of it taking your job. Rather, AI is allowing for more time to be spent on the strategic value-driven work, rather than administrative and repetitive tasks.
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AI has high potential and low penetration. While it may feel like it’s everywhere and hard to keep up with, we’re in the early innings. While AI is driving innovation, the reality is that many companies are still exploring rather than fully integrating these tools. This is just the beginning.
🤝 Sophie
Just a headsup, I think the link to the HG Insights report is pointing at a different report.
Attention and others are focused on call recordings and workflow automation, we're taking a different approach at Nayak (nayak.ai) - we're focused on helping sales teams read the room in real-time and build stronger relationships with buyers.
That 1.4% AI adoption rate is fascinating but not surprising. Most sales leaders we talk to know AI is coming, but they're looking for solutions that enhance their team's human capabilities rather than just automating tasks. This is exactly why we built Nayak to be a real-time "wingman" that helps reps understand buyer signals and adjust conversations on the fly.
Love seeing that 64% of AI companies are small teams under 10 people. Being nimble lets us move fast and stay laser-focused on solving real problems. While the big players are busy adding AI checkboxes to their features list, we're doing the deep work of helping reps become better relationship builders.