What percentage of B2B companies are invisible to AI recommendations?

81% of 150 B2B companies scored 0-5 out of 25 on Citation Presence in the April 2026 benchmark. Only 19% are recommended by AI when a buyer searches their category. This is up from 44% invisible in the March study (N=50), reflecting the broader market baseline beyond enterprise leaders.

How does the April 2026 benchmark differ from the March edition?

The April edition tripled the sample from 50 to 150 companies by adding 100 mid-market firms across the same 5 sectors (30 per sector). The average score dropped from 82.2 to 28.7, revealing that the original 50 enterprise companies were outliers. The broader market has significantly weaker AI visibility infrastructure.

Which B2B sector has the worst AI visibility?

Technology and IT Services averages 27.1/100 overall and 4.0/25 on Citation Presence. The bottom 10 companies in the 150-company benchmark are all IT Services firms scoring 2/100. IT Services lacks the review platform ecosystem that gives SaaS companies a structural citation advantage.

Is the AI visibility benchmark published monthly?

Yes. The benchmark expands by approximately 100 companies each month. Each edition includes all companies from previous editions plus new additions. This creates a growing dataset for trend analysis. The March edition had 50 companies; April has 150; May will have approximately 250.

How is AI visibility scored?

Each company is scored across 4 dimensions worth 0-25 points each (100 total): Citation Presence (does AI name you?), Entity Recognition (does AI know you?), Content Structure (can AI extract from your site?), and Citation Breadth (are you mentioned across independent sources?). Scanning uses a multi-API approach: OpenAI, Google Gemini, Brave Search, and Tavily. ---

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We Tripled the Sample to 150 Companies. 81% Are Invisible to AI.

The Short Answer

81% of 150 B2B companies are invisible to AI recommendations. The AI Visibility Benchmark April 2026 expanded the sample from 50 to 150 companies across 5 sectors. The average score dropped from 82.2 to 28.7 out of 100. The original 50 were the elite. The broader market is far less visible than anyone expected.

We Almost Stopped at 50

In March, we published the AI Visibility Benchmark with 50 enterprise B2B companies across 5 sectors. The headline finding: 44% scored 2 out of 25 on Citation Presence — the dimension that determines whether AI recommends you to a buyer.

That felt high. But the sample was weighted toward enterprise heavyweights. Companies with years of content, dedicated SEO teams, and established brand recognition.

The question was obvious: is 44% an enterprise problem, or a market problem?

So we tripled the sample.

100 New Companies. Same Methodology.

We added 100 mid-market companies across the same 5 sectors — 20 per sector. Same 4-dimension scoring framework. Same v2 scanner (OpenAI, Gemini, Brave Search, Tavily). Same category-level keywords.

The only difference: the new companies represent a broader revenue range. Not just the category leaders. The mid-market. The companies that make up most of B2B.

The results changed everything we thought we knew about the baseline.

The Numbers at 150

Metric	March (N=50)	April (N=150)	Delta
Average Total Score	82.2/100	28.7/100	-53.5
Citation Presence (avg)	13.7/25	5.9/25	-7.8
Entity Recognition (avg)	23.4/25	7.8/25	-15.6
Low citation (0-5/25)	44%	81%	+37pp
High citation (20-25/25)	56%	19%	-37pp

The average score did not decline gradually. It dropped by 53 points. The original 50 companies were not the baseline. They were the exception.

What the Sector Data Shows

Every sector tells the same story, but at different volumes.

Sector	Companies	Avg Score	Citation Avg
Enterprise SaaS	30	31.3	9.5
Financial Services	30	29.8	6.1
Professional Services	30	28.3	5.3
Management Consulting	30	27.3	4.7
Technology / IT Services	30	27.1	4.0

Enterprise SaaS still leads. But the advantage narrowed. In March, the original 10 SaaS companies averaged 89.8 with citation at 24.4. At 30 companies, that drops to 31.3 with citation at 9.5. The well-known platforms — HubSpot, Salesforce, 6sense — are outliers, not representatives.

Technology / IT Services remains the floor. The bottom 10 companies in the entire 150-company benchmark are all IT Services firms. Every one scores 2 out of 100.

The Binary Pattern Holds at Scale

This is the finding that keeps confirming across every study we run.

81% of companies score 0-5 on citation. 19% score 20-25. Almost nothing in between. We found the same pattern at 50 enterprise companies (44% vs 56%). We found it at 50 UK law firms (52% vs 48%). Now at 150 companies: 81% vs 19%.

AI either recommends you or it does not. There is no partially visible.

According to 6sense research, 95% of winning vendors were on the buyer's Day 1 shortlist. AI is building that shortlist now. If you are in the 81%, you are not on it.

Why 81% Instead of 44%

The March study sampled established enterprise companies. They had strong Entity Recognition (23.4/25) and Citation Breadth (25/25) because they have been building online presence for years. Their only gap was citation.

The April expansion added mid-market companies that are earlier in their AI visibility journey. Their gaps are across all four dimensions. Not just citation — everything.

This matters because most B2B companies are mid-market. The March data told an enterprise story. The April data tells the market story. And the market story is: 4 out of 5 B2B companies have no meaningful AI visibility infrastructure.

Research from Position Digital shows brands are 6.5x more likely to be cited via third-party content than their own domain. For the 81%, there is no third-party content to cite. The review platforms, buyer guides, and comparison pages that AI draws from simply do not mention them.

What This Means for Marketing Leaders

If you are running enterprise marketing at a B2B company, there are three questions worth asking after this data:

→ Are you in the 19% or the 81%? Check by asking ChatGPT or Google AI Mode for recommendations in your category. If your company is not named, you are in the majority.

→ Is your AI visibility investment proportional to the channel? 48% of B2B searches trigger AI answers. 68% of enterprise buyers start research in AI before Google. If your budget is still 100% optimised for Google organic, the allocation is structurally misaligned.

→ Do you have citation infrastructure or just content? The companies scoring 20+ on citation are not producing more content. They appear in content they did not create — review platforms, buyer guides, analyst reports, partner directories. That is a different type of investment than a blog calendar.

The full data — all 150 scores, sector breakdowns, edition comparison, and interactive charts — is on the research page.