The B2B Loyalty Illusion: Why 71% of "Loyal" Buyers Are One Better Offer Away
Data shows that B2B loyalty is more fragile than many marketers assume, with buyers driven less by relationships and more by convenience, price, and value alignment.
When staying costs less than switching
If consumer loyalty is fracturing into fleeting trends and viral moments, you’d expect the B2B world (with its long-term contracts and quarterly business reviews) to operate differently.
It doesn’t.
That corporate purchasing officer shopping on Amazon at night? She brings those expectations into the boardroom the next morning. What looked like loyalty was often just inertia. And inertia isn’t a strategy.
Part Two: The B2B Mirror
This article is a continuation of the article The Loyalty Recession published last week.
SAP’s B2B Buyer Loyalty Index surveyed 3,008 decision-makers across five markets. Having identified a “loyalty recession” in consumer spending in Part One, Sarah Richter, CMO of SAP Emarsys, finds the same stress points are now running through enterprise procurement.
71% claim loyalty to at least one supplier. Which sounds reassuring until you examine what that loyalty actually represents.
Six Types of Loyalty (Only One Actually Matters)
The research identifies six loyalty types. Only one resembles genuine commitment: Strategic Loyalty at 35%, based on trust and mutual value.
Default Loyalty sits at 70%. These buyers remain with suppliers because switching is painful, not because relationships deliver value. A manufacturing director I spoke with last month has been with the same ERP vendor for eight years—not because they’re excellent, but because migration would be “career suicide.” That’s Default Loyalty.
The rest (Incentivised, Values-based, Legacy, and Adaptive) are conditional relationships that fracture the moment pricing changes or commitments slip.
Here’s what’s propping up that claimed loyalty: broad product range, seamless system integration, high-quality products. These aren’t emotional bonds. They’re operational dependencies dressed as loyalty.
And the dealbreakers? 28% cite disconnected experiences across touch points. 27% are tired of suppliers pushing unnecessary products. 26% simply want to speak to a human. Sound familiar? These are the same complaints consumers have about retail apps and chatbots.
The insight is straightforward: B2B buyers are people. The boundary between B2C and B2B hasn’t blurred. It’s vanished.
The AI Paradox
95% of B2B buyers say a supplier’s AI use positively influences their loyalty. Meanwhile, 63 per cent of consumers distrust AI’s data privacy protections.
The same person who worries about AI privacy at home becomes its champion at work. Businesses are rewarding suppliers for AI adoption that their own customers increasingly fear.
When Chatbots Replace Consultants
Here’s where it gets interesting.
25% of B2B buyers now consult AI chatbots for supplier research.
Twenty-four per cent seek recommendations from industry experts.
AI chatbots have overtaken human expertise in supplier discovery.
30% still use Google. 27% still use social media. Traditional gatekeepers (industry analysts, trade publications) share space with algorithmically generated content.
For B2B vendors trying to measure what’s working, this creates problems. Only 33% have formal loyalty strategies across all departments. They’re flying blind.
The ROI Problem
Most organisations cannot prove loyalty programmes work. Not because programmes fail but because measurement is genuinely difficult.
A procurement VP at a Fortune 500 company told me they track “enhanced data sharing” and “system compatibility” as loyalty metrics. I asked if the programme was profitable. Long pause. “We think so?”
The chart is showing what organisations use to evaluate loyalty programme success, highlighting the 35% data sharing metric.
That’s the problem. Customer interactions happen across marketing, sales, service, operations. Each department tracks different metrics. Connecting them requires enterprise-wide systems most companies lack. 60% have enhanced data sharing capabilities, yet 42% measuring ROI is only “somewhat easy.”
Without unified data, loyalty is faith-based, not evidence-based.
What Breaks Loyalty
67% of B2B buyers have switched suppliers due to poor service, cost increases, or declining quality. Missed delivery dates, lack of innovation, sustainability concerns, data breaches: all drive defection.
For consumers it’s simpler: make engagement difficult, betray trust, or bore them. They leave. Second chances are rare.
The dealbreakers cluster around the same themes whether you’re buying software or shampoo: disconnected experiences, poor service, broken trust.
Three Ways Forward
Sara Richter offers three strategies. Deploy AI-powered personalisation.
24% of B2B buyers are more loyal to suppliers that personalise marketing. Most organisations lack the real-time data and cross-functional collaboration required. Fix that.
Convert Default Loyalty into Strategic Loyalty. Use data to uncover growth trends proactively. Twenty-three per cent are more loyal to suppliers that scale with their organisation. Default Loyalty evaporates when better options emerge.
Develop Values-based strategies. Twenty-two per cent prioritise suppliers with sustainable business practices. ESG commitments now influence buying decisions at scale. This isn’t virtue signalling; it’s procurement criteria.
Sara Richter is clear: loyalty isn’t passive. It’s engineered through data, personalisation and operational excellence.
What Comes Next
True Loyalty has stalled. In its place: Trend Loyalty amongst consumers, Default Loyalty amongst B2B buyers, conditional loyalty everywhere else.
44% of marketers rate their personalisation as effective. 57% cannot use data in real time. 66% admit their data is too unstructured. These aren’t outliers; they’re the majority.
The opportunity belongs to brands willing to rebuild from scratch. That requires unified data systems, cross-functional collaboration, real-time responsiveness and transparent AI use. It requires understanding that loyalty isn’t a programme but every interaction a customer has with your brand.
Sara Richter is explicit about what’s at stake: “Every customer touchpoint is a chance to build lasting loyalty that fuels sustainable, profitable growth.” Miss that opportunity, and customers (whether consumers or B2B buyers) will find someone who doesn’t.
The market is sorting brands into categories. Which one are you in?
Key Takeaways
B2C:
True brand loyalty replaced by “Trend Loyalty” driven by viral moments
63% of Gen Z abandon brands out of boredom
63% distrust AI data privacy protections
Only 44% of marketers believe their personalisation works
B2B:
70% exhibit Default Loyalty (staying because switching hurts)
95% say AI positively impacts loyalty—opposite of consumer sentiment
AI chatbots now rival industry experts in supplier research (25% vs 24%)
67% have switched suppliers due to poor service or quality declines
Both:
Disconnected experiences are the top loyalty killer
Loyalty must connect data across marketing, sales, service, operations
The boundary between consumer and business buying has vanished
