Forrester’s 2027 forecasts put an AI cost squeeze at the center of B2C marketing and customer experience planning. In predictions published October 21, 2026, the firm says rising AI costs will force B2C marketing leaders to scale back a third of AI initiatives. The same research cycle says CX staffing will rise 20% after overzealous cuts, that efficiency strategies will weaken customer loyalty, and that one in 20 US and UK consumers will replace traditional shopping with conversations.
Key Takeaways
- Rising AI costs will force B2C leaders to scale back a third of initiatives.
- CX staffing rises 20% after overzealous cuts, into AI-support roles.
- One in 20 US and UK consumers will replace traditional shopping with conversations.
- Efficiency strategies will eclipse meaningful connection and weaken customer loyalty.
Why the 2027 AI Cost Squeeze Hits Martech Budgets
Forrester’s B2C predictions announcement says that as AI usage grows, martech vendors are increasingly adopting usage-based pricing, so every agent interaction, generated asset, and automated workflow becomes a billable event. Leaders will need to make tougher decisions and focus investments on AI initiatives that deliver measurable business value.
Sharyn Leaver, chief research officer at Forrester, described the management test:
Whether managing AI costs, preparing for agentic commerce, or earning trust in an increasingly synthetic digital world, organizations must make more deliberate decisions about where AI creates value, where human expertise matters most, and where investment is best spent.
For CxOs, the implication is portfolio control. Once every interaction is billable, expansion should follow evidence of business value, not pilot volume. See this site’s reporting on AI payoff outside the technology sector and on AWS capacity sold out through 2027.
CX Rehiring and the Loyalty Trade-Off
That same October 21 announcement says CX staffing will rise by 20% after overzealous cuts, focusing on AI-supporting roles. After two years of widespread layoffs across CX teams, companies will increase hiring for roles such as natural language processing engineers, data scientists, and AI experience designers to identify high-value AI use cases and strengthen AI capabilities.
Forrester’s CX predictions describe teams that have lost staff and influence after two years of layoffs and reorgs, just as organizations need a stronger customer focus. The outlook warns that efficiency strategies will eclipse meaningful connection and weaken customer loyalty. Organizations will deploy AI-powered self-service and other customer-facing automation mainly to cut costs, assuming greater efficiency will also improve CX. Many will discover that reducing friction does not automatically strengthen loyalty when the experience lacks differentiation and human connection. This can still be a sound strategy if the savings outweigh the revenue hit, but most brands cannot make that trade-off intelligently because they do not measure the connection between CX and business results.
Forrester’s guidance for CX leaders includes:
- Study the ROI of AI and human experiences.
- Identify high-stakes moments when a higher-cost human connection maintains a positive return.
- Invest in the data foundations needed to apply AI at scale and treat journeys as decision systems.
- Blend AI with human judgment rather than accelerating legacy measurement or automating dysfunction with unvalidated outputs.
The B2C announcement also says human-generated content will become a top priority again for 50% of brands. As AI-generated content floods digital channels, marketers will increasingly rely on experts, customers, and documented evidence to build trust and credibility.
How the 2027 Forecasts Compare
The figures below are Forrester’s 2027 forecasts, not current results.
| Forecast | Figure | Who it covers |
|---|---|---|
| AI initiatives scaled back | One-third | B2C marketing leaders |
| CX staffing | Up 20% | AI-supporting roles after cuts |
| Brands prioritizing human-generated content | 50% | Trust and credibility |
| Consumers replacing shopping with conversations | 1 in 20 | US and UK |
| Fully agentic journey orchestration | 1 in 5 companies | Mostly from the 25% of AI decision-makers already working on AI for CX |
| CX teams transforming measurement with AI | 1 in 4 | Analytics and agentic workflows |
| B2B purchase decisions influenced by AI agents | 75% | Tasks across the buying process |
| B2B selling-budget dollars disappearing | 1 in 10 | Buyer-controlled systems |
| Providers losing deals on unverifiable claims | Two-thirds | B2B providers |
| Marketing roles eliminated | As many as 25% | Marketing leaders anticipating unrealized gains |
| Commerce service providers launching platforms | One-third | Protocols, guardrails, and payments |
Post-Click Commerce and Agent-Led Buying
Forrester’s digital commerce predictions say the assumption that shoppers do most digital buying inside an experience the business owns will start to break down in 2027. One in 20 US and UK consumers will replace traditional shopping with conversations. Most consumers will experiment with conversational product discovery without handing over the entire purchase. A small pioneering group will shift commoditized, repeat purchases to autonomous agents that can choose timing, compare prices, and complete transactions.
Retailers accustomed to recognizing customers through accounts, devices, browsing behavior, and transaction histories must now prepare to recognize a customer represented by an AI shopping agent. Brands that prioritize trust over automation will be best positioned to capitalize on agentic commerce.
Forrester’s B2B go-to-market predictions, also dated October 21, 2026, say AI agents will influence 75% of B2B purchase decisions. Truly autonomous buying will remain concentrated in high-volume, low-risk, and repeatable purchases. Buyers will double their human interactions with provider teams and trusted third parties to validate AI-generated recommendations, because AI cannot fully judge fit, feasibility, trust, or accountability. Most CMOs will cut programs or accept reduced capacity after overestimating AI gains. Marketing leaders will eliminate as many as 25% of roles in anticipation of productivity gains that fail to meet expectations, then choose between cutting program budgets to restore capacity and accepting reduced execution.
