New research commissioned by Outreach and conducted by IDC reveals that agentic artificial intelligence is becoming a strategic necessity for revenue teams, with early adopters seeing significant gains in conversion rates, efficiency, and forecasting accuracy. The study of over 600 organizations indicates that 68% are currently scaling or optimizing AI across revenue functions, signaling a major inflection point in sales execution.
IDC research finds 68% of organizations are scaling or optimizing AI in revenue functions.
Agentic AI adopters report a 41% increase in conversion rates and a 45% reduction in manual work.
38% of organizations see faster sales onboarding due to AI acceleration.
Frontline managers lead 44% of adoption efforts, embedding AI into daily workflows.
Despite infrastructure readiness, concerns around security, accuracy, and oversight persist.
The study warns that companies without an agentic AI strategy risk falling behind competitively.
The IDC survey quantifies the direct benefits driving AI adoption in revenue operations. Organizations using agentic AI report measurable improvements, including higher conversion rates and significant reductions in manual tasks as AI handles complex, multi-step actions. Michelle Morgan, Research Manager at IDC, explained the shift: “Agentic AI represents a structural change in how revenue teams operate. The organizations seeing the greatest impact are moving beyond isolated automation toward intelligent systems that continuously analyze data, execute multi-step actions, and support better decision-making.”
A key finding is the critical role of frontline management in successful implementation. The IDC White Paper notes, “frontline managers are emerging as critical catalysts behind agentic AI adoption in revenue organizations. Nearly half of all adoption efforts (44%) are led by managers who weave AI into daily sales workflows.” This bottom-up integration is essential for moving AI from a pilot project to an embedded component of the revenue workflow.
While most organizations report their infrastructure is ready, the research highlights that technical integration alone is insufficient. Concerns about data privacy, reliability, and loss of human oversight remain significant barriers. Abhijit Mitra, CEO of Outreach, emphasized the need for trust: “AI only delivers value when teams trust it enough to embed it directly into how they work. Agentic AI is about augmenting sellers, the key is automating the operational burden around them with systems that are reliable, secure, and accountable.”
The research concludes that the competitive advantage for early adopters is set to compound, making agentic AI not just a tool for efficiency but a foundational element for future revenue growth and market competitiveness.
About Outreach
Outreach, founded in 2014, is the only complete AI Revenue Workflow Platform built for all revenue teams. Outreach infuses predictive, assistive, conversational and agentic AI to power hundreds of use cases across revenue motions. From new logo prospecting to expansions, deal acceleration, driving retention, and forecasting, Outreach AI automates workflows and frees sellers to focus on more strategic conversations and actions. Revenue leaders benefit from connected account visibility, performance insights, and higher forecasting accuracy across every GTM team. World leading enterprise organizations use Outreach to power their revenue teams, including SAP, Siemens, Snowflake, and Verizon to name a few.
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