More AI agents, lower sales results
At the end of July, Gartner made a prediction that every sales director should take note of. By 2028, there will be ten times as many AI agents as salespeople. That sounds like a productivity revolution—until you read the figure that follows: less than 40 percent of those salespeople will say that the agents actually made their work better.
More AI does not automatically mean more revenue
Melissa Hilbert, VP Analyst at Gartner, sums it up succinctly: AI agents are everywhere, but there’s a ceiling on their value. Beyond a certain point, more AI simply doesn’t lead to increased productivity. What you end up with is just a lot of noise. More automated emails, more logged activities, more dashboards. Yet the number of meaningful conversations isn’t keeping pace.
That pattern is not new. Gartner predicted last year that more than 40 percent of agent-based AI projects would fail by the end of 2027, mainly due to rising costs and unclear business value.
And the bill keeps piling up
In mid-August, Gartner released a figure that directly supports this. The cost per AI workflow will increase by more than a factor of five by 2028. Gartner calls this the Inference Paradox: individual processing costs are falling, but because each new generation of AI performs more steps and engages in more reasoning, the total cost is rising. An agent that reasons and negotiates independently can easily cost five times as much as a simple chatbot.
For a sales organization, this presents a dilemma. You’re consistently paying more for technology that your own salespeople say doesn’t make them more productive.
Where AI Pays Off in Call Center Operations
The problem isn’t with AI itself, but with what you use it to automate. AI excels at everything related to the conversation: sifting through company data before you make a call and coming up with the right talking points; listening in during the conversation, taking notes, and making suggestions; and analyzing afterward what worked and what didn’t, so the next conversation goes better.
What AI doesn’t do is build trust. Ask follow-up questions when someone hesitates. Pick up on what isn’t being said. Those are precisely the moments when a deal is made—or lost.
Here’s how MisterSales handles it
We use AI as a silent coach, not as a replacement. The technology handles the groundwork and administrative tasks, while our salespeople lead the conversation. These are permanent, full-time employees, compensated based on results rather than hours, who represent your company as if they were your own staff. AI provides support; the salesperson makes the sale.
It’s not about whether you use AI in your sales. You’re probably already doing that. It’s about letting technology handle the groundwork and having a human handle the conversation. Otherwise, you’re just creating more work at a higher cost.
Together, you'll go further
Oops! We could not locate your form.
