Gartner Says 74% of Buying Groups Experience “Unhealthy Conflict.” Here’s How to Fix It.

When Gartner released new survey data showing that 74% of B2B buying teams experience unhealthy conflict during the decision process, one thing became clear: sellers don’t just need to fill the funnel, they need to win alignment. In other words: deals don’t fail because the product isn’t good enough—they fail because stakeholders can’t agree.

The Cost of Unhealthy Conflict

Gartner defines “unhealthy conflict” as situations where buying team members have conflicting objectives, disagree on the best course of action, or are overruled by external decision-makers. That’s not just inconvenient—it’s deal-killing. Their survey of 632 B2B buyers found that buying groups who reach consensus are 2.5x more likely to describe their purchase as a high-quality deal. When groups fail to align, deals either stall indefinitely, get downgraded in scope, or collapse completely. The challenge is structural. Buying groups today are larger and more diverse than ever, ranging from five to 16 stakeholders across as many as four functions. Finance has one agenda, IT another, operations yet another. Each brings different fears, metrics, and criteria into the room. No one person—not even the strongest champion—can reconcile all those perspectives alone. The result? Conflict simmers under the surface until it explodes in the form of a lost deal.

The Relevance Paradox

The Gartner report also highlights a critical nuance: it’s not just about content being “tailored,” it’s about what level you tailor to.

• Buying group relevance—messages that speak to the shared goals and organizational priorities—boosts consensus by 20%.
• Individual-level relevance—messages crafted to speak to one person’s unique lens—actually backfires, reducing consensus by 59%.

This is a crucial distinction. When sellers hyper-focus on individual champions, they often reinforce silos instead of building bridges. Each stakeholder nods along to the message that validates their worldview—but the group as a whole fractures further apart. Consensus requires relevance at the group level. It requires giving stakeholders a shared language for why this decision matters, how it aligns to company goals, and what success will look like collectively.

Why Current Tools Fall Short

Here’s the problem: most of the GTM stack isn’t built for consensus.

• CRMs track contacts but don’t reveal the hidden influencers.
• ABM tools target accounts but can’t bridge internal conflicts.
• Outreach tools blast messages to individuals, not to buying groups.

The result? Sellers end up over-relying on a single champion, hoping they can carry the deal across the finish line. But champions don’t control every conversation, and they can’t singlehandedly align finance, legal, IT, and operations. When those groups clash, the deal goes quiet.

How to Fix It

If unhealthy conflict is the new normal, then sales teams need a new playbook. One that treats alignment as the primary job in enterprise sales, not an afterthought. That means three things:

1. Map the decision chain. Don’t assume you’re seeing the whole picture. Behind every visible stakeholder are others you’ll never meet directly but who still have influence.
2. Influence the silent stakeholders. Don’t wait for your champion to carry your story into closed rooms. Ensure that the narrative you want told is reaching everyone in the decision chain, even those you can’t talk to.
3. Shift from individual to group relevance. Stop over-optimizing content for one role. Instead, create a shared narrative that frames the decision in terms of enterprise goals, collective risk reduction, and organizational outcomes.

This is the work that actually prevents deals from dying in silence.

Where Yappy Group Fits

At Yappy Group, we believe consensus is the new close. That’s why we built a platform to help sales and marketing teams do what traditional tools can’t:

• Always-On Influence ensures your credibility is already established across the market, so stakeholders are predisposed to trust you before the first RFP lands.
• Tactical Influence allows you to engage the entire decision chain during active deals—not just the people you’ve met. Silent influencers in finance, IT, or operations see the same aligned narrative as your champion.
• Consensus Messaging is built into how Yappy operates. Instead of reinforcing individual silos, Yappy helps sellers deliver group-level relevance, giving stakeholders a shared rationale for moving forward.

The outcome is exactly what Gartner prescribes: fewer conflicts, more alignment, and higher-quality deals.

The Bottom Line

The Gartner data is a wake-up call for sales leaders. Three out of four buying teams are stuck in conflict. And the ones who manage to reach consensus are far more likely to close successfully and feel confident in their decision. Sellers can’t solve this problem by adding more leads to the funnel or sending more one-to-one nurture emails. They solve it by equipping themselves with the ability to influence the full decision chain and create consensus. That’s the missing layer in the GTM stack. And that’s what Yappy delivers. If you want to stop watching deals die in silence, stop relying on champions to do all the heavy lifting. Start building the consensus that today’s enterprise buying reality demands. Get a demo today.