There’s a long-standing rule in B2B buying:

“No one ever got fired for hiring IBM.”

It’s not a comment on quality. It’s a comment on how people protect themselves.

When someone chooses a vendor, or recommends one to a decision maker, they’re not just evaluating the outcome. They’re thinking about how that decision will reflect on them personally.

If it goes wrong, their reputation takes the hit. If it goes right, the credit is shared.

This is why the IBM Rule matters so much for websites.

Your website often sets the narrative before you ever speak to a buyer. It’s what they use internally to justify the decision, so it has to make choosing you feel safe.

This is where risk-adjusted value comes in.

Dale W. Harrison nails this with this illustration of Value vs. Risk-Adjusted Value, which shows how perceived value shrinks once personal and reputational risk are subtracted. Give Dale a follow on LinkedIn. He consistently shares high-quality insights on B2B business development.
 

This means buyers are not optimizing for the “best” option. They are optimizing for the safest defensible decision. Your website plays a bigger role in that than most teams realize.

A strong website reduces perceived risk. It signals that choosing you is reasonable, professional, and unlikely to blow back internally. That’s why credibility markers like testimonials, recognizable clients, awards, and clear positioning matter so much.

If you don’t have those yet, your site needs to work harder in other ways. Clarity, simplicity, and a clear value tradeoff can still make the decision feel smart rather than risky.

For a deeper look at how credibility fits into persuasion more broadly, read The best website advice is 2,000 years old. It provides useful context for why trust and justification matter as much as features.

The takeaway is simple: your website should help the buyer explain their choice before they ever have to defend it.