78% of Indian B2B marketers trust human expertise over AI: LinkedIn's Sachin Sharma – StoryBoard 18

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When AI can summarise a 50-page whitepaper in seconds, write marketing copy on demand and compare vendors without a buyer ever visiting a brand website, what happens to the content machines B2B companies have spent years building?
According to Sachin Sharma, Head of LinkedIn Marketing Solutions India, the answer lies in something AI cannot easily manufacture: trust.
“AI-generated content, volume of distribution, and agility are all going to become table stakes,” Sharma told Storyboard18. “The real differentiator will be whether buyers trust your product, your expertise and the people recommending your solution.”
As LinkedIn releases new research pointing to a paradox in the AI era: while machines are making content easier to produce and consume, human influence is becoming more important in B2B decision-making.
When discovery becomes automated
For years, B2B marketers built their content strategies around discovery. Whitepapers, blogs, reports, webinars and case studies were designed to attract prospects, answer questions and move them into the sales funnel.
Generative AI is changing that behaviour.
Enterprise buyers can increasingly use AI tools to research companies, compare vendors, summarise reports and find answers without necessarily interacting with the original source.
That does not mean content is becoming irrelevant, Sharma argues. It means content itself is becoming less differentiated.
Also read: Generative AI boosting productivity, lowering costs for India’s creators: The Dialogue report
“There is going to be a lot more content, and it is going to be higher quality and more polished than ever before,” he says. “But enterprise buying decisions are not made based on who creates the most content or who distributes it the fastest.”
The question, therefore, shifts from who can produce the most information to whose information buyers believe.
“People making purchase decisions are making decisions that affect their careers and professional success. They're not looking for volume. They're looking for confidence and trust,” Sharma adds.
The new B2B trust economy
LinkedIn’s research points to the growing role of human expertise in that equation.
According to the study, 78% of Indian B2B marketers believe buyers trust human expertise more than AI-generated content, while 82% say brand credibility is becoming more important than visibility.
The change is also playing out across buying committees.
As Gen Z and millennials move into professional decision-making roles, their expectations around influence are entering the enterprise. These are audiences accustomed to discovering products, ideas and people through creators, communities and recommendations.
Read more: 82% of India’s Gen Z uses AI weekly as education and career choices shift: Report
Nearly 97% of marketers surveyed say their company’s future growth depends on influencing younger decision-makers. Another 97% say Gen Z buyers are more likely to consider brands recommended by someone within their professional network.
“The buying committee itself is expanding,” Sharma says.
Purchase decisions are involving more stakeholders and taking longer, making credibility across the journey increasingly important.
He further adds, “Young buyers have grown up consuming creator content, video content and influencer-led recommendations. When they enter workplaces, they don't suddenly change how they make decisions. They're still looking for trusted voices.”
Thought leadership is no longer a PDF
The AI boom is also forcing marketers to rethink what they mean by thought leadership.
For Sharma, it is not about producing another polished report and putting a senior executive’s name on it.
“Thought leadership is not a single document or a creative asset,” he says. “It's the entire buying journey.”
That means brands need to demonstrate an understanding of the problems their customers are facing, contribute original thinking and provide information that helps people make better decisions.
LinkedIn is consequently putting greater emphasis on two ingredients: expert voices and original data.
The platform has expanded its focus on creator-led formats, influencer partnerships and Thought Leader Ads, allowing brands to amplify content from executives, subject-matter experts and creators.
“We've gone through a massive pivot,” Sharma says. “Expert voices and original data have become critical inputs for buying decisions.”
Making B2B sound human
The challenge, however, is not simply putting more executives or creators in front of a camera. It is making their communication credible.
As AI makes corporate messaging increasingly easy to generate, audiences can also become better at spotting content that feels generic.
For Sharma, authenticity comes down to three things: expertise, consistency and transparency.
“Authenticity doesn't come from marketing language,” he says. “It comes from demonstrating expertise, staying consistent over time and being transparent about your values.”
That creates an interesting role for creators and executives in B2B marketing.
They do not necessarily replace the brand. Instead, they can provide the human credibility that corporate communication often struggles to establish.
“The creator is the anchor, not the protagonist,” Sharma says.
“The hero of the story remains the product, the solution or the customer problem you're solving. What expert voices bring is trust and resonance.”
From leads to lifetime value
There is another shift underway, this time inside the boardroom.
B2B marketers have traditionally been judged on metrics such as leads generated, conversion rates and pipeline. But Sharma believes those numbers increasingly fail to capture the full value of brand building and influence.
“We've moved beyond the idea that success is only about how many leads you generated,” he says.
In SaaS and technology businesses especially, the commercial relationship does not end when someone fills out a form. Retention, expansion and renewals can determine the real value of an acquired customer.
That is where the so-called “bow-tie” model becomes relevant, with customer expansion and retention becoming as important as acquisition.
“You don't make money when someone becomes a lead,” Sharma says. “You make money two or three years later when that customer renews and continues growing with you.”
In that context, trust stops being a soft brand metric. It becomes part of the economics of customer acquisition and retention.
Visibility is not enough
Founder-led marketing has given startups a powerful way to build visibility, particularly on LinkedIn. But Sharma does not believe established brands are automatically disadvantaged.
Large companies are increasingly putting executives, experts and subject-matter specialists at the centre of their communication, rather than relying exclusively on corporate channels.
LinkedIn’s Thought Leader Ads are part of that shift, giving brands a way to amplify individual voices while retaining the scale of paid media.
The approach, Sharma says, is to start with credibility rather than reach. “We tell marketers to start small, build trust with the right audience and then scale what works.”
For LinkedIn, the platform's advantage is not simply the size of its audience. It is the mindset of the people using it.
“It's where people come with a mindset of self-improvement, learning and professional growth,” he adds.
The asset AI cannot replicate
The B2B marketing industry is entering a period where content production is becoming faster, cheaper and increasingly automated.
That makes one question more important: if everyone can create content, what separates one brand from another?
When asked about which strategic asset an algorithm will never be able to replicate, Sharma's answer was trust.
LinkedIn’s research reinforces that argument. Eighty-four percent of Indian B2B marketers say brands must show up within trusted professional networks to build credibility, while 58% expect to increase investments in expert voices and creator-led influence.
The implication for marketers is clear: AI may increasingly determine how buyers discover information. It may summarise the research, compare the options and even shape the shortlist.
But when the decision carries professional and financial consequences, buyers still want to know who they can believe.
“There will be more content, more conversations and more noise,” Sharma says. “The brands that win will be the ones that build credibility before the buying decision is made.”
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The conversation highlighted a fundamental shift underway in the relationship between audiences, platforms and brands. Rather than treating Gen Z as a uniform consumer segment, marketers are increasingly having to account for individual behaviours, fragmented content consumption and a stronger expectation
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Storyboard18 Awards for Creativity 2026 honoured campaigns that blended storytelling, cultural relevance and measurable impact across platforms.
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