How to motivate sellers to build trust and personal brands on LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the new handshake

In B2B, sales teams that want to hit their quotas need to build trust with their network contacts. Buyers are harder to reach, more skeptical of sales outreach, and far more likely to research vendors independently before scheduling a meeting. In this environment, LinkedIn has become the modern equivalent of a handshake. It’s where buyers check credibility, validate expertise, and decide whether to engage.

And yet, many sellers are still treating LinkedIn as optional. They post once every few months, if at all. Their profiles read like outdated résumés. And they’re missing a massive opportunity to influence the buyer journey, build trust with future clients, and stand out in crowded markets.

This guide explores how to encourage B2B sellers, such as SaaS representatives or legal partners, to leverage LinkedIn to grow their influence, build credibility, and attract the right buyers. Read how marketing teams can help, how employee advocacy programs play a crucial role, and why social selling is more than a buzzword. It’s the future of building trust at scale.

Social selling is trust-building in disguise

Let’s get one thing clear: social selling doesn’t mean pitching on LinkedIn. It’s not about sliding into inboxes with cold outreach or product offers. It’s about building relationships and credibility in the public eye, so that when buyers are ready, they already know who they want to talk to.

Think of social selling as a modern approach to building trust. When sellers share insights, comment on industry topics, and stay present in their network’s feed, they begin to shape perception. They are no longer anonymous reps behind company emails. They become visible, helpful experts.

And this visibility does more than improve personal brand. It’s how sellers gain access to hard-to-reach buying committees and hidden buyers who influence decisions without ever having to fill out a form. A consistent social presence is a magnet for inbound interest and deeper engagement with key personas.

It is important to realize that at any given time, only 3 % of your market is actively ready to buy, 56 % are not, and 40 % are poised to begin. Therefore, sellers need to work for both future and current buyers. A known research published by Professor John Dawes dives into these stats even further and provides a calculation: “The time between purchases for many goods and services is quite long. Corporations typically change their service providers, such as their principal bank or law firm, approximately once every five years on average. That means only 20% of business buyers are ‘in the market’ over the course of an entire year; something like 5% in a quarter – or put another way, 95% aren’t in the market.”

The mindset shift sellers need to embrace

To succeed at social selling, sellers need to see themselves as more than just quota-carrying reps. They need to think like subject matter experts.

This shift means:

1. Treating LinkedIn as a channel to add value, not promote products
2.  Seeing consistency as a strategy, not a task
3.  Understanding that credibility earns attention, and trust earns meetings.
   

It’s not about becoming influencers. It’s about becoming recognizable, reliable voices in their industry. That means having a complete profile, sharing informed perspectives, and engaging with relevant conversations regularly.

For B2B sales, this is the difference between cold outbound and warm inbound. It’s how modern trust is built.

Why sellers show up on LinkedIn

Before asking sellers to post or engage on LinkedIn, it helps to understand what motivates them. While social presence might not be tied to a sales dashboard (yet), its impact is measurable.

The tangible benefits:

• Increased visibility with buying personas
•  Faster access to decision-makers
•  Shortened sales cycles due to pre-established trust
•  Better response from prospects already familiar with their name

The intangible benefits:

• Personal brand growth
•  Recognition from the industry
• Creating opportunities to speak, partner, or be referenced
• Confidence in industry know-how and thought leadership.

When sellers realize that social selling can fuel both their personal goals and sales performance, resistance starts to fade. But even with the right mindset, they still need support.

How marketing can help sellers succeed on LinkedIn

Most sellers don’t wake up wanting to write LinkedIn content. They may not know what to say, how to say it, or how to stay consistent. That’s where marketing comes in, not just with strategy and support, but also with AI-powered tools that simplify the process.

Your marketing team already excels at messaging, writing, and storytelling. With the help of AI, you can amplify this support without overwhelming your sellers.

Here’s how:

Create a content runway

Provide sellers with ready-to-use posts, commentary, and multimedia aligned with key themes and buyer interests.
How AI helps: Use Oktopost’s AI assistant or integrated GPT models to generate multiple post variations, summarize long-form content into digestible formats, and tailor content to different buyer personas at scale.

Offer writing support

Help sellers polish their posts, ghostwrite when needed, or run short training sessions on how to frame their ideas.
How AI helps: AI writing assistants can suggest hooks, headlines, hashtags, and even improve tone or structure. With prompt libraries and content templates, your team can streamline writing sessions or even co-create posts with sellers live.

Run an employee advocacy program

Utilize a platform like Oktopost to curate content boards specifically designed for sales, making it easy to discover, personalize, and share relevant content.

How AI helps: AI within advocacy platforms can recommend the most relevant content based on seller activity, role, or past engagement. It can even suggest the best time to post and highlight trending insights or competitor signals worth sharing.

Celebrate wins

Highlight seller posts that gain traction, showcase examples of strong engagement, and foster internal momentum to build a culture of advocacy.

How AI helps: AI-powered analytics can identify top-performing posts, summarize impact in real time, and spotlight unexpected engagement from buying personas or hidden influencers, making internal reporting easier and more insightful.

The truth is, social selling becomes sustainable when it’s easy, in the flow of work, and rewarding. With AI, it’s also far less time-consuming. Marketing teams can lead the charge by enabling sellers with both content and the intelligent tools that bring it to life, so building trust online doesn’t feel like just another task.

What social selling looks like across B2B industries

Social selling is not one-size-fits-all. It appears differently depending on the industry, audience, and objectives. Let’s examine what effective social presence entails in four key B2B segments.

What stops sellers from engaging on LinkedIn

Even with motivation and support, many sellers still hesitate. Here are the most common objections and how to overcome them:

“I don’t have time.”
Make it easy. Use employee advocacy tools to offer ready-to-share content. One click, and they’re done.

“I’m not a writer.”
They don’t need to be. Marketing can support with editing or provide short templates. A good post can be as simple as a thoughtful comment or question. With contemporary AI tools, you won’t be looking at a blank screen; you will have ideas, suggestions, and completely written posts to review.

“No one cares what I post.”
Show them examples of internal posts that performed well. Data builds confidence. Recognition fuels momentum.

“It doesn’t feel like selling.”
Exactly. It’s about building trust that makes selling easier. Remind them that today’s buyers often engage first with content, not conversations.

“When I share, nobody engages with my posts, so what’s the point?”

It’s okay if you don’t get likes or comments; each of your posts in decision-makers’ feeds helps shape micropurchasing decisions in their minds. To warm up, they can even comment on content. Consistent visibility is crucial, even if engagement is initially low.

“It’s not my job.”
Reframe social as a revenue channel. If buyers are there, so should sellers be.

A quick-start playbook for enabling social sellers

If you’re just getting started or looking to improve engagement among your sellers, here’s a simple blueprint:

1. Host a profile optimization session.
   Help sellers polish their LinkedIn headline, banner, about section, and featured content. Read more in this Oktopost blog about optimizing your LinkedIn profile. 
2. Run a personal brand workshop.
   Focus on what to post, how to engage, and how to grow their network with intent. 
3. Set up a content board for sellers.
   Utilize your advocacy platform to share weekly posts tailored to specific industries or target audiences. 
4. Celebrate internally.
   Highlight standout posts and results in team meetings or newsletters. 
5. Gamify participation.
   Offer small prizes or shoutouts for top engagement or creative posts.
6. Make it part of onboarding.
   Every new seller should get a crash course in social selling from day one.
7. Incorporate your employee advocacy program into the existing tools that sales already use.
   Outreach, Salesforce, or others, bring advocacy to where your sellers already work.

Final thoughts

B2B sales have changed. Buyers are digital-first, self-educated, and often invisible until the final stages of a deal. Sellers who wait for inbound leads or rely solely on cold outbound tactics are missing key opportunities.

However, sellers who consistently, authentically, and strategically show up on LinkedIn can become trusted voices in their field. They open doors that marketing alone can’t. They warm up prospects before the first conversation. And they close deals faster because trust has already been built.

To make that happen, they need help. From marketing. From leadership. From programs that make social content easy and measurable. With the right mindset, tools, and support, any seller can establish a personal brand on LinkedIn that drives sales.

Want to empower your sellers?

With Oktopost’s employee advocacy solution, you can help your sales team become LinkedIn leaders. Equip them with relevant content, track impact, and create a consistent presence that drives the pipeline. Contact us today and discover how we help B2B businesses make social selling work.