Digital authenticity: Towards a research agenda for the AI-driven fifth phase of digitalization in business-to-business marketing

Abstract

In recent years, we have witnessed a massive proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) in all parts of society and business. Advances in AI are rapidly changing business-to-business marketing as well, with substantial implications for business-to-business theory and practice. In an extension of Ritter and Pedersen's (2020) phases of digitalization in business-to-business firms and through conceptual integration and development, this paper argues that digitalization has entered a new phase based on the generative capabilities of AI, which produce seemingly authentic artefacts, interactions, and datasets that cannot be consistently recognized as artificial, i.e. machine created with no or limited connection to real entities such as persons and places but which can be mistaken for having such connections. The paper outlines the characteristics of this evolution of digitalization and develops a research agenda for this fifth phase of digitalization, including the need for digital authorization to moderate the development of digital authenticity into value creation.