Thought Management: The Final Information (with Examples) Acquire US

It’s getting tougher to face out and construct engagement on-line, particularly as AI helps create an ocean of net content material that every one sounds vaguely the identical. Nonetheless, there’s nonetheless a dependable technique to achieve affect, construct consciousness, and generate engagement along with your content material — a method that AI nonetheless struggles to beat, as a result of it requires originality — and that’s thought management. 

The truth is, numerous high organizations, together with GE, Salesforce, and HubSpot have demonstrated that thought management can result in vital outcomes.

They’ve pushed conversations round closing the gender gap in STEM (GE), the true role of a sales professional in a world overtaken by commoditization (Salesforce), and redefining how companies grow by syncing marketing with other departments inside of a company (HubSpot).

And so they’ve finished this from the angle of the corporate, in addition to key staff, executives, and companions. That’s why we created this information: the A-to-Z run-down of thought management and learn how to use it to extend consciousness and generate leads in your firm. 

What does “thought management” imply, precisely? Thought management is a content material advertising technique that positions an individual or model as a trusted knowledgeable in a specific discipline or business. It entails the method of making and selling content material about your business and contributing to the dialog that’s taking place along with your prospects, prospects, and strategic companions. 

Thought management is one thing that comes from the experience, expertise, and perception of the creator, and may embody every part from the newest analysis to an informed opinion that might go against common beliefs on the subject.

With a strong thought leadership strategy, a company can be recognized as an authority on a particular set of topics, circumstances, and/or industry trends and events. In doing so, you provide genuine value to your audience without the traditional hint of self-promotion.

It’s helping and guiding others through specific, industry content. 

Effective thought leadership can lead to:

• Increased awareness among your target audience
• Increased number of leads, due to prospective customers trusting you and reaching out for assistance
• Enhanced credibility through social proof and engagement

Thought leadership encompasses content on social networks, speaking/events, referrals, published works, videos, podcasts, and more—we’ll go more in-depth about tactics toward the end of this article—and it requires patience and consistency.

But there’s one thing that thought leadership MUST do, and it comes down to the word “leadership.”

By definition, leadership is the art of motivation a group of people to act.

As a result, in exercising thought leadership, you’re using your experiences and expertise to think forward about an industry and lead others through what’s ahead.

To provide some context for this topic, let’s look at some real-life application. Thought leadership marketing starts with putting out informative, high-quality content that could only come from an expert in the field.

Examples of thought leadership content include:

• An article forecasting trends for the upcoming year
• A video providing clarity on an often-misunderstood tactic or practice in your industry
• An interview on a key news outlet that shares takeaways from a significant conference and what they mean for the future of the industry
• An article that showcases insights and guidance on something that’s negatively or positively affecting your industry
• An LinkedIn post pointing an audience to key resources and strategies to make their jobs easier, more strategic, etc. 

Thought leadership content can be shared by a company, such as GE, or by one of the leaders inside the company. And in the best scenario, it’s both.

One of our favorite thought leaders in the marketing industry is Robert Rose. One of many co-founders of Content Marketing Institute, Robert leverages his place at CMI to share his insights and experiences in serving to corporations market by means of content material.

He went on to put in writing a guide, co-host a podcast, visitor creator on tons of of blogs, and extra. Robert is well-respected as one of many go-to specialists on the earth of buyer engagement, educating by means of content material, and transitioning advertising from a one-way avenue to a two-way dialog. And types search him out due to his authority and demonstrated data.

Or contemplate one other instance: Earlier than signing onto a content material partnership with Easy Strat, lots of our purchasers begin with our HubSpot consulting companies. They usually discover these companies by means of our HubSpot Hacks YouTube channel, which is full of tutorials and experience-driven recommendation to assist viewers get extra out of HubSpot. Through the use of this content material to show our data of HubSpot (in a manner that helps our subscribers), we’re in a position to construct belief, so new prospects can really feel safer when making their resolution to rent us.

Thought management is changing into a vital piece of a B2B marketing strategy because it works. But it’s more than that.

Simply take a look at this graph dating back to 2004. This demonstrates a steady increase in Google searches for the phrase “thought leadership”:

There are many reasons for the increase, but one of the most compelling reasons has to do with the decreasing level of consumer trust in brands.

According to a survey by McCann, nearly 42% of Americans find brands and companies less truthful today than 20 years ago.

Additional, a 2021 consumer survey concluded that greater than 80% contemplate belief a deciding issue of their shopping for selections, although solely 34% of customers belief the manufacturers they use. Shoppers are bored with being duped or tricked by conventional promoting, or by advertising campaigns that characteristic actors or fictitious representations of what a services or products can do.

Discover that these surveys have been finished earlier than generative AI like ChatGPT hit the mainstream. If you happen to’re too depending on AI when writing content material (i.e., in the event you’re not contributing a significant quantity of authentic, knowledgeable opinion to a weblog submit, for example), you will not stand an opportunity at changing into a trusted thought chief.

Individuals wish to hear from people. Whereas the strains between human and AI may blur (particularly with built-in writing assistants), the extra you possibly can add human contact into your buyer engagement, the higher.

You’ll see this taking place increasingly on platforms like Twitter (or X, or regardless of the platform known as subsequent week), the place executives promote their very own skilled profiles for connection, reasonably than merely utilizing the corporate account:

One other instance is startup founders like Allen Gannett or Gary Vaynerchuk writing books and sharing insights that result in elevated ranges of belief for his or her firm as a complete.

As demonstrated by these examples, among the strongest methods to combat the growing level of brand distrust are authenticity and private interplay. And each are present in a strong thought management technique.

Incorporating thought management into your advertising efforts entails greater than merely writing blogs and sharing content material on social.

It begins with the analysis, and constructing a method—the constructing blocks of all nice advertising packages!

A powerful thought management advertising program has three important parts:

• Personas—you must know who you’re focusing on along with your content material. The reply to this must be centered and strategic, creating sturdy buyer personas. If the answer to this question is “everybody,” then you’re going to fail.
• Point of View—to be a thought leader as a company or as an executive, you need to have a lens with which you see the world. This point of view should be clear in any thought leadership content piece—whether that is a blog on your website, a podcast you host, or a guest spot on a news interview. The point of view should be the same even if two different executives from the same company are writing thought leadership pieces.
• Personality—your content needs to have a personality. As a human, your personality is what draws people to you and what you have to say. When this is blended with a company’s platform, you must have a consistent personality in your content (this may also be called brand voice). If you happen to’re creating thought management content material on a private degree, personalities can fluctuate, but it surely ought to mix nicely with the general perspective of the corporate.

Armed with these three Ps, take it a step additional and ask questions like:

• What are the highest questions my personas are asking?
• Who’re they at the moment going to for solutions?
• What’s NOT being talked about? Why?
• What do individuals want they knew extra about?
• What are the subjects that get shared most on social media?
• What does key phrase analysis inform me in regards to the search queries being utilized in engines like google for these subjects?
• What’s our perspective as an organization? What will we consider in/stand for? What are we towards?
• What staff/executives/leaders can contribute or create content material? What are their areas of experience?

For instruments that can assist you on this dialog, think about using BuzzSumo, Ahrefs, or SEMRush. Every exhibits you the highest content material shared on subjects, in addition to key phrase analysis, viewers networks, and/or content material clusters.

To make use of thought management, you will need to first change into a thought chief.

However labeling your self (or your organization) as a “thought chief” is just not the reply. It’s like somebody calling themselves a visionary (ugh – don’t try this!). 

Being known as a “thought chief” is an attribution from the skin, a praise that’s earned primarily based in your demonstrated worth. In designing a thought management program, that’s the outcome that you just’re after—being labeled or famous as one of many go-to individuals in your business.

To be a thought chief, you will need to: 

• Love your matter. If you happen to’re going to be writing, talking, and sharing a few particular matter, it’s important that you just’re enthusiastic about it and your ardour exhibits. If you happen to’re serving to a member in your govt workforce create content material, the identical rule applies.

• Have expertise. Changing into a go-to authority on a subject requires some “battle tales” or experiences that qualify you as somebody who’s been there. Understanding the business is vital, and the inside workings of ways and methods in your area of interest is important.

• Be genuine. One of many greatest failures in thought management is attempting to be somebody you’re not or blatantly copying a thought chief that you just love and admire (nothing flawed with liking their content material. Simply don’t attempt to copy them). There can solely be one Gary Vee! Discover your individual voice and share it in your content material.

• Stay centered and constant. As with many advertising methods, the temptation will be to do an excessive amount of and write about a whole lot of subjects. The alternative is true. Refine your focus and be prepared to go deeper as an alternative of wider. And consistency is non-negotiable. If you happen to share one highly effective thought a yr, that hardly qualifies you or your organization as a thought chief.

• Share and reciprocate. To ensure that your content material to achieve the widest viewers, you must be prepared to share the content material on a wide range of mediums. This additionally contains collaborating with strategic companions, media shops, and influencers in your area of interest.

These 5 issues aren’t going to occur in a single day, however you have to be prepared to just accept them as necessities in your approach to constructing an efficient thought management follow.

When you’ve decided your personas, persona, and perspective, it’s time to overview the concepts you’ve provide you with in your brainstorming.

Once more, these will embody frequent questions, developments, search phrases from key phrase analysis, and popular culture subjects.

At this stage, you’ll wish to take a listing of the assets you have got accessible. This contains inside and exterior assets, but in addition the kind of expertise you have got (in your personal thought management) or the expertise accessible in your organization (for a company-wide thought management initiative).

• Take into consideration platform:
  • The place is our viewers consuming content material? LinkedIn? YouTube? Fb? Information websites? Twitter? Reddit? Affiliation web sites? Newsletters? Conferences?
• Think about the sort:
  • What sort of content material are we most comfy creating at first? Written? Video? Audio?
• Remember frequency:
  • How usually can we decide to creating and publishing content material? Weekly? Month-to-month?

There isn’t any proper or flawed reply to any of those questions, however they do require intense overview. There have been many corporations who’ve been excited to launch a YouTube video marketing campaign, till they understand they appear too stiff on video, which does NOT convey the authenticity they have been going for within the first place.

Or they tried being a visitor on a podcast, however found they wanted extra media coaching as a result of they weren’t nearly as good at considering on their toes as they thought they have been.

If you happen to need assistance trying genuine on video, take a look at this useful resource from Wistia about Educating Employees about Being on Camera.

The primary couple of items you create are going to be an experiment. Use them to study your self and your organization. Then put effort into creating a extra strategic calendar of thought management alternatives (the following part will assist with that).

Getting eyes in your content material and creating alternatives to drive engagement and generate conversations are the highest targets for efficient thought management.

And whereas there are a number of tactics and promotional strategies to consider with thought leadership, some of the most popular include:

1. Speaking

Public speaking positions you as an expert in your field. Period.

When you’re in front of a group, sharing what you know, you’re quickly seen as an authority on that particular topic. Plus, when you pair your information with examples of how this plays out in your world each and every day, you submit a strong case that you’re the expert worth talking to.

To get started with speaking, start by demonstrating that you can speak in front of a group effectively.

If this is your first time using this strategy, you may want to start by joining a local Toastmasters Group or hiring a speaking coach. The good part of speaking is that it establishes credibility fast. The downfall is that a bad speaking engagement can hurt your reputation just as much.

Once you’ve established a good process for delivering a quality presentation, start identifying groups, conferences, or associations who might be interested in having you come present to their groups. Do this enough, do it well, and the speaking requests will start to come to you.

2. Blogging

While it’s not required, most thought leaders use blogging as a core tactic.

It’s familiar and easy to execute, especially if you have contract writers or editors to help with the process. Nothing says you can’t hire out some of the content you need to create for thought leadership programs, as long as you’re providing the direction of the article and the type of research or insight that goes into it. And once it’s edited for brand voice and point of view, it should fit well with the rest of your content. 

As a bonus, blog content can often be syndicated to other networks, such as LinkedIn articles, Medium, Quora, etc.

For example, a post about “When to Rebrand” originated on our blog with an infographic, and then became a series of Twitter posts and a LinkedIn article for our CEO.

 3. PR

Public relations was the follow of touchdown press protection in your firm. And whereas that’s nonetheless the case, the strains are blurred between PR and owned media.

In different phrases, you have got the chance to make information just by creating content material! 

A superb instance of that is when an organization or key chief in an business publishes a analysis paper or conducts a research. That research turns into the supply of curiosity for numerous individuals in that business, and, consequently, business shops write about it, and in flip, point out the corporate and/or thought chief.

You see this occur with corporations like Buffer, who publishes the state of social media report, in addition to Animoto, who just lately revealed the state of video marketing report.

One other tip for PR is to pitch ideas to journalists that align with topics your key personas are interested in, that additionally match your key perspective and persona.

4. Visitor alternatives on blogs, podcasts, movies, and many others.

One of the vital efficient methods to maneuver into the place the place you are seen as a thought chief is by publishing distinctive content material in your business’s largest publishers. Authoritative, trusted blogs, podcasts, and different shops are the important thing to reaching new audiences.

The most important key to success right here is having just a few key subjects you can pitch to visitor shops. Remember the fact that it’s not about what YOU wish to say. It’s about what the viewers needs to know and may study on account of your content material.

There’s a complete methodology for locating and securing visitor content material alternatives, which we’ll cowl in a future submit. When you have particular questions on these proper now, be happy to drop a touch upon the weblog or ship us a message so we will shoot some concepts your manner. 

5. Revealed works like books, merchandise, and many others.

A rising variety of corporations and leaders search to spice up their thought management place by means of publishing a guide or printed useful resource.

Typically seen because the “holy grail” of thought management advertising, it is change into quite common with the variety of print-on-demand companies, in addition to ebooks on Amazon Kindle, and different cheaper “guide” choices.

We can’t go into the variations between self-publishing and going by means of a writer, but it surely’s one thing to think about. In the identical manner {that a} poorly written and poorly designed brochure received’t increase your credibility, many self-published books miss the mark as a result of they don’t spend money on refining the thought, designing the quilt, or giving a compelling motive to learn or purchase the guide.

A guide can be utilized to open doorways for writing alternatives in addition to talking. Even when it’s not a WSJ Greatest Vendor, it may be a elaborate enterprise card that results in larger degree content material creation.

Getting began along with your thought management marketing campaign

Alright, so you have got a way for what thought management appears like, the way it works, and studying this has hopefully given you a greater sense for what it takes. Now let’s go over the steps you may must take to get began. 

1. Establish your group’s thought leaders: select inside specialists who resonate along with your model. Acknowledge the time and dedication that will probably be required from them, particularly from busy firm leaders.
2. Outline your area of interest and message: concentrate on distinctive insights and align along with your firm’s core values. This helps in creating a definite voice that units you aside.
3. Develop your content material technique: plan varied content material varieties and platforms, and create a sustainable calendar with subjects you possibly can present your experience on. Thought management is a steady effort, not a one-time initiative.
4. Make the content material: whether or not you are writing long-form LinkedIn posts or blogs, recording a podcast, or making a video, you must truly make the content material on the schedule you set. Whichever medium you select, be sure somebody can polish it up or edit it.
5. Have interaction along with your viewers: distribute the thought management content material on social platforms so that you will be extra attentive to suggestions. Adapt your method primarily based on viewers engagement to maintain the dialog alive.
6. Maximize your attain with a number of mediums: you possibly can attain a wider and extra numerous viewers in the event you repurpose your content throughout channels. As an illustration, you possibly can document a podcast or video, after which use the data and perception to repurpose throughout a half dozen different channels. Lots of corporations will flip to a 3rd celebration to repurpose current content material extra effectively.
7. Monitor and measure success: outline clear targets and key efficiency indicators (KPIs). Usually overview progress and regulate methods to make sure alignment with goals.
8. Perceive the challenges: acknowledge the time, effort, and consistency required, particularly from executives or founders. Thought management calls for dedication to ascertain your self as a dependable authority within the discipline, so outcomes will not come in a single day.

Thought management is a strong advertising technique that places human experience on the middle of the client dialog. Whereas plenty of corporations are excited by utilizing this tactic, few execute it persistently. This offers an unimaginable alternative for executives and entrepreneurs to step in and educate their viewers whereas establishing authority and credibility.

At Easy Strat, we’ve seen this repay for purchasers, who deliver experience however could initially lack the bandwidth or course of to produce such content at scale. We’e additionally seen thought management technique result in content material advertising alternatives for our personal workforce.

Whereas it may be formidable to jump in and get began, we encourage you to experiment a bit in creating your first pieces of thought leadership content material. And don’t neglect to trace your outcomes, as information (or lack thereof) will help you make higher, smarter thought leadership selections.

P.S. We hope to see your identify in lights (or on the primary web page of Google or in an business information outlet) sooner or later!