Don't just 'do thought leadership'

Thought leadership is useless unless you ask these questions first

Far too often, marketing teams use a "thought leadership" tactic without any strategy. You know, the ol': "Let's just do a little thought leadership to establish authority. We'll just ask X leader to post a few company updates or reshare blog stories on her LinkedIn!"

Often, you'll find corporate leaders who are open to this (especially if you're willing to write the social copy for them first), but when you're positioning them as a thought leader, you should first ask:

• Why "do" thought leadership?
• To whom are you trying to project that leadership?
• And to what end?

Simply posting on LinkedIn for the sake of posting and (potentially) gaining visibility isn’t a great use of your time unless the content you’re posting specifically aligns with your strategic business goals.

What do I mean? Here are two examples:

1?? First, let’s say your company provides information security solutions for other large companies. The business is strictly B2B with no need to influence consumers to buy your product and no need for brand recognition beyond industry insiders. However, you have a need to influence policymakers who regulate your industry or advocate for industry regulation and policy. Their expertise and influence greatly impact your product.

Having your CEO post generic updates about your company on LinkedIn is not a good use of that person’s time (or more likely, your marketing team’s time). Instead, have your Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) publish content showing their knowledge of how your product positively impacts other companies and also contributes to the public good. Begin with a series of blog posts on your company website and edit them to share with a LinkedIn audience.

This will help fulfill your business goal – influence policymakers and industry insiders who might have previously doubted your knowledge and concern about corporate information security. Boom!

2?? Let’s say you are a retired leader who is interested serving on paid corporate boards of directors and leading philanthropic campaigns as a volunteer. In this case, your business goal looks a little bit different because YOU are the business. Your goal is to appear as a wise thought leader who can make contributions, advise and raise money for companies and organizations that interest you. You need to represent yourself as an active, tuned-in, knowledgeable person who could easily, authoritatively advise and lead campaigns and make valuable contributions to a board.

Although you probably already know or have networked with a lot of the people who would invite you to serve on a paid board or invite you to lead nonprofit fundraising campaign, you need to stay top of mind and show them you’re the person for the job. In this case, your thought leadership is trying to influence people within your own network.

I’d suggest starting a newsletter that shows what you’re thinking about as it relates to your topic of interest (send direct emails to your contacts inviting them to subscribe). Next, repurpose and edit that content to springboard a series of LinkedIn posts – maybe just 3-4 a month, but that’s enough.

Bottom line: Leaders showing their thought leadership is great, but like any social, digital or content strategy you use, it must be tied to a business goal. And a final important note:

3?? Don’t forget to measure to see if it’s working. Analytics (open rates on newsletters, engagement rates on social posts) are helpful, but they aren’t always directly tied to your business goals. Think about what your own Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) look like and then use them to determine if your strategy is working:

?? In the case of the CISO above, ask:

• Have these posts been reshared or liked by people in the info-sec policy realm?
• Has that share resulted in an uptick in website visits (perhaps from people in that community)?
• At the end of the year (or three years), have you seen any evidence that policymakers are more open to your industry and type of product?

?? In the case of the retired leader, ask yourself:

• Have you heard from people in your network that they forwarded your newsletter to friends?
• Have people who you don’t know – but who work for the companies or nonprofits you’d like to help – engaged with your social posts?
• After six months, or one year, have you received any invitations to serve on a paid board or in a leadership role as a volunteer?

Next time "thought leadership" makes its way into your conversation about marketing strategy, just ask a few questions before writing and posting, and you'll be more effective and efficient in fulfilling that goal.

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