Thought leadership is one of those PR and communications jargon words that everybody loves to hate. For those of us who work on the business-to-business (B2B) side of SHIFT, it’s almost always an ask in agency RFPs issued by prospective clients and an ongoing priority for current clients. But what does it really mean and why should we focus on it in communications programs?
Thought leadership is critical in establishing brand credibility and relevance with your target audience. Consider that unless they're somewhat far into a buying journey, customers are much more interested in hearing about your expertise (in relation to what they prioritize and care about) rather than your product.
Your thought leadership message or platform can take many shapes and forms content wise – it can be a contributed article, a video, an infographic, commentary an industry trend or news article.However, it always has the following components:
A solidified message
Thought leadership starts with an idea or platform from an executive or spokesperson who feels strongly (and is an expert) about what they’re talking about. It needs to be clearly defined, consistent, strong and something that the whole company can rally behind.
You want your thought leadership platform to be something that matters to your business and will speak to both your customers and prospects but isn’t something that your peers are already talking about. Try honing in on one particular aspect of your business, technology or solution where you can own that message and stand out from what’s already being said. Bonus points if it’s a bold, contrarian, unique point of view.
Data to back it up
It’s an asset to have strong data that backs up your thought leadership platform. Try issuing a data report or running a survey of decision makers that will showcase the realities of business today. Then, with those results, tie that back to your thought leadership message and either dispel myths within the industry or shed light on real-world business problems.
Activities outside of "PR"
A well-structured B2B thought leadership campaign might start with earned media, but it certainly doesn’t end with it. Make sure there are speaking engagements and shared and owned content that accompany your message. Direct communications on LinkedIn is a great way to fortify and add consistency to your POV.
Additionally, don’t forget to run social promotions around solid articles you secure with relevant publications. The more eyeballs you drive to that story, the more likely the reporter is to work with you again and, hopefully, more traffic will be driven to your website.
Finally, even with a compelling thought leadership narrative and assets planned out, it’s important to recognize that a lot of people outside of the PR department at your company aren’t going to understand what thought leadership is and why they should lend their valuable time to support it.
Educating your C-suite or other spokespeople within your organization is a major key to your success and something I recommend starting off with.
Hold a meeting to outline what thought leadership is and how it impacts the business. We all know the power of the press and what regular, consistent and quality coverage can do for a company.
After you receive buy in and have solidified your message, you’ll want to assign goals to your campaign. If your CEO is having a hard time getting behind the idea, put metrics in place to demonstrate your confidence in what you’re proposing. Then hold yourself and your team accountable.
Overall, the right thought leadership campaign can lead to loads of success not only within PR but the broader marketing department as well, however, it’s important to know what it involves and why it matters. Being able to demonstrate its importance will help set you and your team up for success.
If you're interested in seeing examples of impactful thought leadership, check out our approach and work in B2B PR.
What’s a Rich Text element?
The rich text element allows you to create and format headings, paragraphs, blockquotes, images, and video all in one place instead of having to add and format them individually. Just double-click and easily create content.
The rich text element allows you to create and format headings, paragraphs, blockquotes, images, and video all in one place instead of having to add and format them individually. Just double-click and easily create content.
Static and dynamic content editing
A rich text element can be used with static or dynamic content. For static content, just drop it into any page and begin editing. For dynamic content, add a rich text field to any collection and then connect a rich text element to that field in the settings panel. Voila!
How to customize formatting for each rich text
Headings, paragraphs, blockquotes, figures, images, and figure captions can all be styled after a class is added to the rich text element using the "When inside of" nested selector system.
