Five steps to excellence for thought leadership marketing

I am excited.

 I have just read Rob Leavitt’s article based on his impressions as a judge at the ITSMA’s Marketing Excellence Awards, for submissions in the Thought Leadership Marketing category.

 If you only read one article on thought leadership this year , this is the one to read. 

You can view his full article here http://www.reputationtorevenue.com/2010/07/strengthening-thought-leadership-marketing-five-steps-to-excellence.html  but I do cover all his points below because I believe they are worth repeating.

B2B thought leadership gains pace

Most marketers know that while thought leadership is a massive opportunity in the B2B space they also know that what constitutes thought leadership varies widely.  Rob points out that until five years ago thought leadership marketing was mainly the domain of the top consulting firms,.  Few B2B firms took it seriously.

But based on what Rob has seen judging the entries at the ITSMA awards this year, this has changed dramatically.

Not only does he say that the thought leadership submissions reflect a substantial increase in spending but more importantly that there has been a significant shift in the application of thought leadership as a discipline which is reflected in its impacts on customers and market influencers alike.

He goes on to identify five areas in which the best thought leadership campaigns stand out. 

The 5 steps to thought leadership excellence

The reason I am so excited about his analysis is because they reflect what I have been saying on this blog in various posts for over a year.  They are:

1.    Focus and depth: As Rob points out there are lots of companies out there who practice “random acts of content”, including sending out the occasional white papers, articles, videos, blog posts.  His concern is that with little focus or depth they are really providing little value.  Companies or individuals serious about joining the ranks of truly helpful thought leaders need to pick one or a few issues, stick with it, and go deep.

I would like to add to this by saying that to be truly successful, thought leadership should become part of the culture of an organisation.  If one looks at companies who are innovative or have research as their backbone – they don’t bolt these on.  Rather, they are an integral part of who they are how they think and it consumes the entire organisation every day.  Thought leadership should be no different.

2.    Do the research: As Rob points out, a lot of the so-called thought leadership we see is merely opinion based on experience. However, customers want evidence, and evidence usually requires research.

From what Rob has seen in the entries he concludes that the best thought leadership programs are built around serious research, including things like an analysis of existing literature, new customer surveys, and in-depth case studies.

3.    Engage and empower internally: Your organisation and your colleagues are one of the most important keys to your thought leadership campaign.  They are and should be its best ambassadors.

Given the pervasive nature of social media, more and more of your employees are engaging directly with customers, prospects, and other stakeholders online. By engaging and empowering these employees with your thought leadership position you give them something valuable to talk about over and above the obvious product or service specs and sales pitch.  More importantly if you have done your homework you are providing information and insights that hit the right spot with your prospects.

4.    Leverage your best content:  Market engagement today is about pervasive presence and ongoing conversations, not just traditional publishing and speaking. Rob says that customers want to chew over and debate your ideas, often without you and often in the virtual room. To help make this happen, he points out that you need to leverage your best thought leadership content by publishing compelling and appropriate formats across the networks and channels where your customers congregate.

He gives the example of a white paper and how you could leverage that into a short video, a blog post, an article, a customer briefing, etc.

5.    Invest in expertise: Great thought leadership programs are built around experts in the subjects at hand but also experts in research, analysis, publication, social media, and collaboration.

Rob believes that the most successful programs invest in their people in at least three ways:

·         Funding full time staff positions

·         Recruiting for necessary skills and helping existing staff develop the right skills

·         Investing in partnerships for complementary capabilities (including brand recognition, as with prestigious academics, universities, and/or outside media and research organizations).

Finally, and this is something I have trumpeted for a long time, building a successful thought leadership marketing program is a long-term process.

Rob uses the examples of McKinsey, Accenture, IBM, Deloitte who have spent years doing the research, building market presence, and refining what works. The common theme among them is that they pick key customer issues and stick with them.

They dive deep on these issues. And they invest in their people and programs. 

Rob, thanks for some of the best insights on thought leadership I have seen for some time.  I can’t wait to see the ITSMA results for the best thought leadership campaigns.

Thought leadership gems from someone who really stands out

For those of you who have never read My Name is Scott I suggest you do.  Scott has some refreshing views on the world particularly when it comes to marketing oneself.

In one of his recent posts entitled the ‘Approachable Leaders Handbook to being heard Vol 2’, http://www.hellomynameisblog.com/2010/07/approachable-leaders-handbook-of-being.html he gives six key tips to how you would go about being heard.  The beauty of these tips is that there are some real gems for aspiring and current thought leaders.

Scott makes the point that the world is not waiting to hear what you have to say.  And therein is the rub for thought leaders and it is why I constantly go on about thought leadership being a long-term commitment by the business or thought leader.  To be successful you need to make it part of your corporate make-up and you need to constantly work on your thought leadership position always looking at ways to share your insights.

Let’s look at what Scott had to say.  His five suggestions are as follows:

1.    Align your petitions with the self-interest of your audience. Find out what their success seeds are.

Absolutely - in fact one of the critical success factors of any thought leadership campaign is to understand the interests of your target publics.  Without these insights you run the risk of missing the boat.

Once you have this understanding, you need to identify how you are going to add value to their current understanding/knowledge.  In doing so you should strive constantly to stretch their minds and stimulate new thoughts, views and perspectives.

2.    Give clear direction of what you want people to follow. Make the audience your accomplice.

Absolutely.  Clear, definitive perspectives or insights about your topic make it a lot easier for your audience.  Furthermore if they are involved in the process, the stickiness you create with that target public is enormous – they feel vested in it and thus part of the journey.

3.    Build a listening platform. Demonstrate to the people you want to hear that they have been heard first.

The whole idea of thought leadership is to generate discussion and interest in what you have to say.  To test whether your thought leadership is being received in the right manner so that you can tweak it if needs be, you should, where possible, have a platform for two-way feedback.  This could include: one-on-one or group presentations; feedback forms; independent research; online polls; chat forums on line; feedback mechanisms online; round tables and the like.

4.    Create a dialogue that draws people into the cause. Say things you haven’t said elsewhere.

Thought leadership is exactly that – leading with your thoughts.  That implies they should be new, fresh and provide interesting insights that no-one else has previously given.  To do so, thought leaders need courage, they need to be aware that not everyone will agree with their point of view.  But that’s OK because as a thought leader you want to provoke discussion and debate. 

5.    Invite layers of interpretation around your message. Allow people to add multiple dimensions to your ideas.

The whole idea of thought leadership is to seed an idea, insight, interpretation and then watch and participate as others get involved and share their views.  By provoking and promoting healthy discussion and at times heated debate, it serves to air your ideas and spread the conversation across multiple, interested audiences.  With the power of the web these ideas are global instantly.   

Scott concludes by saying that if you follow this process your voice will be heard.  What do you think?

Thought leadership is a culture not a tactic

Thought leadership is not and should not be a marketing or PR tactic – rather it is a culture.  Like companies who innovate, thought leadership too should be a way of doing things.

If it is not a function of corporate culture I can guarantee that most long-term thought leadership positions will not get across the starting line. Alternatively the company produces one or two ‘thought leadership’ campaigns a year that become part of the marketing team’s annual list of objectives and kpis and are ticked off as thought leadership but are really just PR campaigns to drive coverage.

The true test of thought leadership

The true test of a thought leadership campaign is to ask the following six questions.  Does your thought leadership campaign:

1.       Add real value to your public’s lives/decision making/business

2.       Position you as a trusted advisor engendering trust in your brand as the leader in that particular sector/area

3.       Help underpin sales

4.       Provide a content rich platform from which you can write, talk, publish online and share with clients valuable insights

5.       Position your people as the experts and ‘go to’ people in their field

6.       Move your brand from product and sales leadership to market leadership and in the process delivers long-term, sustainable advantage over your competitors.

If not you should be going back to the drawing board.

Thought leadership tops focus for B2B marketers

In 2009 thought leadership trailed behind email as the area of most significant focus for B2B marketers according to MarketingProfs Daily Fix blog.  If marketers are recognising the power of thought leadership and the management consulting industry has been using thought leadership as one of their most important lead generators for over a decade, why haven’t other companies jumped on the bandwagon?

From my experience it comes back to the question of whether it is part of their culture or not.  As I have indicated in previous posts, true, long-term, thought leadership campaigns need to align closely with the values of an organisation and needs to have the buy-in and ownership of senior management.  Historically, the campaigns that do this fly and those that don’t fail, or at best limp along, never quite realising their true potential. 

Thought leadership is about long-term reputation and trust

Unfortunately the pressure on CEOs, marketing directors and the corporate relations team to produce immediate, measurable results is a big dampener on deep-seated, long-term thought leadership campaigns.  The longer-term reputation and trust building resulting from this type of campaign does not satisfy the need for immediate results.

Ask any company which as at its heart a focus on innovation or research and they will tell you that the return on this investment takes years.  A culture of thought leadership is no different but the rewards are immeasurable.  Ask the multinational management consultancies, they know too well.

The sales pitch is dead

I love what Chad and Linda Nelson from The Basis Group have to say about sales and thought leadership in their paper “Thought Leadership is the New Sales Pitch.”  These guys absolutely get it.  It is a must read for anyone in sales and marketing.

In my all my research and writings on the topic I have come across only a handful of people who can articulate so succinctly the impact thought leadership has on selling a brand, product or service .  Dana vandenHeuvel and David Meerman Scott are two others who spring to mind.

Consumers actively seek experts

Chad and Linda point out that consumers no longer passively accept marketing information.  Instead, they actively seek experts who have answers or insights into their world and who through these insights help them manage better this world and the issues and challenges they face.  Consumers today crave relationships and resources in the form of knowledge and insights and herein lies the opportunity for selling differently.

While traditional marketing is still the bread and butter of many sales efforts, as  the Nelsons point out:  “When you begin your marketing efforts by establishing trust and demonstrating thought leadership, you create a new more effective entry point for your brand message.”

Stop pushing products and services

Very true.  But before this happens, companies need to unlearn current habits of pushing products and services down their customers’ throats.  Instead they should start demonstrating their insights, knowledge and expertise in their sector and in particular the issues and challenges facing their consumers.

Underpinning this approach is thought leadership.  There are many positive outcomes of thought leadership, I have a table illustrating these in an earlier blog post, but the ultimate outcome should always be that your customers seek you out because they trust you based on the knowledge and insights you have shared so openly with them.

Thought leadership builds trust which underpins sales

While thought leadership may not result in a quick sell, what it will do is truly cement your brand with your publics in a way that has a far deeper stickability factor.  But this is what most marketers and salespeople have difficulty getting their heads around - thought leadership does not primarily drive sales.  Rather it builds trust, takes your conversations with customers to another level so that when the time comes to present your offering they are so vested in your brand that the sale is as good as done.

As the Nelsons point out:  ”you need to be out in your marketplace talking to people, learning what they know, discussing ideas, taking the pulse of the industry to see where it’s going, responding to concerns and expanding your understanding of what is needed.  This is the best kind of leadership because it demonstrates your intimacy with your audience and your industry.” 

While there is nothing new in this and the best sales people will tell you that the best selling is all about listening, the difference is how you interpret, articulate and then package and share your insights and information.

 Thought leaders have an abundance mentality.  They share openly and freely and understand that it is not first and foremost about the sale but rather it is first and foremost about being available and being generous with your knowledge.

Only this way will take your place at the head of your industry’s table.  The sales will naturally follow.              

The six lessons of thought leadership

I was reading an article penned by veteran marketing strategist, Rob Leavitt.  Rob is the Principal at Solutions Insights and he specializes in issues- and content-based marketing.  Rob helps companies distinguish themselves in the marketplace and advises them on how to have strategic conversations with their clients, prospects, and market influencers.

Rob gets thought leadership and I thought the six lessons he has for thought leaders at any level were well worth sharing.  Here they are:

Six thought leadership lessons

Stepping back from the specifics of these two initiatives, I see six general lessons for thought leadership marketers at any level:

1. Put Customers First. It sounds obvious to say that thought leadership marketing should focus on what your customers really care about, but far too many marketers take a product- or solution-first approach and try to fit some larger issue neatly around their offering. Buyers don’t care about your offerings by themselves; they have their own problems to worry about. Engage them where they live. IBM is trying to build relationships with CEOs, so they research and talk about what other CEOs are doing. Deloitte works especially closely with Boards of Directors, CFOs, and other C-level executives; it’s hard to think of a C-suite issue more pressing these days than risk management. What do your customers and prospects really worry about?
2. Do the Research. Thought leadership without real research is just opinion, and opinions are a dime a dozen. Show buyers serious research, though, and they’re much more likely to pay attention. You might not be able to interview 1,130 CEOs around the world, but you can survey and interview your customers and prospects, produce serious case studies (not puff piece “success stories”), and comb the literature and online conversation to produce new insights.
3. Say Something New. Thought leadership without a differentiated point of view is just an echo of conventional wisdom. Why should customers listen to your version then they’ve already heard it before — or if you’re only telling them something they already know. Smart customers want to be challenged. If you’re not sparking at least some disagreement and debate, you probably haven’t said anything new. None of IBM’s five attributes are themselves shockingly new but the synthesis suggests and aggressive and innovative approach that goes well beyond conventional thinking. Deloitte’s focus on the upside as well as the downside of risk clearly stands apart from the post-Wall Street collapse mentality of compliance first, last, and always.
4. Build a Pervasive Presence. Long gone are the days when thought leadership marketing meant publishing a white paper, research report, or journal article and then moving on to the next project. Media fragmentation, information overload, and the power of social media make it critical that thought leadership marketers put substantial energy into getting the word out across a broad range of media and activities. IBM’s 360 degree campaign for the CEO study included traditional activities (email, Web, direct mail, advertising, press and analyst briefings, sales enablement, video, etc.) as well as a number of newer approaches (blogs, podcasts, online innovation jams, and branded content). IBM also produced 15 “flavors” of the main report for different industries and C-suite positions. Deloitte has similarly tapped a wide variety of media and activities to engage clients, prospects, and market influencers. For thought leadership marketing today, think multi-media, social media, and complementary online and offline engagement to build a strong presence wherever your stakeholders already spend their time.
5. Stick with It. IBM’s CEO study is a two year project, and the 2008 version is IBM’s third such study. To maximize marketing impact, IBM organizes a “teaser phase” (outreach to build awareness before the formal launch), a “reveal phase” (a multi-faceted public launch to build buzz internally and externally), and a “sustain phase” (ongoing engagement to dig more deeply into the issues with customers and others). Deloitte launched the Risk Intelligent Enterprise effort in 2006 and has continued to explore the issues, refine the point of view, publish, and engage. The point is to pick a core issue for your customers and stick with it. Thought leadership takes time. It’s better to pick one or two issues and work them hard for several years than to flit from one issue to the next in a more superficial way.
6. Confirm the metrics. Far from an airy initiative, thought leadership marketing can and should focus on core metrics essential to business development and growth. Objectives for the IBM initiative revolved around relationship building with CEOs, corporate visibility and interest, ongoing engagement with key contacts, and sales leads. Deloitte takes a similar approach, focusing on competitive differentiation, influencer relations, client connections, and business development support. Setting and gaining organizational agreement on clear marketing and business development objectives provides the grounding and accountability that marketers need to justify the necessary investments.

Serious thought leadership marketing is not easy, but taking these six lessons to heart will go a long way toward success. At least that’s my opinion! What do you think?

I think Rob is right on the money and would be interested to see whether anyone else has any more ‘lessons’ to add to his list of six?  

There are thought leadership lessons in Tiger’s tale

Gap analysis has been around for decades.  Simply put it is the expectation of a brand’s current level of performance and where it wants to be in the future. The difference between the two is the gap analysis.

In Tiger Woods’ case the gap has become a chasm.  However, it also begs the question as to whether his personal brand was built into something it was not.  Testimony to this is the website www.tigerisgod.com which was taken down a few weeks ago.

What has this got to do with thought leadership?

Put it this way.  If you are planning on using your thought leadership campaign to build you or your brand into something you are not you run the risk creating a massive perceptual gap problem - one which could be damaging to your brand.

Very few consumers stick with brands that overpromise and under-deliver.  So be wary of the PR campaign or thought leadership campaign that sets out to build you into something you are not.

Align your campaigns to your values

I am a firm believer in aligning, in particular your thought leadership but also other campaigns like your PR and CSR campaigns to your company values.

These values should be the compass by which to steer your profile building efforts.  But how often do you hear an advertising agency or PR company asking for a company’s values when designing a campaign?

True thought leadership campaigns need to be credible internally and across multiple external stakeholders.  The more your thought leadership campaign relates closely to the issues, trends or hot topics across your sector and the more it addresses the concerns of your clients or customers, the more authentic it will be.

Today more than ever, consumers are looking for authenticity in the brands they choose.  If you can achieve this there is far less chance that your campaign will create a gap between the perception of what you stand for and the reality.

A classic Australian example was a company called Firepower, a company which created enormous media hype around the promise of a fuel pill that would save motorists and transport companies a lot of money on their fuel consumption.  It has gone down as one of the biggest corporate scams this country has seen – a brand promise that missed the mark by a country mile leaving a litany of court cases and red faces and designated the brand to the bottom of the corporate scrapheap.

I would love to hear from you if you have examples of similar companies or campaigns that have overpromised and under-delivered.  

Thought leaders will fail

Being a thought leader in your sector means that you will fail at some point. 

Why? Because you can never satisfy everyone, not everybody will see you as a thought leader and you will always have your detractors.  In fact some people and organisations may attack your position outright. That’s the price of being a leader.

Thought leaders aren’t shy, retiring types.

The very nature of thought leadership requires that you put yourself out there.  If you want to be seen to be leading or framing the conversations around a topic, if you want people to sit up and take note and think differently about the way they do things, if you want to highlight issues or trends that we have not yet experienced you are opening yourself for criticism at some point with some audience.

Does that mean you have failed as a thought leader?  Not at all.

Throughout history some of the greatest thought leaders have been criticised by the media, their competitors, government and other detractors.

Look at some of the great innovators and inventors of our time. Over the centuries they too have been wrong.  Consider how many times some inventions or ideas failed before they came to fruition or before they were generally accepted.

Thought leaders require vision, courage and perseverance

The fact of the matter is that the very nature of leadership whether it be thought leadership, innovation or leadership per se requires three key characteristics – vision, courage and perseverance.

It is also precisely why so many large corporations don’t embark on thought leadership campaigns.  True thought leadership often falls into the too hard box making it very easy for its detractors in the organisation to explore what could go wrong, how much IP they are going to have to give away and what the immediate return on investment might be.

It is far easier for the marketing department to stick with the tried and tested above the line campaign or PR campaign that disseminates media releases and marketing collateral.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that this stuff is not important to the marketing success of the company, indeed we could all name many a campaign which stands out and that really hit the mark.  

However, more and more today the standard marketing and PR campaigns are probably not going to deliver your brand the cut through you need to stand out from the crowd.

If your thought leadership campaign isn’t working what do you do?

If you have a thought leadership campaign currently running and it’s not hitting the mark try some of these tips: 

• Get closer to your customers, clients or whoever it is aimed at.  Ask them what they like about it, what is most useful, what they don’t like and how it could be improved to truly deliver something of value to them.  Far from failure, this should be viewed as a great opportunity to engage with your audience in a really authentic manner, a manner that shows you care 

• As a matter of course, like any good marketing campaign does, your thought leadership campaign should be cross checked to make sure it is delivering on your initial objectives.  Go back and re-evaluate these and measure them against what it is currently delivering

• Follow in the footsteps of the great inventors and thought leaders of our time.  Don’t give up.  Tweak your campaign, use the interactions and feedback from your market to adjust your campaign and you will end up with a far stronger thought leadership property than you initially envisioned.

Fear of failure will leave you lagging

If you aren’t prepared to give your thought leadership campaign a go because of the fear of failure you can be sure that you will remain in the marketing trenches doing what everyone else is doing.

I’d love to hear from thought leaders out there who have failed and who have come back better for it with a more robust campaign.         

Thought leadership is powered by three key principles

I reckon when you boil any thought leadership idea or campaign down it ultimately rests on three key principles.

1.         It is a public relations rather than an advertising exercise

In order to truly take hold, thought leadership needs to be driven first and foremost by PR. Advertising and other marketing interventions can and, where possible, should support thought leadership, but the very nature of advertising’s bought space negates this medium as a driver of thought leadership. Only PR can truly create buy-in and sustain a thought leadership position for a brand.

Why do I say this? Because thought leadership is about sharing information, it is about engaging with an audience through delivering content via channels such as print, radio, television, websites, research, white papers, discussion forums, speaking opportunities, stakeholder engagement strategies, books and events.

It is about conversations with rather than sending messages one way to your audience.

I have seen thought leadership campaigns combine these elements in such a way that it has been able to influence and change behaviour of the target audience – surely the ultimate goal of any thought leadership campaign.

On its own, advertising cannot do this, but it can work very effectively in conjunction with a broader communications campaign if used strategically, at the right time and using the relevant channels.

2.            It is about sharing information or content

While thought leadership is about sharing information, this is anathema to some brands. Many corporations are, by nature, secretive and hold their intellectual property or product/brand information close to their chests. How often have you heard a client or you own company say: ‘We cannot tell them that. We cannot give that information away to our competitors.’

No one’s asking you to give away your ‘Coca-Cola formula’, but very often the information that companies are so precious about hanging onto can be found out there anyway.

Corporations with this attitude are rarely thought leaders. Thought leaders are refreshingly candid and they understand the bigger picture and where they and their brands fit into their consumers’ lives.

They understand their consumers and want to add value or insights to their customers’ lives beyond merely selling them a product or service. They often believe passionately in what they do or the space which they occupy, and they feel a moral or social responsibility to deliver something of value to the community in which they sell.

They understand that today merely selling a product is no longer good enough. For their brands to survive in the medium- to long-term they need to deliver value beyond their product benefits.

Brands with this sort of abundance mentality are prepared to engage with their stakeholders and share information and insights, and literally expect nothing in return in the immediate future. Their return on investment is in building trust and loyalty, and through this, positioning their brand as the leading choice.

Consumers are changing and so are the ways they make their purchasing decisions. They are demanding more from a company and its products. There are strings attached and they are best defined by the question: ‘What are you giving me or doing for me, my kids, my life, my community, or the environment?’

The companies that grasp this and can give satisfactory answers will be the ones that set themselves apart from their competition.

Thought leadership is precisely about creating an environment in which a company’s customers choose its brand because of what it stands for or because the position it has taken on an issue sets it apart from its competitors.

3.         It should aim to produce a sound business outcome

While thought leadership need not, and often does not, focus directly on selling a brand or service, it should still aim to produce the best possible business outcome for the long-term reputation and standing of that particular brand or company.

I love Dana vandenHeuvel’s analysis of this.  He says that you take a point of view to the market in order to gain share of voice in that sector or industry so that you can drive greater share of mind and ultimately greater share of market.   

The power of thought leadership lies in influence. If correctly targeted and structured, it is a potent tool for influencing a particular audience.  Your aim should be to become known as the expert or the ‘go to’, trusted source of knowledge or information in that particular area.

When you are recognized as the thought leader in your industry it does a number of things:

§         Creates ongoing, meaningful dialogue with your audiences

§         Delivers greater share of voice in the industry and as a result, greater share of mind over your competitors

§         Increases the profile of your brand

§         Delivers pre-qualified leads

§         Creates a set of customers who have already experienced your ‘value’ and who have ‘bought’ into your ideas before physically buying

§         Leads to less price resistance and a shortened sales cycle

§         Enhances the reputation of the brand/company as a leader in its field 

Thought leadership requires courage

I never forget the first full length story my daughter wrote when she was about six or seven – she called it “The rat that lost its courage”.   Forget about who moved my cheese, this rat didn’t even have the courage to go out and look for cheese.

It struck me on reflecting on my daughter’s story the other day that I along with many people with whom I have worked, seem at various times in our careers, to lose our courage.

Think about how often you’ve seen marketing, PR or brand teams compromising their work because of: insufficient budget; too much ‘political’ risk; lack of courage; taking the easiest or most reasonable path; too many other ‘things’ on their plate; fear of failure; adopting the safe route; being output focused rather than outcomes focused?

The question we as marketing, advertising, brand or PR professionals need to ask ourselves is how often we are brave with the work we do and the ideas we put forward? Sure some of us vacillate between brave and reasonable. But how many of us are truly courageous - brave with the advice given, brave with ideas and brave with implementation? How many of us have the strength to tell it as it is and to give hard-nosed counsel and strategic direction when required?

A true thought leadership example

The guys who came up with the Dove campaign for Real Beauty were brave.  How many marketers or brand managers do you know who would give the green light for spending big on a campaign that doesn’t mention any of the company’s products on the flagship website for the campaign?

So the question is how we can interrogate daily the real value we add to our campaigns because it is no longer good enough to practice yesterday’s PR, brand, marketing and advertising strategies.

The impacts of a company’s social, environmental and political footprints are disappearing. On the contrary, the focus of all stakeholders on these impacts is growing and will continue to influence buying behaviour, purchasing decisions, perceptions of the brand and that much vaunted word of mouth.

Today we need to carefully reflect how we can add sustainable value to our consumers and the campaigns we run on behalf of our brands.

Thought leadership requires alignment with your consumer/stakeholder

As communicators we are in an enviable position. At no time in the history of marketing have we had the power to interact with a company’s audiences as now.

The advent of Web 2.0 and social media has seen a marked shift in the communication game. Consumers are not only interacting with brands directly but they have also become part of the media landscape.

Today, companies can communicate directly with their consumers and vice versa. Traditional media channels are no longer the only conduit to reaching an audience. Increasingly marketing is about communicating with, rather than to, the consumer. It is about participating in a dialogue with your consumers.

But consumers want more – they want to know what value you are add to their world and the society in which they live over and above merely selling them a product or service.  And herein lies the opportunity for thought leadership as well as strategically relevant CSR campaigns.

I believe that this is the way companies will need to align with their consumers in the future.  For consumers want more than a brand to merely sell them a product or service – they want to know that the brand gets them, understands their issues and is prepared to give something of value to them over and above the product or service they sell.  

By being brave and spending time arriving at a great thought leadership position, you, your company and your brand will be able to create a compelling point of difference and add substantially more value to your campaigns and ultimately your audience.

Is thought leadership coming of age?

I would like to draw your attention to a post written by Blair Currie the CEO of Aegis Media in Japan at  http://tinyurl.com/lljhdg . In it he talks about his ten predictions for 2010.  But what caught my eye were two points in particular:

Disruption will be the norm. With an abundance of choice, products and services need to be even more extraordinary to stand out and succeed. More attention and reward will be given to those who can find greatness within or outside market norms. The need to be more inventive will make creative destruction the norm rather than the exception. Consequently, effective change agents will be in increasing demand.

 Brands will grow up. People will expect brands to do more than simply satisfy their basic needs. Brands will need to appeal higher up Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs. As a result, brands will take on different roles in society supporting an increasing range and depth of CSR programs.  

Both of these have serious implications for thought leadership and how a) one differentiates ones brand and b) the need to position it in such a way that at every level - consumer, government and employees - the company is seen to be striving to deliver to their audiences something of value beyond what they sell and something which aligns with the values and aspirations of society.

It’s what I call the social license to operate which is quite distinct from the regulatory license to operate.  Social license to operate signifies going beyond what is required by law.  It challenges companies to always go one step further, the extra mile. 

Why? Because that is what society has come to expect and that is what consumers are starting to demand of their suppliers of goods and services.  

The other reason is that if a crisis hits the company has some sort of responsible brand shield which can, depending on the crisis, to some degree either buy them time or soften the consumer/societal backlash.

What does this all have to do with thought leadership?

Precisely the point that great thought leadership ideas are vested in the values of the company which should these days be inextricably linked to the good of greater society, employees and the community in which the company operates.  We’ve all heard the expression ‘No man is an island’.  Well no company is an island either.

By understanding the needs, fears and desires of the society in which you operate and specifically those same issues with your direct target audience, you/the company are in a far better position  to delivering a thought leadership campaign which hits the mark.

If you’ve seen or had experience of this, please share it with me.