#Thought Leadership Tweet – what’s your communication strategy?

The way you take your thought leadership to market is critical.

Taking your thought leadership campaign to market is the final chapter in the book #Thought Leadership Tweet 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign.  You may have the best thought leadership campaign in the world but if you don’t communicate it effectively to your desired audiences you’re going to waste a lot of valuable resources and your campaign will fail.

To overcome this, research is critical.  I refer to Tweet no 107: “Have you researched what your clients read and where they source their information so you can tailor your thought leadership accordingly.

Building a thought leadership platform is a long-term program. As such you need to be sure that you are packaging and reaching your audience where they are consuming their content.  Someone who heads up the thought leadership program for a multi-national once told me:  “We’ve researched our audience and they tell us they don’t want long reports, they want pithy, executive summaries and time with senior partners to talk through their issues.”

The tweet outline in this chapter will guide you to coming up with the best possible communication strategy for your campaign.

Internal and external thought leadership communication drivers

One of the aspects so often overlooked in a thought leadership communication strategy is how you work with your employees to ensure they become your best advocates for the campaign.  As tweet no 111 says: “To what extent is your sales team adequately equipped to use this thought leadership material in conversations with prospects.”

When it comes to external communication we use the term leverage.  It is a cardinal thought leadership sin not to leverage your content in as many ways possible and across all your client or prospects touch points.

Customise your thought leadership

Finally customise your thought leadership as far as possible for each prospect and client.  Every senior person likes to think that your insights are written exclusively for them.  Ensure you modify your content for the different stages of the buying cycle – what you give a new prospect when you first meet them compared to when you have established a relationship with them should be very different.

A thought leadership methodology

#Thought Leadership Tweet concludes with a special addendum – a practical chapter with a step by step methodology on how to successfully plan, develop, communicate, evaluate and recalibrate your thought leadership campaign from start to finish.

We set out to write this book to make it easy for those new to the concept to understand what thought leadership is and how it works.  However it is also a valuable guide for sophisticated thought leaders to help them ensure they are covering all the bases and that their campaign is track.

If you have any questions on this or once you’ve read the book please feel free to contact either myself or my co-author Dr Liz Alexander.  We are more than happy to answer your questions.

#Thought Leadership Tweet covers the seven essential elements of a thought leadership campaign.  This post is the last in a series that covered:

1. Your guide to winning the content war and what is thought leadership? Covered in past post.
2. What does it take to become a thought leader? Covered in past post.
3. What impact do you want to achieve? Covered in past post.
4. How will you know you’ve succeeded? Covered in past post.
5. What space has already been claimed? Covered in past post.
6. What will be your unique point of view? Covered in past post.
7. What’s your communication strategy? Covered in this post.

Craig Badings is a director at Sydney-based, Cannings Corporate Communications.  He has consulted to companies small and large, listed and unlisted across Australia and South Africa about their communication strategies, corporate reputation and thought leadership.  He is the co-author of  #THOUGHT LEADERSHIP Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign.  He published his first book in 2009: “Brand Stand: seven steps to thought leadership”

Join him on twitter @thoughtstrategy and on LinkedIn.

#Thought Leadership Tweet – what space has already been claimed?

Thought leadership is not merely an opinion, opinions are everywhere and everybody has one, instead, thought leadership should be based on evidence/data/research.  I cannot stress enough how important research is for a thought leadership campaign to succeed.  And critically it should be across a number of areas.

First research the space you want to own, who else is covering this and are they doing it well – you don’t want to compete in an already overcrowded space unless you have something really different or a unique angle to share.  Then most importantly research the key issues affecting your clients’/consumer’s lives – Tweet #67 in the book asks: “What key trends are impacting your clients? Can these inform your thought leadership or is someone else already providing insights on these?”

The tweet prompts under this section in the book will help you in your discussions on where your focus should lie.  For example would you take on Dove on real beauty or IBM on a smarter planet?  Probably not as you would face an up-hill battle.

Thought leadership and content curation

The chapter also covers off our views of content curation and where it fits in the thought leadership mix.  If you are curating other peoples content and you want to use it to help drive a thought leadership position, you’d better be sure that you are adding something new or something of value to your clients if that is the case.  After all since when was merely collating other people’s content thought leadership?!

Our view is that content curation does two things:  It adds value to a conversation about a topic by assimilating a range of information on that topic, and; it can help you discover, inform and articulate your thought leadership point of view.

#Thought Leadership Tweet 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign covers the seven essential elements of a thought leadership campaign. I have covered off on some of these in previous posts and in the new year I will conclude with the final two.

Already covered in this series:

1. Your guide to winning the content war and what is thought leadership? Covered in past post.
2. What does it take to become a thought leader? Covered in past post.
3. What impact do you want to achieve? Covered in past post.
4. How will you know you’ve succeeded? Covered in past post.
5. What space has already been claimed? Covered in this post.

Still to come:

1. What will be your unique point of view? Still to come…
2. What’s your communication strategy? Still to come…

Craig Badings is a director at Sydney-based, Cannings Corporate Communications.  He has consulted to companies small and large, listed and unlisted across Australia and South Africa about their communication strategies, corporate reputation and thought leadership.  He is the co-author of  #THOUGHT LEADERSHIP Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign.  He published his first book in 2009: “Brand Stand: seven steps to thought leadership”

Join him on twitter @thoughtstrategy and on LinkedIn.

#Thought Leadership Tweet – what does it take to become a thought leader?

The best way to introduce this topic which is covered in section one of #Thought Leadership Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign, is to quote Eric Wittlake, senior director of media at Babcock & Jenkins: “Everyone wants to be a thought leader today, but can they?”

Those under the illusion that thought leadership is a white paper, a bit of random content there or some curated content over here need to think again.  This random approach to content will never cut it and in the process time, money and valuable resources are wasted for little effect.

Becoming a thought leader requires a planned and disciplined approach.  To start there some preliminary questions anyone person or organisation embarking on this journey should ask.  In #Thought Leadership Tweet we make it easy by posing these questions for you.  For example #Thought Leadership Tweet no 2 asks: “Have you defined clearly what thought leadership means to your organization and what you want to achieve from it?”

This is a key question as it:

1. Helps you deliver a strategic framework from which to work
2. Aligns the campaign with your business objectives
3. Gives you a benchmark from which you can measure and evaluate your campaign

A successful thought leadership approach needs three things

When you are ready to embark on your first steps towards a thought leadership approach there are three areas on which to focus your discussions:

1. What type of environment do you need in order to foster a culture of thought leadership?
2. How does this campaign align with your overall vision and mission?
3. Do you have the right people involved at the most senior level and across disciplines?

#Thought Leadership Tweet no 21 illustrates just one of these questions: “Which members of your team will challenge your organization’s assumptions in order to engage in truly breakthrough thinking?”

I leave you with this thought: If you find people courageous enough to take your organization and clients into previously unexplored territory, trust them and back them with the right resources.

#Thought Leadership Tweet covers the seven essential elements of a thought leadership campaign.  Over the course of the next few weeks I will go into each one in more detail.

1. Your guide to winning the content war and what is thought leadership? Covered in past post.
2. What does it take to become a thought leader? Covered in this post.
3. What impact do you want to achieve? Still to come…
4. How will you know you’ve succeeded? Still to come…
5. What space has already been claimed? Still to come…
6. What will be your unique point of view? Still to come…
7. What’s your communication strategy? Still to come…

Look out in the next few days for the next blog piece in this series covering #Thought Leadership Tweet which will touch on what impact you want to achieve.

Craig Badings is a director at Sydney-based, Cannings Corporate Communications.  He has consulted to companies small and large, listed and unlisted across Australia and South Africa about their communication strategies, corporate reputation and thought leadership.  He is the co-author of  #THOUGHT LEADERSHIP Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign.  He published his first book in 2009: “Brand Stand: seven steps to thought leadership”

Join him on twitter @thoughtstrategy and on LinkedIn.

#Thought Leadership Tweet – your guide to winning the content war

On reading ‘#Thought Leadership Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign’, David Meerman Scott best-selling author of The New Rules of Marketing and PR had this to say: “This book echoes my view that people don’t care about products! Thought Leadership engages buyers about what matters to them, not your ego.”

And therein lies the clue to this book. Many organisations are squandering time, money and effort on thought leadership initiatives that do not move the needle in terms of establishing a differentiated brand identity, trust and a loyal following.

To win the content war requires smart thinking and content that critically goes to the very heart of your target audiences or customers’/clients’ issues.

Gaining an understanding first of what thought leadership is, is critical to the success of your campaign.

The first section of #Thought Leadership Tweet outlines what thought leadership is.

What is thought leadership?

There are many definitions out there.  In fact click on definitions of thought leadership to the right of this post and you will find a number of them.  However, co-author Liz Alexander and I have said this in the book: “Thought leaders advance the marketplace of ideas by positing actionable, commercially relevant, research-backed, new points of view. They engage in ‘blue ocean strategy’ thinking on behalf of themselves and their clients, as opposed to simply churning out product-focused, brand-centric white papers or curated content that shares or mimics others’ ideas.”

Why do some organisations struggle with thought leadership?

Individual thought leaders are in plentiful supply so why do organisations struggle with the concept?

My experience tells me it is for three reasons:

1. Organisations generally are not great listeners and many are not truly engaging with their  customers/clients around the genuine business, social, economic, environmental and political issues they face face
2. Many leave their thought leadership to the marketing department and it is not owned by senior management i.e. there is no culture of thought leadership
3. Most companies are too product or service focused and sharing content or intellectual  property is a big ask for them

As we point out in this book, we all need to listen more, understand better, and re-energise our relationships with increasingly discerning, demanding and sceptical customers and clients.  Our believe and experience shows that the way around this is to differentiate with compelling points of view that are intriguing, innovative, inspiring and wholly relevant to your audience.

Thought leadership is a discipline requiring a process

Adapting to the content war currently raging for share of consumers’ and clients minds requires a disciplined approach and focus.  #Thought Leadership Tweet makes this easy.  It takes the reader on a journey and in process delivers a complete methodology for a thought leadership campaign.

These are the seven essential elements of a thought leadership campaign covered in the book.  Over the course of the next few weeks I will go into each one in more detail.

1. Your guide to winning the content war and what is thought leadership? Covered in this post.
2. What does it take to become a thought leader? Next post.
3. What impact do you want to achieve?
4. How will you know you’ve succeeded?
5. What space has already been claimed?
6. What will be your unique point of view?
7. What’s your communication strategy?

# Thought Leadership Tweet no 8: “A hallmark of true thought leadership is the confidence to take the route that 99.9 per cent of the industry experts don’t even see.  Will you?”

Look out in the next few days for the next blog piece in this series covering #Thought Leadership Tweet which will touch on what it takes to become a thought leader.

Craig Badings is a director at Sydney-based, Cannings Corporate Communications.  He has consulted to companies small and large, listed and unlisted across Australia and South Africa about their communication strategies, corporate reputation and thought leadership.  He is the co-author of  #THOUGHT LEADERSHIP Tweet: 140 Prompts for Designing and Executing an Effective Thought Leadership Campaign.  He published his first book in 2009: “Brand Stand: seven steps to thought leadership”

Join him on twitter @thoughtstrategy and on LinkedIn.

What role does content curation play in thought leadership?

I’ve always said no because to be a thought leader necessitates generating original, new content or insights that address a certain markets issues or challenges.  By doing this you display your depth of expertise on a topic or a business sector.

After some good banter on one to two websites about this I have developed two observations on content curation and thought leadership.

Curated content plays a support role to thought leadership

The first is that curated content can play a very important role in supporting and informing a thought leadership content program.  For example, curated content feeds are a great way to keep in touch with trends which can inform your thought leadership topics and in that sense help with the content calendar.

New ideas as a result of curated content  could be thought leadership

The second is that if the person curating the content is able to, through that content, arrive at new ideas or insights which they then deliver to their audience this could be construed as thought leadership.

Regurgitating content doesn’t cut it

Simply regurgitating someone else’s content is not going to cut it.  Repurposing content is not going to cut it and neither will re-packaging it.  Content curation cannot be called thought leadership.  Only when it leads the curator into a totally new hypothesis or insight can it start approaching thought leadership status and at that point it is no longer curated content but rather the curator’s interpretation off the back of the curated content.    

I don’t want to take anything away from content curation.  It is fantastic for a content/editorial calendar and it can be a great support to a thought leadership campaign.  Content curation allows you to monitor trends in your space and help inform better what you are planning in real time.

Some great sites on content curation

If you are interested in reading more on content and content marketing/curation there are some great sites such as www.contentmarketinginstitute.com  www.junta42.com  http://optimalaccess.com/ and www.getcurata.com

Please download my free e book top right of this page.  Follow me on twitter @thoughtstrategy and join me on LinkedIn.

Thought leadership insights from global expert

Fiona Czerniawska shares her insights on thought leadership

For this interview on thought leadership, I had the privilege of interviewing Fiona Czerniawska, one of the foremost global authorities on thought leadership, particularly in the management consultancy space.  There are few people who understand as much about thought leadership as Fiona.  She is the co-founder of Source, a company specialising in researching the consulting industry www.sourceforconsulting.com .  She has authored numerous management reports, books and articles.

I would urge you to visit her site and join up to her thought leadership newsletter White Space http://www.sourceforconsulting.com/whitespace/ . White Space is a subscriber-based web service which provides detailed analysis of the thought leadership of around 30 leading global consulting firms.She is also the Director of the Management Consultancies Association’s Think Tank, she is a Programme Director for the Centre of Management Development at London Business School, and also lectures at Kingston Business School in London and Haarlem School of Advanced Management Studies in Holland.

 Trends in thought leadership

1.      Fiona your firm White Space does an exhaustive annual analysis of the thought leadership material of around 30 leading global consulting firms.  What trends have you seen emerging in this field from the leaders in the thought leadership space?

The overall quality of thought leadership in 2010 slipped a bit – at least in our opinion. We think there were two main reasons for this.  The first is that many firms cut their thought leadership and research budgets during the recession and the cracks this opened up really began to show in the latter half of the year.  Thankfully that particular trend seems to being reversed.  The second reason is to do with the way in which people are publishing their material: we’ll all have noticed a plethora of new formats, including Twitter, videos, podcasts and design-your-own graphs.  But these share a common challenge which is that you have less space to say things and I think consulting firms are struggling with the transition from back-breaking flagship reports to a pithier, more opinionated style.  A five-minute video shouldn’t be a balding man in a grey suit reading the executive summary, but someone saying something memorable and thought-provoking, as well as fast.  This type of thought leadership should be like the tip of an iceberg, with the underlying research below the waterline, but it often becomes an excuse for not doing the research in the first place – and that shows.

Content and thought leadership

 2.      There’s a lot written these days about marketing content but what’s your view that content alone doesn’t make you a thought leader?   

I’d agree, but with some caveats.  I honestly don’t think you can beat good content: that’s easy to forget because so much of the content we do see isn’t that good.  If you look back at the block-buster management ideas of the past, they were all based on serious research, not a sudden brainwave or luck.  I don’t believe in eureka moments except those that emerge from deeper-than-deep content.  That being said, I do think that innovation in thought leadership will come from the way this content is assembled and disseminated.  I’m watching McKinsey’s What Matters micro-site with interest and I know that other firms are looking at this issue too. 

Thought leadership quantity vs quality

3.      You talk about four factors likely to attract a client’s attention as appeal, differentiation, practical application and quality of thinking but do you think the volume of thought leadership these firms produce these days means they are having to be more creative with the way it is packaged?

These four factors relate to the quality of a firm’s output and that’s independent of quality (although, almost inevitably, a firm that decides to increase the quantity of its material takes a hit on quality).  It’s tempting to say that quantity should never matter but it does: if you produce one piece of thought leadership on, say, strategy in the banking sector, but your competitor produces 20, then there’s a fair chance that you’ll get shouted down, however great your piece is.  Quantity also sends a not-so-subliminal message to clients about how much a firm specialises in a particular area.  However, I think firms could indeed be more creative about the way they package their content.  In particular, I’d like to seem more “bundling” (putting related articles, in a mix of different formats, together in the same place); better recommendations (suggesting articles I might find of interest); and, please, please, please, better search engines.  It’s incredibly frustrating to put a keyword in but not be able to sort the results by date or filter them.

Thought leadership as a term

4.      The term thought leadership is bandied about quite loosely do you think the term itself is dated and if so are there better terms to encapsulate thought leadership?

Like all jargon (the first book I wrote was on business language… ), “thought leadership” has its uses.  People – at least consultants – know what it refers to means and broadly understand what’s involved even if they might quibble about its exact meaning.  The trouble is that it’s an inherently arrogant term that set itself up for a fall: it’s an old joke that most thought leadership is really thought “followship.”  And of course the even bigger problem is that no one, certainly not us, has a better term.

Thought leadership – a growing discipline

5.      Are you seeing signs that thought leadership is becoming a discipline in its own right?  Are there any examples of it being split in terms of resourcing and manpower from the traditional marketing and corporate communication roles?

We’re certainly seeing this more – and I think that’s the right thing to do.  If you ask clients what influences their choice of consulting firm, they almost always cite personal recommendations, case studies and thought leadership, but these components have an impact in different ways and at different times.  A personal recommendation is very much about which firm to use for a specific piece of work, but case studies and thought leadership are important at an earlier stage in the thinking process.  Long before they reach the point when they decide to hire a consulting firm, clients need evidence that it makes sense to invest time and effort in an idea or problem they’ve been mulling over – and case studies and thought leadership can provide this.  In other words, done well the latter help stimulate demand for consulting in general even if they don’t convert into a sale for a specific firm.  That’s why it makes sense to view these functions separately – but of course you can go too far in the opposite direction and it’s important for marketing, corporate comms and thought leadership to plan and act in unison.

The client’s view on thought leadership

6.      What are clients of the firms you analyse saying about the thought leadership material they receive?   

They have mixed reactions, depending on the subject-matter and their position.  Overall, clients dismiss most thought leadership simply because it’s not relevant to them.  There’s a lesson in this about ensuring all material is focused on as tight a group of clients as possible, otherwise – a bit like infections treated with antibiotics – they become resistant!  Where it is relevant, views are much more positive: indeed, it’s quite clear that producing good thought leadership is, in many senior managers’ eye, a fundamental characteristic of a certain type of established, high-class consulting.

Thought leadership case study

7.      What’s the best thought leadership campaign you’ve seen and why?

The BBC’s A History of the World in 100 Objects.  Not exactly a conventional programme, but it gives us a clear sense and standard about what can be achieved when you mix great content with an intelligent use of new media.  It should be required listening for all marketing departments.

The future of thought leadership

8.      What is your view on where thought leadership is heading over the next five years?

I like to think that it will become a serious battleground for really good ideas.  I may be laughed at for this on the quite reasonable grounds that (a) clients value small-scale insights more than grandiose conceptual models and (b) the extent to which thought leadership is – or can be – a crucible for innovation is questionable.  But I do get frustrated by the lack of ambitious in much thought leadership.  There are some big and interesting questions about business that never seem to get debated – and it would be good to think that some of these will start to be discussed.  The prerequisites to this, and I suspect to upping the overall quality of thought leadership, are investment and collaboration.  I can’t believe we won’t see more money going into thought leadership in the future, as it’s clear that it is one of the few marketing activities which can differentiate a firm.  And I also think consulting firms will realise that they have to work with people (clients and other consultants) outside the boundaries of their firms for inspiration.

If you have any comments on Fiona’s points of view I’d love to hear from you – also don’t forget to sign up for Fiona’s newsletter here http://www.sourceforconsulting.com/whitespace/

Three key challenges facing thought leadership

After working in thought leadership for many years across multiple sectors, writing about it, researching it and speaking to a wide variety of people across a spectrum of industries, I believe the key challenges facing thought leaders or a thought leadership campaign boils down to three things:

1.       1. Thought leadership Engagement – are your senior leaders/executives engaged in your thought leadership position?

If not you will have a problem as the campaign is bound to be short-lived, it will miss the gravitas of senior commitment internally and externally, you will struggle to excite the target audiences for whom the thought leadership is intended, you will make limited inroads into making thought leadership part of the culture of your organisation and you will battle to convince your executives about the efficacy of thought leadership as a client and new business engagement strategy.

2.       Thought leadership Connectivity – is your thought leadership campaign enabling your key client-facing people to connect with their clients and prospects?  Did you include them in the journey?   Do they feel part of this campaign or is it content that is thrust upon them at the last minute and they have to make use of it? 

The risk to all of these questions that you can run the risk of your thought leadership material being perceived by your own people as ineffectual in helping them connect with your client or prospects resulting in them merely paying lip service to it at best and at worst not using it at all or dismissing it.

3.       Thought leadership Packaging – are you maximising the opportunity to leverage your content as much as possible across every possible client or new business touch point?  Have you researched your target audiences in terms of where they source their information, how they like to receive it, what they read, where they go online, whether they like face-to-face, etc?

These are critical questions that will guide you in deciding how you cut and dice your content for maximum effect.  Furthermore, and only if relevant, are you packaging your content online for maximum search engine optimisation so that a) people can find you, and b) you feature on page one of Google for those specific search terms?  

If you have any more to add to these I’d be delighted to hear from you.

Beware, content doesn’t a thought leader make

There is a lot of a commentary flying around the web at the moment about content, optimising that content for search engines , content curation (filtering and aggregating relevant content) and how best to deliver content to your publics.

But…and this is a big but – content alone does not make you a thought leader.  It may help a company’s publics, it may make their lives easier, it may drive traffic to a site and it may position that brand as a trusted source of particular information.  But does it make that company a thought leader?

No it does not.

Let’s have a quick look at my definition of thought leadership:  Thought Leadership is establishing a relationship with and delivering something of value to your stakeholders and customers that aligns with your brand/company value. In the process you go well beyond merely selling a product or service and establish your brand /company as the expert in that field and differentiate yourself from your competitors

Key to thought leadership is innovative content

The key to being a thought leader is offering something of value, insights that position you as the expert in that field.  By that I mean stuff which frames the debate and conversations on a particular issue or issues.  Content that challenges the paradigms and the thinking of your own staff as well as your publics if not an entire industry sector, and content that delivers deep insights around a particular issue or sector.

Content that doesn’t do this cannot and should not be labelled as thought leadership.  It is merely information.

This is not to say that it’s not useful but it doesn’t make you a thought leader.

Content curation

HiveFire has produced a thought provoking e book on content curation.  You can download it here : http://info.hivefire.com/eBook.html  and I suggest you do.  It is a good read and raises some very interesting questions about how you manage your content.

But as they say, competitors are drowning in a sea of information overload and they are challenged to decipher what information is relevant and which sources are trustworthy.  My view is that it is particularly because of this that to be a thought leader, the content you deliver needs to differentiate you from the crowd, must be different and challenge insights and should position you as the pre-eminent company/commentator in that space.

The spin-offs of doing this right are huge as many marketers, particularly in the professional services arena will attest.  True thought leadership is one of the most valuable marketing assets in which a company can invest.  It inspires trust in your brand and in process imbues in your company and your people a perception by the marketplace that you are the ‘go to’ authorities and knowledge experts on that topic – a perception that no amount of advertising can buy.  OK maybe a bucket load could buy it but it would cost a bomb .

Publishing alone will not help

Publishing on its own is not going to help.  It’s what you publish and how you take it to market that makes the difference.

Before you become an aggregator or curator of content ask yourself the following questions:   What is our thought leadership position?  What do we stand for in the market place?  What is our differentiator in terms of leading the market?

Only once you have established a position in this regard are seen as the go to place for insights in your area of specialty is it useful to become a content curator and specifically for content that relates to and helps inform that position.

 Until then I’m afraid, you will just be a follower.

Is content marketing merely a form of thought leadership?

Is content marketing a misnomer for thought leadership?

Great content marketing is merely thought leadership dressed up in another form.  Or is it? 

I have been reading a bit about content marketing of late and it appears there are, in many instances, close correlations between thought leadership and content marketing.

My understanding is that content marketing is high quality content packaged in a way that presents the intellectual property of that brand in order to attract, engage and retain customers.  The question is how that is different to thought leadership?

I don’t believe it is.

The key, however, lies in what and how a brand gathers and uses its content.  I have previously posted that content alone does not make you a thought leader and I still believe that.  Rather it is the insights and intellectual property that comes with your content that measures whether you are providing thought leadership material or not.   It is how you frame and stimulate new thinking and debate in your field, how you empower people with your knowledge, how you stimulate them to think differently as a business or as consumers.

Is your content thought leadership or not?

Anyone can piece together content but the trick lies in whether it makes a difference to your target audiences and whether they see it as thought leading content or not.

In a recent white paper entitled ‘Marketing is Content’ by PR Newswire, it states:  “Marketers are investing more aggressively in content in myriad forms, all in the interest of driving engagement with new customers, enhancing brand loyalty and share of wallet among existing customers, and creating both buzz and substantive value exchange across social, online, search, mobile, viral and traditional channels.”

It goes on further to say: “compelling content…is becoming the glue that re-integrates brand marketers’ audiences…”

All great but one important thing is missing.  The thought that goes into this content, the intellectual property or the compelling insights that the content so clearly needs in order to have the desired impact is in fact the thought leadership piece.  It’s the stuff that sets your brand apart from the others.

Any old content can be dangerous to your brand

Content marketing without the thought leadership component is merely dangerous drivel which runs the risk of irritating your consumer and potentially damaging your brand.  Hence the importance for strategic input and senior management commitment to focusing on what this content should include and how it is resourced.

Content without thought leadership is just that – content.

The marketers who were interviewed for the PRNewswire white paper said: “…rich, high-quality content, in multiple forms and formats and distributed intelligently to the right media channels, has emerged as the backbone of their marketing strategies.”

So is content marketing a misnomer?  I think it is.  Content without thought leadership properties will merely end up in file 13.  Content on the other hand that will engage consumers and clients alike is thought leading content.