What is a people-led thought leadership strategy?
Using the right thought leadership strategy will help business-to-business (B2B) organisations build credibility, carve out their market niche, and attract the types of customers you want to serve most. The key to success is to choose the thought leadership strategy that’s right for your organisation.
Earlier in this series of articles I mentioned the seven thought leadership strategies in brief.
To recap, I’ve built a model to underpin the requirements needed to deliver an effective thought leadership program.
In this model, there are seven possible thought leadership strategies which can map to B2B-centric organisations. In applying this framework, only one of these will fit your organisation type.
As I mentioned in the earlier article:
“Until you define which applies to your company, there’s a good chance your thought leadership content-generation program will be misdirected, struggle for a flow of ideas and content, or not resonate with your sales leaders and subject matter experts, which means limited internal support.”
The seven thought leadership strategies are:
- People – we are the leading experts.
- Process – our process delivers a superior outcome.
- Product – our product is the best.
- CEO – our leader defines or leads the industry with their vision and passion.
- Societal – we are the most powerful and important voice on this issue or cause.
- Political – we shape the kind of nation, state, or community we live in.
- Cultural – our culture is what defines us and why we matter.
Don’t think of these as values or strengths of an organisation. Clearly, every organisation needs people, processes, and products or they don’t exist.
In the context of this framework, only one of these strategies can be applied to your organisation (as a seller). Remember, a strategy is about deciding what goal to pursue in the context of the resources (time, money, energy) that are available. It is, by definition, a singular pursuit.
So, knowing which strategy to deploy is predicated on understanding the primary reason your customers do business with you. Or, to put it another way, understanding the nature of the value that is exchanged between seller (you) and your ideal customer.
What is people-led thought leadership?
Your organisation should leverage a people-led thought leadership strategy if the primary reason customers buy from you is because of your people.
No, not just because you have people, or you have a great people culture, or because your products are made by people, but because your people are the product.
If the reason your customers come to you is primarily to access and interface directly with your human expertise, then a people-led thought leadership strategy is most likely the right approach for you.
In this strategy setting, your people are marketing artefacts in their own right. Their knowledge, know-how, experience, qualifications, success, interpersonal skills, and standing in their profession provide the value that customers seek.
Typical people-led organisations that should run this kind of strategy are management consultancies, creative agencies, lobbyists, architects, law firms, accounting firms, consulting engineers, and the like.
Customers seek out firms in these and similar categories because they want expertise that is customised to their unique requirements. They are looking for individuals who they can trust in order to secure an important outcome.
A firm leveraging a people-led thought leadership strategy will bring those individuals, along with their credentials and experience, to light at every opportunity. Amplifying them, their insights, and their knowledge on important matters is the central plank to this strategy.
People-led thought leadership artefacts will include:
- research, journal articles, and books written by the experts in the company
- heavy involvement in, or leadership of, industry and trade associations
- advisory roles to government on policy-setting, planning, or program execution
- media interviews to provide commentary on areas of expertise
- paying to speak at conferences (or being invited to speak if already sought-after talent)
- hosting client and prospect roundtable events and sharing expert insight
- company announcements drawing attention to significant hires
- company announcements about recognition for individuals in a firm (e.g., winning awards, achieving PhDs, selection onto boards, registering patents, appointment to high-profile client projects, etc.).
There are many other artefacts that can be deployed to bring a people-led thought leadership strategy to life but this list is a good starting point.
The main thing to remember is that, if you sell expertise and experience as your primary product, then your ability to increase authority and recognition for your firm is directly related to how well you showcase your talent.
In fact, in many companies where people-led thought leadership is the focus, there are key performance indicators (KPIs) in place to measure the intellectually driven content that experienced team members contribute towards marketing. As such, there is an expectation that time will be allocated to this important task.
A final thought
I once had a client tell me that they couldn’t compete with a larger, more well-known professional services brand because the competitor had a ‘whole team of people’ who tirelessly produced content to demonstrate their expertise.
The inference was that a big professional services firm can afford the expense of a content team.
I think this is backwards thinking. A critical component of becoming a large, successful professional services firm is by investing in a people-led thought leadership strategy; it’s not the other way around.
You can’t start with a big content production team on day one, sure, but you can certainly focus on it using the experts you already employ in your business. This will get the flywheel turning; as you build credibility and success through thought leadership, your business will grow. It is also likely to attract more high-performing thought leaders who want to work for you. That, in turn, leads to bigger and better clients. And, that leads to more resources being available to create more impactful, higher-volume thought leadership content.
Adam Benson,
CEO
The Recognition Group
This article is completely generated by the author. No artificial intelligence tools were used to create or edit this copy.
Other articles in the thought leader series include:
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- Why it’s hard to make your B2B company a thought leader (and what to do about it)
- The two myths about thought leadership that challenger brands waste time worrying about.
- Seven thought leadership strategies B2B marketers need to know
- Recognition and authority – the two drivers of thought leadership
- Thought leadership marketing for companies that sell a process
This article originally published on LinkedIn: HERE
