What is Thought Leadership Content?
All content has a purpose and thought leadership content has become an increasingly popular option because its purpose is to build a relationship with your audience by establishing yourself as an expert. Good thought leadership content goes beyond expressing an opinion on a topic. It shows the reader that you have the right credentials and experience to chime in and provide insight.
Although “Thought Leadership” has become somewhat of a buzzword these days, this kind of content at its heart is expert-led. Instead, we’re talking about “expert-led content,” a term coined by Brooklyn Nash of Beam Content referring to content that “leverages the wisdom of industry and company experts.”
Ultimately, using your expertise or that of others lends your content legitimacy.
Think about it this way, anyone can hop on LinkedIn and talk about how much they loved or hated a Superbowl ad. But if you see this kind of content being published by someone within the ad industry in a position where they interact with these kinds of ads, their content has higher value, especially when shared through the lens of their lived experience.
Countless companies do a great job of this—and the best example is HubSpot. They’ve become the go-to standard for marketing and sales content, which makes sense as a top CRM. In addition to staff writers with considerable expertise, they also bring in freelancers for specific topics. HubSpot has an extensive suite of products, which requires an equally varied pool of experts in subjects like SEO, email marketing, content creation, landing pages and more.
Why Expert-Led Content Is Important
Expert-led thought leadership content positions you as an authority in your field, but how exactly does that happen? There are a few ways I’ve helped clients establish authority while building credibility and visibility.
It starts with REACH (Visibility Trajectory™)
My flexible framework is called the REACH Visibility Trajectory
Thought leadership—or expert-led—content blends most of the elements:
- Speaking to your audience based on what you know about them (R= Research Your Audience)
- Sharing what you want to be known for (E= Engage with brand voice & values)
- Becoming a go-to source of insights and information on a conversion-focused site (A= attract with your website)
- Nurturing and converting them through a predefined customer journey (C=create an online funnel)
- Capturing their attention and driving leads into your journey with insights and value (H=Hook with tactical strategies)
But how do you capture their attention?
Offer unique insights into your products, services, or industry
Some industries are more technical than others and require a higher level of knowledge than many may have. By publishing expert-led content, you are in a position to break down your industry and potentially even your company into more digestible pieces.
Let me outline two ways you could accomplish this.
The first is by introducing a new topic to your audience. Begin by outlining why this topic is important to your audience, and then you can insert your experience and insights of the topic. Keep in mind, you’ll want to deliver a unique and valuable perspective since this is what separates expert-led content from other content.
Another angle is educating your audience on a topic they may only have surface level knowledge of. For instance, if you’re the CEO of a computer company, you may not be the person programming the computers, but it’s important to stay up to date on technological advances to get ahead of the competition.
Pro-actively tackle issues before they materialize
Remember, you are the expert in this dynamic with your audience. So it’s your job to help them avoid problems they may not even know about.
If it’s a new challenge, then getting in front of it can help you establish yourself as a go-to expert. What does that look like?
In the past few years alone, there are several major shifts that presented and/or continue to present opportunities to distinguish your expertise:
- The shift to online/remote workplaces necessitated by the pandemic
- Post-pandemic supply chain issues causing new adaptations to forecasting and purchasing
- AI becoming more accessible to laypeople
But it doesn’t all have to be groundbreaking. Nor do you have to be at the bleeding edge of tech or business process. There are opportunities to establish yourself as a thought leader in every industry.
Tattoo aftercare brand, Stories & Inks sells products to safely heal and maintain tattoos. However, they have plenty of content to help their customers navigate the process before they even step foot into a tattoo parlor, including a blog about tattoo etiquette and skin prep.
Did you know that you aren’t supposed to have any fake tanner on? Not even a stain-free gradual tanner before you get a tattoo? I know, it’s news to me as one of the few card-carrying millennials without a tattoo! It turns out If you do, that pigment is pushed into your skin and becomes part of the tattoo! If I ever get one, they’ve helped me avoid a serious issue by publishing these content pieces. This kind of expertise could sway the audience towards using their products and building trust in the brand.
Give your audience a reason to return to your site
Whether you have a low or high-ticket product or service, you always want your customers to return to your site to make another purchase. Creating excellent expert-led content is a fantastic way to get first-time customers back on your site. You can create expert-led content that further validates their purchase by giving them more value. If they feel good about their purchase, they’ll be more likely to become a repeat customer. You can also use this kind of content to nurture your customers and build a relationship with them.
Now that you understand why expert-led content is important to your overall marketing strategy, let’s talk about how you can start creating this type of content.
What to consider before creating expert-led content
Before you start drafting your thought leader content, there are a few things you’ll want to establish.
What kind of expert do you want to be?
Start by identifying what you want to be known for—and how you want to set yourself up as an expert. You can be as general or specific as you want, as long as it makes sense. For example, if you’re a dermatologist, it may feel obvious to set yourself up as an expert in all things dermatology. However, you can go deeper and narrower.
Dr. Sandra Lee is a dermatologist who established herself as a specialist in treating blemishes, cysts, and other similar conditions. She is publicly known as “Dr. Pimple Popper,” thanks to her social media videos. (Popaholics unite!)
It’s not just about the popping though—she also shares how she helps people grow confidence and change their lives through storytelling, while also making sure people know important info (always remove the cyst sac and always wear gloves).
Her practice’s website shares plenty of press coverage around her public image. While her audience understands she can likely treat all skin conditions, she’ll most likely get more patients seeking blemish and cyst-specific treatment. And hey, if you follow her lead, you might get millions of followers, product deals, and even your own TV show.
Another way to set yourself up as an expert in a specific area of your field, is to focus on a vertical. Imagine you’re an accounting business that specializes in serving cannabis brands, you’d have expertise that general accountants may not have or want to dip into. On the other hand, you could serve all types of businesses, but only choose to specialize in taxes or payroll rather than the full breadth of accounting services.
Keep in mind, if you present yourself as an expert in an area of your business, you won’t box yourself into specific type of content. Going back to Stories & Ink, they’ve set up a Journals page, where they publish a variety of content relating to tattoos, including aftercare, but also artist highlights, and tattoo culture news. By immersing themselves in the overall tattoo lifestyle and providing their audience with valuable content, readers immediately recognize that the brand legitimately is an expert in not only after-care, but tattoo culture as a whole.
What does your audience know?
Next, think about what kind of information your audience might already have. You don’t want to spend time creating content that they may not need—after all, you don’t want to create the same ol’ snoozefest content that everyone else is writing. In this case, it’s helpful to think about the different stages of your audience’s buyer’s journey or even the role your audience may have in their company.
For example, if you’re a tech company specializing in AI integration, and you want to create content for C-suite level executives, you don’t want to go to the basics. Your C-suite already knows some of the concerns and challenges around AI—they now need to know what’s in it for them and how to make decisions around policies or successfully integrate it into their company.
If your chief customers are marketers, you want to show them how to use it to reduce busywork and become more effective.
Keep in mind, you can always create content for different roles and buyer journey stages as long as you make sure your content is tailored to their needs and wants.
What are your goals?
You’re going to spend valuable time ideating and creating your expert-led content, so ask yourself what you hope to get out of this piece? Your content’s purpose could be to create awareness around your brand, convert current leads, or something else entirely. Identifying your goal will make it much easier to determine what the right CTA for your content is.
This is really a series of questions:
- What do you want them to walk away now knowing?
- What do you want them to do with the information?
- How does this piece of thought leadership contribute to your overall marketing strategy?
- How does it tie into your existing services and offers?
- How does it help you build expertise in the specific area you’re covering?
When I’m writing expert-led content, people sometimes look at me sideways when I ask questions like this—but it’s mission-critical. If I know ahead of time what I’m building towards, I can bake Easter eggs into the content that makes it a no-brainer for them to take whatever action we’re guiding them to.
Where will your content live?
The most important part of your content is your CTA (Call to Action), but you’ll want to consider where your content will be published as that can make a difference regarding the type of CTA you choose and can help you tailor that content to your audience
If your content will be on a third party’s site or in a well-known publication, your CTA could invite the audience to simply visit your website or score a freebie that grows your mailing list. There may also be some requirements around outbound links to consider
On the other hand, if your content is already on your site, you can be a bit more explicit in your request to contact you or act on an offer.
Writing your expert-led thought leadership content piece
Establish the context for your content piece
I always start expert interviews by asking why this topic and why now. Why’s that? We always start thought leadership content by establishing the context for the audience. It’s important your audience understands why this content is relevant and you’re also setting up the expectations about the problems you’re going to help them solve.
Make a “state-of-the-world” statement
Next, you’ll want to expand on the context by giving your audience what I refer to as a “state-of-the-world” explanation. If we use the AI company example from earlier, you could talk about the increasing implementation of AI-based programs, the different use cases, and what matters most to them. This will be a lead-in to the next portion, which ties into why they should care.
Provide a challenge or concern surrounding your topic
This is all about sharing why the challenge you’re about to address is a potential problem to be aware of or concerned about. Get as specific as you can with statistics if relevant, but don’t worry about giving them a preview of everything you’re covering. You’re still establishing context at this point and helping them want to read more.
Share your experience and expertise
Now that you’ve laid out an issue in your audience’s landscape, this is where your know-how comes to play. Explore the different aspects or considerations and draw from your experience to give insights on the issues and provide potential solutions. You can also share some quotes and insights from your colleagues if it will help strengthen your content’s credibility.
Wrap it up with actionable advice
There’s nothing that drives me crazier than a conclusion that just regurgitates the content your audience has already just read. (Okay, you caught me — there are lots of things that drive me nuts.) Your conclusion can reiterate the key points you want your reader to walk away knowing, but you also need to offer guidance as to what they should do with this new information.
Some things to consider including:
- Any thoughts you haven’t covered
- Any additional steps they should take to educate themselves further
- Considerations about why they can’t afford to NOT take action
Using Expert-Led Thought Leadership Content to Stand Out
Well-written expert-led content is an excellent way to set yourself up as an authority in your field.
You can benefit in different ways from publishing expert-led content, and now it’s time to sit down and think about what kind of content you want to create. If you’re not sure where to start, make a list of topics or specialties you want to be known for and analyze whether or not people come to you for those topics. Then identify any gaps or pivots and use those opportunities as starting points. Once you’ve done that, ask yourself the following questions:
- How does this contribute to the authority I want to build?
- How does this fit into current or upcoming promotions or offers?
- What goals does it support?
Use your answers to help you prioritize what to write first.
You can also make each content piece go further by re-purposing it into different types of content from YouTube videos to social posts. If your thought leadership content is hosted on your site, I suggest you reach out to relevant publications to see if they could feature it. You’ll get more eyes on the same piece of content.
If you still need some help setting yourself up as an expert through your content, I can help! You can purchase my Content Creation Blueprint Bundle which is designed to help you market yourself online without burning out.
It includes:
- Market Yourself Online Without Burning Out Masterclass
- 30 Days of Content Workshop and Planner
- Creating Content Trees Masterclass and Workbook for brainstorming a year of content (or more!)
Want me to help personally? Just send me a message or book a time on my calendar, and we can look at all your options to find the best fit for you.
