Everyone has the Potential to Become a Thought Leader. Here Are the 4 Reasons Why Most Fail
These days, it seems as though everyone is hopping on the thought-leadership train.
Re-reading that, it sounds like a bad thing. It’s not. Founders and c-level executives are starting to realize the importance of speaking on behalf of their organization, or speaking from experience to establish credibility and a deeper trust with the general public.
Take Uber, for example. Its entire rebranding approach is essentially thought leadership through content marketing—Dara Khosrowshahi being the ‘face’ and the ‘voice’ of the company itself. The goal is to establish a newfound trust with users and potential users, building relationships at scale.
At Digital Press, we call this ‘humanizing a company.’
And people are finally starting to recognize the value in the whole first-person, speak-from-experience approach. The problem, though, is that most people have a grave misunderstanding of what thought leadership actually is.
Everyone has the potential to become a thought leader in their space. In fact, thought leadership can be your most effective form of marketing—bar none—if done right.
Easier said than done.
Here are the 4 primary reasons people fail when it comes to thought leadership:
1. They don’t really know Thought Leadership.
Being a thought leader isn’t about doing the most.
Yet, so many people think that’s exactly what it is.
“Thought leadership? Yeah, I’m looking into that. Our company has it’s own blog, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, which I post on every day. I’ve written 17 e-books so far this year and have had press pieces in every major publication.”
No, no, no.
Having a profile on every social media platform known to man does not make you a thought leader. Neither does having your marketing team come up with content pieces titled, “Here’s How This Brilliant CEO is Disrupting A $20 Billion Dollar Industry,” and pitch them off to publications each week.
For whatever reason, people think constant publicity is the key to becoming a thought leader. It’s not—there is no value-add in simply being present.
Thought leadership is really about contributing to industry conversations (and starting new ones) by providing quality, consistent content that provides real value to people.
That’s the foundation of thought leadership.
2. They do it for the wrong reasons.
Everyone wants to be seen as leading their space, yet, the vast majority of that crowd has their bottom line in mind.
Now, I’m not going to beat around the bush—the ultimate goal of every marketing campaign, quite obviously, is more business. But thought leadership is not a, ‘How can they help me’ approach, like most marketing campaigns. It’s never really about you, or your company.
And that’s the point.
The right way to do thought leadership, is to ask:
How can I help them?
‘Them,’ of course, being prospects, clients, stockholders, people interested in your industry and anyone of the like.
It’s about teaching people stories and lessons-learned—sharing what you know with the goal of building relationships at scale.
That’ll inherently get you recognized as a valued source in your space, bringing you more business in the form of people wanting to work for you, wanting to establish partnerships, wanting to invest.
3. They lack consistency.
Even if you have a full understanding of thought leadership the right way, most aspiring thought leaders fail when it comes to consistency.
I get it—founders and CEOs have a lot on their plate, and producing quality content is rather time-consuming. But regardless of how busy you are, if you want to be a thought leader you need to find a way to get content out regularly.
However, I have to warn you: tread lightly. People often confuse consistency for quantity—it’s a really bad habit. Consistency and quantity are not one in the same, and if you confuse the two, it could be detrimental on your path to industry leader.
Never sacrifice quality for quantity. Pick a recurring time that works for you—enough time between posts to produce quality content, but on a consistent-enough basis to be a presence in your industry.
Finding that happy medium is essentially the secret formula to success as a thought leader.
4. They don’t have the patience.
That’s what most people get wrong about thought leadership: they want an immediate ROI.
Frankly, that’s not how thought leadership works. By no means will you publish a few content pieces and automatically be recognized as a thought leader, as so many aspiring thought leaders seem to think. Being published in X Major Publication doesn’t really impress anyone anymore.
Thought leadership is a long-term commitment.
It’s about providing value to your industry on a consistent basis, building your credibility over time. Depending on how often you push out content, it could take anywhere from a few months to a few years.
What everyone needs to remember, though, is that as long as you’re consistent, it doesn’t really matter how long it takes.
Why?
Because you’re building a library of usable content you can point to whenever someone questions your credibility.
Understanding the long-term growth potential is the essence of thought leadership.
Over time, you will have proved your expertise by sharing what you know from experience. You will have participated in industry conversations, and will have spoken on industry pain points. You will have been actively contributing valuable content, and will have built those relationships at scale.
Recognizing and being comfortable with that long-term commitment will practically guarantee your spot at the industry forefront.
