As I write this late in the evening of March 23, there is a ship run aground in the Suez Canal causing the most EPIC traffic jam of all time, and I’ll be damned if it isn’t providing the most perfect metaphor for the ever-growing backlog of articles, white papers, blog posts and webinars waiting for me in my inbox.
A year ago, sales and marketing teams the world over lost their ability to meet new people in traditional ways. Most trade shows, conferences and networking events have all either been cancelled or gone online, making organic opportunities to get noticed and engage prospects in meaningful conversation nearly impossible.
In the quest to get noticed and show relevance, many have turned to thought leadership. As a result, the internet has become awash in content promising industry insights, best practices and the “top 10 ways” to achieve any goal. At face value, this would seem a brilliant development—indicative of a community that has taken this opportunity to learn and grow. But the reality is that in the race to get content in front of eyeballs, the slurry has become so thick, and so repetitive, that it’s become hard to find value amongst the dross.
“Credibility is the currency with which we buy the trust and goodwill of our customers, and thought leadership remains one of the best ways to build that credibility.”
In a recent conversation amongst over 50 marketing and event professionals, the reigning consensus was that much of the onslaught of outreach and marketing in the form of thought leadership is often a re-hash of the same material over and over again. Material of this nature languishes in inboxes or gathers in ‘”to be read later” folders, only to reach critical mass before being deleted en masse and unread.
So, what’s to be done? Thought leadership in all forms remains a very powerful tool for marketing and outreach, and in its purest form is a great force for developing brand perception, establishing trust and, on a larger scale, helping the industry grow and evolve.
At the risk of committing high irony, I’d like to suggest to all those considering adding their own voice to the cacophony that they lead their message through a subset of Bernard Meltzer’s four gates.
Gate #1: Is It True?
This should be the baseline for any interaction but is especially true for a medium by which we are attempting to engender the trust of our audience. One challenge to this is that so often, these pieces are written as opinion pieces that might as well be published as fiction for the lack of supporting evidence. As such, these pieces are often an attempt to gain appeal and shares by virtue of prose, or heavy use of keywords, but offer little in the form of substance. If you are attempting to position yourself as an authority by presenting information to an audience, it’s so much more powerful when accompanied by data or provable, real-world examples.
Gate #2: Is It Helpful?
Does your article, your post or your webinar contain information or address issues that are important to your target audience? This is one point I think we can all agree on: If the information you’re presenting or the arguments you’re posing are of no relevance to your readers, why would anyone waste the time to put it together, let alone the time to read it?
Every piece of content generated for the purposes of thought leadership should address a problem relevant to one’s audience.
Gate #3: Is It Necessary?
Do me a favor: Look at your inbox, your LinkedIn, your Feedly account—wherever you store and access content. How many posts are variations on a single theme? If you’re an event planner, how many posts or articles have you received touting “the best practices or dos and don’ts of virtual events?” How many “5/10/25 best virtual platform” posts? How many versions of “what you need to know about hybrid events?”
Here’s a secret: There’s a very good chance that your audience is reading the same posts, attending the same webinars and being sent the same content you are. If your content is a rehash of something that’s already been produced, they’ll probably know, and you, as a thought leader, have become that much less credible.
Gate #4: Is It Kind?
I like to think of this in two ways. First, kindness to the subject matter. If it’s worth writing about, then it matters. Do the research. KNOW what you’re talking about. Second, kindness to your audience. Their time is valuable. If your piece is a reiteration or recital of information or content they’ve already been exposed to, why subject them to it? They’re already dealing with glutted inboxes and endless Zoom calls (see the ENORMOUS amount of content available offering best practices for reaching “inbox zero” or how to counter Zoom fatigue). It simply isn’t a kind use of their time.
Credibility is the currency with which we buy the trust and goodwill of our customers, and thought leadership remains one of the best ways to build that credibility. When we water down that credibility, though, we lose that capital and run the risk of alienating the very people we’re trying to reach out to.
Photo by Milad B. Fakurian on Unsplash
