If you’re ready to build up your brand as a thought leader but just not sure how – you need to read this. When you’re marketing your brand to a B2B audience, getting people to sit up and listen can feel noisy, tricky and slow.
Whether there’s too much noise in your niche, or you’re not sure how to find your point of view, we’re ready to help you master that hard-to-crack knack of being known and trusted for your brand’s opinion.
Use this comprehensive guide and thought leadership examples to get your content right the first time and get people to pay attention.
How to brainstorm your thought leadership content
Let’s cut to the chase – your thought leadership content simply can’t be wishy-washy, half-baked or cut-and-pasted from other brands: this kind of content demands that you and your team bring a strong, unique perspective to the table that marks you out as an industry leader. Answer these questions to start brainstorming:
- What unique approaches do you take as a business?
- Where do your strongest USPs and differentiators lie?
- Does your team specialize in any areas of your niche?
- Which staff members have the strongest points of view (and could they create content for the company)?
8 ideas to start creating thought leadership video content now
You don’t have to have a huge budget or reinvent the wheel to start being an effective thought leader. You can start right now with the content you’ve already got, or create some new content by asking questions to thought leaders within your office.
1. Trending news
Share a clip of an expert at your company’s opinion on the news, to get your brand at the forefront of the conversation.
2. Experts on stage
Had a notable guest in the past? How can you make their advice relevant to what the industry’s talking about today? Share clips from your event or webinar.
3. White papers
Not just great for bringing in those expensive new leads – you can share excerpts from the reports your company produces to show you know your stuff. Stats welcome!
4. Post-event summaries
Share key takeaways from a recent event.
5. Interviews
Film a social-friendly Q&A with an expert on a trending topic in your industry, then clip up the highlights and share them individually.
6. Podcast clips
Gather the most thought-provoking clips from podcasts your company is part of and share them as fresh content.
7. Trend forecasts
Does someone on your team have fresh ideas on where you’re headed? People love to feel ahead of the game and if you can help them know where their industry is going, it’s time to get sharing!
8. Clever solutions
Can a relevant member of your team share the problem-solving parts of your case studies to show how it’s really done? The more value you’re able to give away in a shorter space of time, the better.
5 thought leadership examples to inspire you
Rome might not have been built in a day, but your content certainly can be. The more relevant and engaging content you share, the quicker you’ll learn what works, and the easier it’ll be to pull more leads your way. We’ve done the structuring for you ahead of time – you can just fill in and distribute!
1. Share your company’s take on a trending topic
Use the 'Invite Only' template to pull together your employees’ top thoughts on whatever’s trending in the news that day – and don’t be afraid to think outside the box to relate it back to your company’s niche or mission! Pull together clips and images of your team, then just paste in their views – and voila, your 'Invite Only' Template is ready to go!
2. Show off your knowledge with an “ask me anything”
Our top tip for the 'Ask Us Anything' template is to film one long Q&A with a senior member of your team, then get to work splicing away using this template for a strong bank of evergreen content you can keep coming back to! There’s something irresistible about seeing an expert get their brain picked: whether it’s their passion, the sheer value they bring, or just a friendly, familiar face that stops the audience in their scroll.
3. Shine the spotlight on your story’s hero
Using the 'Highlight A Hero' template is an easy way to be part of the conversation on a shoestring budget: just highlight whoever is driving the conversation in your industry (and that doesn’t have to be you!). Whether you’ve had a recent guest on your podcast who shone, one of your team has a strong take to share, or even if you’ve seen a smart quip from someone in your industry, just drop in the best assets of their face and what they said. It really is that simple!
4. Be the source of new news
Act as your industry’s newsreader with the 'Research & Regulation' editorial-style template that will allow you to keep on top of your industry quickly without needing a huge team. Jump on a recent topic (the LinkedIn sidebar can be a helpful place to start!) and add in insights, quotes, or stats from your company’s whitepapers. The faster you act, the greater your results are likely to be.
5. Tell powerful stories, get powerful results
The 'Great Truths' template lets you tell the kind of stories from inside and outside your industry that you’ve always wanted to but never had the time to. Just plug and play, from a shocking headline into rich, eye-catching detail. Now you can tell the whole story in one go, without stopping to worry about the editing.
Conclusion
Hard truth: Building a thought leadership brand takes time, persistence and courage. You need to be comfortable sharing strong opinions, so you can build trust and create relationships that matter in your industry.
Now that you know how to simply combine the things you feel strongest about with a powerful suite of easy-to-use video templates, becoming a thought leader in your industry should feel more in reach than yesterday.
Start using Storykit for a simple, elegant, and powerful way to link your brand to your industry. Shocked? Delighted? Both? We hoped you might be!
