Get creative about crowdsourcing your knowledge

If you’re developing a new piece of thought leadership content based on research, don’t just limit your information gathering to surveys. In an era of overflowing inboxes, survey requests are increasingly easy to ignore. Instead, couple your traditional research methods with personal, direct outreach:

• Schedule feedback sessions with your best storytellers, advisors and connectors who can weigh in on issues shaping your industry/mission.
• Find time to do monthly calls with your top clients and prospects, working in coordination with your business development team, and use this time to listen to them share their latest challenges and opportunities.
• Do regular check-ins with your Board members and employees to pressure test ideas and discover new topics.
• Touch base with your counterparts in professional associations and see what they’re paying attention to – does it affirm ideas you’re developing?

Need inspiration for your next piece? Listen for a consistent theme or topic that keeps surfacing in different conversations. What problems are these different groups trying to solve that keep coming up again and again? What is your organization doing that can address those challenges? Do you have a new report or product that answers their questions and sheds light on the issues they’re facing? What’s a creative way to introduce that solution to them without making it feel overly pushy and inauthentic?

Don’t just do a stand-alone piece of content – think strategically about how it can be a conversation starter. A mistake public affairs professionals make is taking a “one-and-done” approach to reports and white papers they publish but don’t really promote. Turn your new report or research you released into an opportunity to initiate live feedback, commentary and knowledge sharing. The easiest way to do this is to go back to the stakeholders who inspired your ideas and invite them to join a virtual or in-person discussion, perhaps highlighting them as featured experts and speakers. It’s also smart to release your content in conjunction with a gathering. For example, an invite-only dinner the day before a conference can provide a natural opportunity to introduce new content and discuss it with key clients and prospects.

Strength in numbers: The power of partnerships and cohorts

If you’re looking at my suggestions and wondering where you’ll find the time and budget to do half of them, have no fear – this is where the power of community building really makes a difference. To create a dynamic, engaging thought leadership experience, you need mission-aligned partners who can expand your reach and supplement your limited resources and staff with their own.

Partner with like-minded individuals and groups who can provide logistical support and help share what you’re doing more widely. One example is the employer of someone you interviewed for your content. If the issue is relevant to that organization, it may have an interest in helping amplify it, hosting your discussion in their beautiful boardroom or suggesting a great speaker for the topic you’re covering. Other ideas include a think tank with experts who can weigh in on a topic/theme you’re highlighting or a peer organization similar to yours that could expand your network/reach. If your focus is on marketing your content, a partner can be a force multiplier and help you get your content in front of a much larger audience through their network.

When co-creating thought leadership with partners, it’s crucial to align on outreach goals, deliverables and cross-promotional opportunities. If you’re planning an event together, perhaps one partner supplies refreshments and the other provides the space where the event is held. Ideally, both groups should contribute speaker suggestions and agree to invite key stakeholders who would benefit from the experience and expand each other’s respective networks. It’s also important to align on how you will promote the experience. Is the conversation you’re creating a closed-door, invite-only discussion? Or are you opening it up to your respective communities to get wider reach? Can you agree to work from a collective, master invite list to keep track of who each party is inviting? Be sure to also loop in each other’s respective communication teams so you can develop cross-promotional materials like social media graphics and invites and ensure they are consistent, uniform and uphold each organization’s branding.

Hosting thought leadership events is also a terrific opportunity to establish a cohort of like-minded peers who want to explore a particular topic or issue together. If you do an in-person event, build off the momentum and consider turning it into a series of discussions that benchmark how the theme/topic progresses and changes over time, and invite the same people who joined the first event. Participants appreciate being able to stay in touch in a structured way while developing their own expertise and knowledge around key issues over time.

In the Age of AI, Authenticity Is Our Best Bet

I recently saw a clip from a CNN interview with Molly Kinder, a Brookings Senior Fellow who studies AI and work, that adds perspective to the AI challenges we’re facing. “When Fareed (Zakaria) asked which jobs might be on the frontlines, I pointed to COVID, but in reverse,” she shared on LinkedIn. “Last time, the jobs that had to be done in person were the ones most vulnerable to the virus. This time, with AI, it is the opposite: jobs that can be done remotely, on a computer, are more at risk. Or, as I put it on air: If you can do your job locked in a closet with a computer, eventually you will be in trouble.”

We need to adopt this same mindset with how we expand our concept of content. It is no longer enough to push out a report or white paper via digital communications and hope it sticks. People are bombarded by information and craving human connection, especially in a time when things feel like they’re changing quickly and AI makes it easy to produce mass amounts of content that may or may not be accurate.

When it comes to thought leadership, community building is key. Let’s ensure we’re making the most of our hard-earned insights by bringing them to life through interesting, interactive conversations that strengthen relationships.