Thought Leadership for the Long Game | Dorie Clark | 455

Thought leadership creates real results - but measuring them can be difficult, especially in the short-term.

But smart thought leaders know: it's the long-term results that really change the game!

Dorie Clark has been twice named one of the Top 50 Business Thinkers in the World by Thinkers50, and the #1 Communication Coach in the World by the Marshall Goldsmith Leading Global Coaches Awards. She's a consultant, keynote speaker, and author of multiple books including her newest: The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World. She knows that lasting success takes persistence, effort, and day-by-day advancement, completing a thousand small goals along the way.

Our conversation begins on the topic of personal branding. How do you differentiate branding from thought leadership? Dorie explains how thought leadership can create trust and even put you ahead of the competition, by giving potential clients a sneak peek into who you are and where you specialize.

Still, it takes long-term work to create lasting success.Dorie shares her insights into the pains a lot of thought leaders suffer when they first start creating content, and how to hang on for the first few years before your big results manifest. By combining consistent content and using multiple modalities to reach your audience, thought leadership efforts can have a huge impact on your business.

Lastly, Dorie discusses her newest book, and how publishing can add to your thought leadership movement. Peter and Dorie discuss books as revenue drivers (they aren't), and how a book can introduce your audience to your content, share your most valuable insights, and generate interest in your work. Combined with a strategic business model, a book release can be an important part of building a viable business for speaking, consulting, online courses and more.

Three Key Takeaways:

* Thought leadership can create a level of trust and familiarity with a potential client. This can be the difference maker that sets you apart.

*  While there can be overlap between thought leadership and content marketing, thought leadership should be more substantive and less transactional.

*  Thought leadership needs many touch-points for its audience to engage. Consider writing articles, guesting on or hosting a podcast, doing keynotes, and writing a book. The more modalities you utilize, the better chance you have of reaching your audience.