Creating content

One of the challenges of thought leadership marketing is around the amount of time it takes. Many marketing professionals have pointed this out to me – it’s not like creating an ad with a few words of text. It demands time from the marketing team, but more challenging – it demands time from the firm’s senior members, who are already too busy with client work, mentoring, supervising the work of juniors, and project management.

Staying current with developments in one’s field is important, so I attended the inaugural “Pinnacle” conference for experienced marketers, by the Society for Marketing Professional Services in October 2017.

They may be facing a deadline for a blog post, article, speech or other content, but no topic comes to mind. They’ve clicked on “open new document,” and that’s where they’re stuck. There’s that cursor, and it hasn’t moved. Blink blink blink.


- “I know I need to produce thought leadership content, but I don’t have the time.”
- “I hate writing, and people tell me it shows in what I write.”
- “I tried writing articles, but they kept getting turned down by editors, so I stopped.
If any of these statements describes you, you’re not alone. A lot of business professionals want to get their ideas published, but it seems like an insurmountable mountain to climb. But there is a ghostly answer to all of these concerns – specifically, a ghostwriter.

That’s wrong.

But for an article, blog post, video, podcast recording or other content to be effective as a business development tool, it has to persuade the other person to make a change. Specifically, you want that content to generate some kind of action.