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For years I’ve talked about how important creating and sharing useful content is to building thought leadership. Until I came across Mark Schaefer’s blog post on this topic earlier this summer, I hadn’t thought about how to measure thought leadership.
Like so many things in marketing, measuring it must be hard! Yes, kind of. Once you know what signals to look for, it’s not. And in fact, it’s pretty obvious.
As usual, I’d like to first define what we’re talking about, since thought leadership is a rather abstract idea.
Here’s my favorite definition, from an article in Forbes:
A thought leader “is a person who is specialized in a given area and whom others in that industry turn to for guidance.”
I’m sure you can name a handful of thought leaders in your industry. You read their blogs, underline passages in their books, and follow their advice. If they’re speaking at a conference, you make a beeline to the front row as soon as the doors open.
You might never have thought of yourself as a thought leader. But are you? Maybe!
Here are some of Mark’s metrics and some of my own (including what I disagree with). Let’s start measuring!
7 ways to measure thought leadership
Website traffic
If you’re a thought leader, people are turning to you for advice. Hopefully, that means you get a lot of website visits from humans. So, track your website traffic from year to year. It should be steadily increasing as you create and share useful content.
On a monthly basis, look at traffic to your latest blog posts or any landing pages you’ve been promoting on social or via email. Is there a spike in traffic after you share the links?
You could also look at contact page form fills, though I do get a lot of spam through them. But if you are getting genuine inquiries from total strangers, it means people are finding you, reading your stuff, and developing trust in you. That’s pretty awesome.
Subscribers/followers
As your thought leadership and web traffic increases, you will also see an increase in the number of newsletter, podcast, or YouTube subscribers. This is big!
As Mark Schaefer says, “when people subscribe to my blog, podcast, or videos, it is a reflection of the quality of what I’m doing. These subscribers are ‘opting in’ to me.”
He doesn’t mention social media followers, but I think this is an important metric to look at as well. If people follow you (not connect with you) on LinkedIn, that says to me that your content is interesting enough they want it in their feeds.
I think it’s an even bigger deal on Instagram, because there is so much great content being added every single day. Again, someone is opting in to hear from you. Pat yourself on the back!
Social media and email engagement
Mark dismisses engagement as a vanity metric. I disagree. Taking the time to comment on a LinkedIn post means they enjoyed what they read so much that they will spend a minute engaging with you on the topic. They are giving you their time!
And if someone shares one of your social posts, wow! They want THEIR own network to hear what you have to say. They are betting that your content will help their reputation.
Most people delete marketing emails, so when I get responses from my email newsletter, I feel truly humbled. One former client even told me that she forwards my newsletter to her network every month. If that’s not a sign of thought leadership, I don’t know what is.
Word of mouth
Something that Mark didn’t mention – but I think indicates thought leadership – is when people in your network talk about you. Why would anyone praise you if they didn’t view you as an expert?
Now, this is hard to measure unless you ask potential clients where they heard about you. I do this. And people hear about me from others in my network, including people I am not in close touch with.
If I am not in close touch with someone yet I’m still top of mind – that’s thought leadership. At the very least, they remember me.
Interview/guest blog requests
Are you invited onto a podcast or video series to be interviewed? Do people ask you to guest blog for them? Or maybe people reach out asking if they can guest blog for YOUR website?
For Mark, this is a massive, flashing neon sign that you’re a thought leader. I totally agree – as LONG as the people reaching out are legitimate. Do they have to be a thought leader? No. They just need to be quality content creators with a great (and probably growing) reputation.
Being paid to share your ideas
You’ve made it to the big leagues of thought leadership when you are invited to speak at a conference or some other paid event – and the gig is PAID. Ditto if you are paid to coach others (and you are not a business coach) or advocate for a product as an influencer.
I have never aspired to get to this level of thought leadership – too much work!
But YOU can get there if you want to. Keep sharing useful content on a regular basis. Stay engaged with and visible to your network. Join conversations.
The more visible you are, the better your chances of becoming a thought leader.
Are you a thought leader?
Based on the measurement tools laid out above, are you a thought leader? What is missing from my list?
Related: Making Sense of SPY Breadth