So much of what you do as a Thought Leader is playing a game of make believe. We are selling the invisible (a service) and as such we will often benefit from making the idea tangible and visible to others.
This is why books still have a kind of positioning arbitrage. While bookstores die, libraries struggle and Seth Godin has proclaimed that his most recent book is his last book, books still serve a function. All my books are free to download digitally, I am not afraid of being taken advantage of, I am more afraid of being ignored or my work falling into obscurity. Keeping my work tangible and visible is key to the paid delivery work I do as a thought leader. A book sent in the mail closes the speaking deal, a great speech then rolls into a training program and off the back end of the training program I pick up executive coaching. The flow makes sense as one idea refers to, or positions the next.
However, all of that requires that first you be seen, be visible, and make the intangible somehow tangible.
What will you use to make this happen?
A book
A website
Videos
Blogging and newsletters
A free/low-cost experience
A recommendation or referral
These are OLD school ideas for sure, in a world of social media, retargeting and lead scoring, but they work.
Make it real.
A quick note on the psychology here...
The first person who needs to believe it is you.
You need to see it out of nothing and bring it into form.
Then you need to set it free in the world and respond to the opportunities it creates.
If you want to learn more about Thought Leaders Business School, join us at our next discovery session.
If you've thought about attending one of our discovery sessions but haven't managed to make it yet, you can watch the replay of our last session here.
Matt Church
Founder