There is often a misconception that thought leadership and content marketing are the same things, but they’re not. While both areas are very valuable and can be used side by side, the way thought leadership and content marketing tactics are executed by companies, and perceived by readers, is fairly different.
Understanding and homing in on the differences between the two is crucial in producing content that is useful for your target audience.
What Is Content Marketing?
Content marketing is the act of producing content like blog posts, social media blurbs, videos and photos that contain a message you want to communicate to your customers. As a well-established practice used for generating inbound leads and driving subscriptions, content marketing focuses on well-written and informative content to answer consumer questions. Businesses use content marketing strategically, with the goal of meeting their target audience right where they are in the marketing funnel.
What Is Thought Leadership?
The goal of thought leadership marketing is to promote your business as a leader in your industry while building confidence with your target customer. As a whole, thought leadership content is insightful, compelling content meant to pique interest in your company. Because these pieces tend to be more authoritative and creative, they inspire readers to take action — whether that is to call you, make a purchase or stop by your brick-and-mortar store.
Thought Leadership vs. Content Marketing: 5 Differences
To better illustrate the differences between thought leadership and content marketing, we’ve broken out a few key differences here.
1. Content Marketing Is an Overarching Strategy
As mentioned before, content marketing includes every piece of content that a business promotes about itself. From physical promotional materials and billboards to email marketing campaigns, social media posts and even what’s written on its website, content marketing is the strategy behind every word a company publishes. Thought leadership content can be included in this strategy. However, other assets, such as brochures, newsletters and product tutorials are part of a comprehensive content program. Content marketing includes all the assets developed over the course of a business’s marketing program.
When both potential and returning customers consume content marketing assets like blog posts and videos, they’re simply looking to find answers to their questions. They need to be pushed a little and become convinced that your brand is the one to help them. That’s where the strategy behind what is posted, when and via what format, comes in.
Think of content marketing as an umbrella term for how companies advertise themselves. There are many pieces to the puzzle and thought leadership is just one tactic under this approach. Typically, thought leadership is more conversational and strives to have a unique perspective that hasn’t been seen within the other pieces of content produced. These pieces have less straightforward answers with more thought-provoking ideas on a specific topic of interest.
2. Thought Leadership Seeks to Build Strong Connections, While Content Marketing Builds the Funnel
Both B2B and B2C companies utilize content marketing to ultimately sell a product or service and to convert customers. However, when done properly, there is a hierarchical component to a content marketing strategy. The goal is to start a relationship between the business and the target audience, one that can eventually be nurtured into a promising lead down the line.
Because of this, content marketing looks at the entire customer journey and marketing funnel when creating a strategy. This is because content can be produced to convert customers at any point in their user journey — each stage and each persona needs to have content that is relevant to their needs. Depending on where the consumer is in their journey, they might need to determine what is best to use as middle of the funnel content. This content strategy may include some thought leadership pieces, but the company will also need to look into other high-level assets to ensure the message is received well.
With thought leadership, the reader feels like they’re having a conversation with the writer, making an opportunity to create a stronger connection between them and the brand.
3. Thought Leadership Emphasizes Quality Over Quantity
While a strong content marketing strategy thrives on a robust publishing schedule and the internal resources needed to pump out new content, thought leadership is more focused on quality versus quantity. Thought leadership pieces often take more time and thought, and, as a result, can have a deep impact on the reader.
Considering the average modern consumer sees between 4,000 and 10,000 ads per day, according to estimates, it makes sense for businesses to invest in thought leadership in order to stand out. Consumers can easily tell the difference between a company that puts time, thought and heart into their pieces, compared to other pieces that were merely copied and pasted.
4. Thought Leadership Is One of the End Goals of Content Marketing
By its definition, thought leadership shows expertise and know-how in an industry. Because of this, thought leadership is usually the end goal of any organization, as it means you’re perceived as a trustworthy and credible leader in your space.
However, it takes time to achieve this kind of brand credibility, and organizations can’t just get there overnight. Oftentimes, it takes a comprehensive content marketing strategy to even get close to promoting thought leadership ideals because they take quite a lot of energy to even get started!
To start off your thought leadership journey with a bang, we recommend starting slow. As you continue to bring in new audiences with engaging and informative content, you can then start incorporating thought leadership content into your mix.
5. Content Marketing Is About Engagement, While Thought Leadership Is About Credibility
In summary, content marketing is about driving engagement, increasing traffic to your website and driving leads. Because of its nature, thought leadership pieces aren’t promotional or sales-y in tone; rather, they simply strive to enhance the credibility of an organization by providing a newer perspective.
An Overview of Key Differences Between Content Marketing and Thought Leadership
| Content Marketing | Thought Leadership | |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Overarching strategy. |
A specific content marketing tactic. |
| Target Audience |
Caters toward the entire funnel and meets consumers where they are in the user journey. |
Aims to build stronger connections with customers and prospects. |
|
Volume |
A large variety of content is needed to adequately promote the brand’s messaging across numerous platforms. |
Emphasizes the quality of the content, rather than the quantity. |
| Creation |
Can be created by both old and new businesses alike. |
Requires time and effort and is more of a long game. |
| Goals |
The goal is to drive engagement, increase traffic to your website and drive leads. |
Strives to enhance the credibility of an organization. |
Why You Need Thought Leadership in Your Content Strategy
Simply put, no content strategy is complete without thought leadership content. This is because many content pieces can be considered low quality by key decision-makers, and only serve the purpose of being promotional. On the other hand, thought leadership content provides more value than typical content assets, as you cannot buy credibility. It must be earned organically.
But not all thought leadership content is created equal. Having the right assets is an incredibly important component. And with the pandemic causing an influx in content creation, thought leadership is on the rise unlike ever before. In fact, 66% of decision-makers noted that the pandemic led to an influx in the creation of new thought leadership assets, and 38% of these same thought leaders noted that the market has become increasingly oversaturated in terms of the material being produced.
In order to stand out, it’s necessary to create thought leadership pieces that inspire, engage and highlight your business’s unique traits.
Final Thoughts
Not sure where to start on your thought leadership journey? The NYTLicensing Group can help bring your brand to new heights by providing licensed content packages to enhance your content marketing strategy. We have an archive of content that spans an extensive range of subjects, so let our world-class journalism offerings enhance your current content.
No matter your brand and content goals, The New York Times Licensing Group has content that will bring you to where you need to go. Explore more about our options, today.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Is Thought Leadership Top of Funnel?
Thought leadership content can engage with all stages of the marketing funnel, including current customers. The goal is to provide value and credibility, which is beneficial throughout the customer journey.
What Is a Thought Leadership Example?
AdvisorStream curates news from publications like The New York Times and Harvard Business Review to engage with customers. Only 20% of people in the U.S. pay for news, and even fewer pay for more than one subscription. By showcasing these articles, AdvisorStream can deliver original and valuable content to its audience.
