Thought-leadership writing works 24/7, anywhere in the world...
As lawyers and legal marketers everywhere adjust to their new realities and work environments, one thing has become abundantly clear: the old way of doing things needs to be modernized in a hurry. This is especially true of business development, marketing and networking, now that handshakes, coffee meetings and networking events are impossible.
Attorneys are suddenly finding ways to adapt to new challenges. With the limitations being placed on spatial and interpersonal connections, we must find new ways to interact, nurture relationships, share expertise, and—yes—get hired!
Those who have embraced thought-leadership content marketing are quite familiar with the benefits of sharing expertise in the form of blogs, articles, white papers, podcasts, videos, webinars and remote presentations.
Thought-leadership writing, in particular, when syndicated broadly and published/shared widely, works 24/7, anywhere in the world, whether you’re in the room to state your case or not. As a result, newcomers suddenly want in on the rewards that early adopters have been reaping for some time.
The good news is that most attorneys are very capable writers.
Many are superb crafters of argumentative and persuasive content. Yet, fewer have ever endeavored to author a thought-leadership article to be positioned for publication on a third-party publishing platform. There is some nuance to understand, for those who are accustomed to drafting legal briefs but are unfamiliar with how to position content to market expertise or build brand awareness.
Consider this a cookbook for beginners, and a refresher course for the veterans.
Not So Fast: Start with Goal Setting
I know: It’s tempting to dive right in. But “What should I write about?” is the wrong place to begin. Rather, step back and clearly articulate the best possible set of outcomes for the piece of content you’re about to create. Engineer an overarching content strategy tied to your specific, documented list of desired results. Some examples:
- I want to generate leads.
- I want to build awareness.
- I want to be recognized as an expert in a given industry.
- I want to get published in our industry’s most popular trade publication.
Believe it or not, each of these are distinct potential outcomes. And in a best-case scenario, you might achieve all of them. In any case, your content should be oriented to what matters most to you, so that you can craft content that matters most to those who are in a position to fulfill your wish list of results.
Narrow Your Audience
Which brings us to audience. Get really clear and meticulously specific about who your target audience is. That will allow you to better narrow in on topics that will resonate with those discrete individuals.
considering a specific person ... allows you to more accurately and intuitively generate relevant topics
In fact, it’s prudent to name names. Personify the market segment: “John Smith, General Counsel at ABC Widget Corp.” Putting a specific person at the forefront of your mind allows you to more accurately and intuitively generate relevant topics and content for actual humans that need to hire you.
Serve the Red Meat
Once you’re clear about who should be reading your thought-leadership content, you’ll understand what to write about. You’ll know
- what questions they have,
- what issues they’re dealing with, and
- what challenges they’re trying to overcome.
...their most urgent pain point is the topic for your next article
Plus, if all else fails, you can simply pick up the phone and call John Smith to ask him directly. Chances are, his counterparts are dealing with the exact same set of issues, and therein lies your content calendar. Their biggest and most urgent pain point is the topic for your first or next article.
Work the Content Funnel
Understanding the Content Funnel is critical to mastering the art of thought leadership development. Unlike much of the writing that comes naturally to attorneys, this content is developed for the express purpose of finding and nurturing new business opportunities, not winning arguments. It’s meant to help, not be a hard sell.
Most people are familiar with the concept of the traditional sales funnel, whereby the goal is to get audiences:
- from unaware of you to aware,
- from aware to interested in learning more,
- from interested to desiring your service, and
- finally to taking some sort of action to retain you.
The Content Funnel operates in much the same fashion. The goal is to steal audiences away from their daily routines—responding to emails, browsing social media, visiting media hubs, performing Google searches, etc.—and into the funnel of your thought leadership.
Once there, we need to drive that audience through an interest phase, invested in the topic and wanting to read more. By the end of the article, that reader should want to know or do more, and will, in a perfect world, take an action to pursue that very end.
Most readers make a decision as to whether they will read an article based on the headline alone...
Nail Your (Not So) Cold Open
Critical to your success in guiding readers down your Content Funnel is what happens at the top of the funnel. Crafting a compelling headline is paramount. Most readers make a decision as to whether they will read an article based on the headline alone. Yours should command attention, intrigue interest, and invite participation.
Remember, that headline will likely be later repurposed as a link in an email newsletter, the subject line in a client alert, or the headline to a social media post. It will do a lot of the heavy lifting at the top of the Content Funnel, so invest the necessary time and energy to make it pop and commit the reader’s engagement.
Once that commitment has been made, you have one more chance to keep readers or lose them: your opening paragraph.
You have to provide the punchline early on...
In today’s content-saturated, competitively noisy environment, we humans are wired to skim, browse and click away to return to what we were doing just prior to clicking on an article. There is no option to “bury the lede,” as news editors might admonish their reporters for. You have to, as a thought leader, provide the punchline early on, or least tease enough of the solution in your introductory remarks to build intrigue and get the reader to commit to the full piece.
Don’t Always Be Closing
The conclusion of your article should not be the end of the story, but rather a conduit to a next step. Leave the reader wanting more, to be sure, but also intentionally guide them to the appropriate (and your desired) next course of action. Make the call-to-action clear, and one that provides mutual benefit to the reader and your own business development efforts:
- Subscribe to a newsletter
- Register for a webinar
- Check out related content
- Schedule a brief clarity consultation
- Download a white paper or ebook
Your goal is to continue the conversation, not bid your reader farewell. If done well, your thought leadership just might be “the beginning of a beautiful relationship…”
Match the Tone, Note for Note
Writers in all industries share a tendency to talk over the heads of their intended audiences. Attorneys are not unique in that regard. Remember the person you named in your definition-of-audience exercise? Make sure you match that individual’s tone, form and level of subject matter expertise, so that your content is accessible and relatable.
The goal is not to be revered; the goal is to be understood.
Think Ahead to Publishing: Circling Back to Strategy
I close with a reminder about your strategic goals, because the natural next step once you complete the draft of your thought leadership article will be finding ways to get that content “out there.” But this course of action should first be addressed in your goal-setting exercise at the outset.
Make sure you consider where you hope to publish your thought leadership before you set out to write an article.
If you plan to publish the piece only on your own firm’s website, you should be baking in ways to link to your service pages and marketing content liberally throughout the piece. This is good for your audience’s user experience, your business development goals, and for “internal link building,” a search engine optimization technique. You can also take more liberties relative to more overtly “selling” your services or positioning your firm to solve specific problems that your content addresses. (Though, I wouldn’t overdo it in that regard.)
However, if your goal is to be published on a third-party industry media website or publication, those backlinks and overt selling overtures just may preclude an editor from considering your piece for publication at all. An editor’s obligation is to serve her readers, not serve the author’s interests.
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Tom Nixon is a principal with Harrington Communications, a thought-leadership marketing agency serving lawyers and law firms. He co-hosts The Thought Leadership Project podcast with the firm's founder, Jay Harrington. His firm provides workshops and remote training sessions to attorneys looking to master the art of thought-leadership content writing.
Connect with Tom on LinkedIn; follow his latest on JD Supra.
