Are you delivering more value than you’re communicating?
 
The title of this post might be somewhat misleading to you. This article is not about how to become the smartest, most experienced expert in a given field of endeavor. That’s really a prerequisite to what we’re about to cover here, which is how to let the world know you’re a thought leader in your field. Big difference.
 
It may be about ego. But for our purposes, it’s about billing. So if you’re looking for tips on nixing those zits in your headshot, look elsewhere. Thought leadership translates to “trusted authority,” which means more and better booking for your services—and a premium for your time.
 
Before you begin
 
As we mentioned at the outset, this article is directed at people who already have substantial expertise and experience under their belts. If that’s you, you have the scars and the war stories to prove it. Very little can surprise you these days. But that doesn’t make you jaded. To the contrary: It makes you eager to share what you’ve learned with others, to help them lift their game to the best-practice standard for which you stand.
 
(If you lack that world-leading experience, don’t fret. You can build yourself to that level. Check one of our previous articles on topics such as how to promote your independent consulting business.)
 
The cobbler’s-children dilemma
 
“The cobbler’s children have no shoes.” That’s the adage. For you, this probably resonates. It means “You’ve been so busy doing the actual work of helping clients succeed, that it’s come at the cost of self-promotion which could actually lead to better and more lucrative engagements.”
 
So committing to becoming a thought-leader requires a commensurate commitment of time and effort. This simply won’t happen on its own. The world will not come to you.
 
That said, make an effort. Carve time out of your schedule for these reputation-building activities, and stick to it. It’s just like getting yourself into shape: The less you talk about it, and the more you actually do it, the more benefit you’ll see.
 
Cull
 
The subhead of this article--“Are you delivering more value than you’re communicating?”—should’ve made you sit up and take notice. There’s a very good chance that you’ve got groundbreaking, paradigm-shattering insights in your own possession, gathering digital dust in some forgotten folder on your hard drive. What was that assignment that really pushed the envelope of conventional thinking? How could you effectively cloak its client-sensitive details to turn the world on its head—and let you claim credit for doing so?
 
In other words, don’t reinvent the wheel. (Alert: this may be the most proverb-heavy article we’ve posted to date!) Don’t try and scare up a game-changing opportunity when you’ve already done it, but the world doesn’t know it. That’s the gist of the “delivering more value than you’re communicating” slant, as it applies to this challenge.
 
And don’t think that just because your client is in Industry A, that others in Industry B won’t be bowled over. That’s as myopic as believing there are no other potential clients awaiting you in Industry A! You want to find this prior work of yours—even if it includes brilliantly-conceived proposals that didn't fly or projects that were short-shrifted by budget cuts—and use it to set up the next phase of elevating your thought-leadership status…
 
Tell the world
 
In a word, Duh! But while this may seem like a no-brainer, it’s certainly not a no-effort-er. It takes work to transform your boundary-pushing and provocative ideas out to the masses.
 
Fortunately in the digital age, you have a wealth of dissemination tools at your disposal. Dare we list some of them? Sure:

• Your website
• Whitepapers
• Videos
• Your newsletter
• Your blog
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Press releases

 
Want to be more ambitious? Hire a P.R. firm. They can get you local and national coverage, which includes the added credibility of the unbiased third-party “source,” even if the germ of the story comes from you and the agency. They can help position you as an expert resource in the event of a fast-breaking news story (assuming you can make yourself available). Heck, see if they can get you your own TED talk.
 
Which leads to the final topic of this article:
 
Push the edge
 
Don’t forget the “leadership” part of “thought leadership.” This isn’t just about your past brilliant successes. It’s also about your approach to future assignments and your expert “read” on the trends that are re-shaping your industry landscape. While your goal shouldn’t be to be regarded as an academic, you can still float provocative theories and predictions that set the world abuzz. You may get some blowback, but that’s a small price to pay for the exposure, the notoriety, and the increased billing that will follow.

​Which order will yield better results?
 
Art and copy live together. But not always harmoniously—if you’ve ever worked at a newspaper or ad agency, think of “Art Department” and “Sales.” The end user—that is, the reader—should not see any conflict. But competing agendas perennially assure one.
 
Ditto for art and copy. And when we say “art” we mean “pretty much any creative that doesn’t include the words.” So that can mean storyboard panels, layouts, stock photos, website mockups, jingle tunes, and so on. All of these vehicles require writing to make them work. But which should be undertaken first? Should the artwork be created, and then the copy added? Or should the words be crafted first, and used to inspire the visuals?
 
Let’s take a look at both sides of this argument and then compare the results.
 
Art first.
 
This is the more common approach to most assignments. Most creative directors cut their teeth on the art side (or, these days, the Illustrator/InDesign/Photoshop side), and since they develop the germ of any concept, it’s expressed in the medium in which they’re most comfortable and fluent. Whereas a writer may start with notes, an art person may start with a pencil sketch or a thumbnail. This is then developed to the point at which it requires copy, which is often indicated as “Greeked-in text” or a lorem ipsum file.
 

• Advantages: Rough art can be understood instantly. You don’t have to take time to read it to “get” it. Well-done rough art can convey movement, color, texture, and tone. These can help guide (and inspire) the writer, when it’s time to write, so that the copy will fit the intended style.

 

• Disadvantages: The biggest pitfall of this approach is that it’s highly execution-dependent. We mentioned “well-done rough art” above, and for a good reason. If it’s not consummately created, it will undermine all the advantages we listed. It can convey the wrong tone or feel. It can misdirect the writer. Similarly, modern technology can, in the art-first world, be more a hindrance than a helper. In the old days before computers, layouts would be hand-drawn in marker. It was thus impossible to mistake a layout for a finished product. But something assembled from stock photos, in a layout program, with flawless fonts, looks finished, even if it isn’t. That can prove dangerously misleading, even to seasoned pros who are used to working with rough images.

 
Copy first.
 

• Advantages: Well-crafted copy-based concepts work as a “written layout.” They can suggest images, visual treatments, suggested stock photography, even music and sound effects for audiovisual media. Narrative concepts also offer a huge bang for the buck; a good creative writer can knock out several versions faster than many artists can rough up a single one. And if the treatment is well-crafted, it can inform and inspire the downstream art teams just as effectively as writers can be guided via the art-first approach.

 

• Disadvantages. A narrative concept description, whether it’s a few sentences or a few paragraphs, takes some time to read. So it’s not as instantly visceral as a well-crafted visual. It requires some internal visualization and imagination on the part of the reader. And it’s execution-dependent, too: It could fall short when it comes to conveying the tone and voice, or lack enough detail to inspire those on the visual side. It can also be too wordy; some writers love their words too much for a given assignment, but things like banner ads, radio spots, and outdoor advertising require brevity. Like this. No exceptions. See?

 
So now that we’ve weighed the pros and cons of each, we can make a judgment call, right?
 
Not yet.
 
There’s a third approach to consider, one that borrows from each of the above. Let’s call it:
 
Hybrid.
 
This is the artwork with a headline written in. The website mockup with a few of the key links indicated or named. Or the catalog page with the first item described in detail.
 
At first blush, this would seem to be the perfect solution to any creative challenge, but it’s not that simple. It, too, has advantages and disadvantages.
 

• Advantages. The hybrid approach packs a real one-two punch. You get to see the intended visual treatment, and subvocalize (read to yourself in your mind’s voice) the key wording. Properly executed, it can be more effective than either the art- or words-first approaches.

 

• Disadvantages. This approach “assumes” a lot. It assumes that both its visual and copy “teases” are on target. Which isn’t necessarily the case. One could be better than the other; indeed, one could truly suck. There are many art people who think they’re better writers than they are, and there are plenty of word people who think they can draw. Yet if they sell (or believe) themselves as equally good at both tasks, they can throw up obstacles to constructive critique, undermining the power of the finished piece, not to mention the teamwork required to create it.

 
The verdict.
 
This is a clear-cut case of “it depends.” That’s not a cop-out. It depends on the assignment itself and the media it will employ. It depends on the talent of the creative leads, and the strengths (art or words) they have. It depends on the composition of the team and its contributors and their roles.
 
Regardless of the route you choose, it requires a real park-your-ego-in-the-lot mentality. Reminds us of a Ronald Reagan quote we always liked: “There is no limit to the amount of good you can do if you don’t care who gets the credit.” Whichever side comes first, it presents the other with a golden opportunity to do amazing things.
 
Questions? Comments? Let us know what you think.