We recently published our first piece of thought leadership for Entrepreneur online and it was a big success for The Second Shift and brought new eyes to our business and our pool of talent. Helping to shepherd this from idea to publication was our new featured member Cori Howard. She worked with Jenny to keep focused and on deadline and then pushed it through to publication. It would not have happened without her, so thank you Cori!
Here are some tips from Cori about why the creating your own content is invaluable to any business.
1. What is thought leadership and why is it important for businesses?
Thought leadership is a relatively new and very important media strategy for business leaders, corporate executives and CEOs today. Thought leaders – innovators who drive the conversation around a particular industry – don’t wait for media to come to them. They bring their message directly to a global audience through high-profile published articles and guest blogs. it helps raise awareness, builds a brand – for a company or individual – and provides a way to share ideas important to your company or industry with a large audience.
2. How do you work with companies and individuals?
The first step is brainstorming to define goals, target the right publications and come up with a list of compelling story ideas. The stories have to be original and contribute something new to the conversation already taking place online. And they can’t be overtly self-promotional. It’s a tricky balance to find just the right combination of what’s useful for a publication’s readership and what’s useful for the CEO.
3. How did you get into this?
I spent 15 years as a journalist and another ten in PR. Thought leadership is the perfect combination of both jobs. It involves research, writing, editing, a strong story sense and media placement. It allows me to use all my skills to help other people tell their stories, which is my passion.
4. Did you enjoy working with us? I am sure it was hard to keep cracking the whip to keep me focused 🙂
As a working mom who has struggled with my own choices around full-time and part-time work, and as someone now fully embracing the gig economy, I was very passionate about this story and I’m very passionate about what you’re doing at The Second Shift. So that made all the pestering emails to get your feedback and all the edits and research worthwhile.