I’m often confused when talking to authors and thought leaders when I ask them to tell me how their work impacts the lives and businesses of their clients. Many times they’ll immediately dive into a thorough explanation of models, processes and the latest iteration of the work they do. Other times I’ll get an update on research they’ve done that further validates a theory they’ve had or a new theory that they are focusing on. These are all good things, but there’s a big difference between creating something powerful and being able to clearly and concisely communicate the impact of your work to clients and prospects.
There’s often a gap between what is of interest to the thought leader and the needs of a client or prospect. Clients are concerned about the struggles and business issues at hand and they express an interest in your work (for the most part) not out of intellectual curiosity but out of a need to determine if your work can help them resolve those struggles and issues. Organizations pay for training and learning solutions not so that they can make their employees smarter for the sake of being smarter, but so that employees can use that knowledge in a way that has a measurable impact on the business. If you’re not sure about the impact your work has I’d suggest that you take the time you need to be able to articulate the impact effectively.
One of the easiest ways I’ve found to do that is to ask what it is that you hope people will be able to do, think, act, behave or believe differently as a result of consuming your content. There is usually more than one answer to this question. Once you’ve answered that question the next question is: Given that my client will be able to do X differently, what impact does that have on them as an individual? As a team? As an organization? This may seem a bit overly simplistic but the reality is it’s better to start by being able to simply and clearly state the impact that your work can and does have on your clients as opposed to diving in deeply into the “how” of your work.
The addition to understanding and measuring the impact you are creating with your work is asking yourself, “Who is telling my story?” Identify who is able to tell your story of impact and get in front of those people on a daily and weekly basis. Whether that’s your leadership team, your sales force, your employees, your partnerships, your clients, your peers, you need to identify people who are able to tell your story and give them a story worth telling.
The way to break through the noise is understanding that you have to make a personal commitment to others' success. When your client tells their peers that you went above and beyond to solve their problems, when your sales team tells their co-workers at the water cooler that you spend extra time helping them package and land a deal that they couldn’t get traction on, now you are building stories and creating impact with your work.
Regardless of how novel, interesting, innovative or fascinating your work is, if it can’t be connected to a measurable, sustainable behavior change that drives a business result, the conversation will go from a “that’s a nice thought” to a “doing business is a mandate” in the eyes of your clients.
When you can clearly communicate and build a story around the impact your work does, your personal brand and success of the company will increase exponentially.
At Executive Brand Growth we partner with CEOs, Senior Executives and Entrepreneurs to ensure them a position as thought leaders in their market by making them a content machine that runs 24/7 ranking them on google and allowing them to dominate on social platforms.
Work with us today.
John mediana
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