Markt Success for Consulting and Professional Services

Marketing for professional services businesses - Creating new business fields with thought leadership


Professional services businesses have thought leadership engrained in their business model. Thought leadership is a strategic component of many professional service businesses like law firms, consulting firms, auditing firms, accounting firms, and market research institutes. Their customer reach is established by affirming that they are the leaders in the field and the go-to-authority for customers and prospects.

Professional service businesses depend on their leadership for core business topics of their clients. With thought leadership, a professional business company can identify, market and exploit new trends and business topics that they stand for as an opinion leader in the eyes of their customers.

Thought Leadership can help any professional services business to become the leader in the perception of their customers.

All important management terms like competitive strategy, business process reengineering or agile development etc. have emerged from thought leaders who have coined the terms as well as the specific management philosophy behind these technical terms.

However, many consulting firms are still unsuccessful in claiming their know-how as their intellectual property. They struggle to efficiently capitalize on their know-how as well as to position themselves as the pioneer of their know-how.

Our advice for professional service companies is to grasp the opportunity and become the thought leader for their target group. As professional services become more and more interchangeable, customer loyalty can only be achieved with perceived competence and authority. A trademark which can be achieved with thought leadership.

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Active Topic Management

Professional thought leaders amongst consulting firms actively use topic management and create new trends and topics. By communicating these trends thoroughly but not intrusively to their community (e.g. with whitepapers, eBooks, articles), they involve their target customers  – who in turn spread the message as influencers. Even though many competitors may later use their ideas, the community will guarantee that it can always be traced back to the initiator, the thought leader, who will remain the leader in the field.

Many companies have discovered thought leadership as early as the 50s and 60s of the last century. They have remained thought leaders for decades now. But – anyone can become a thought leader – with the right strategy and help.

Thought Leader Systems is helping professional services businesses to position themselves in the competitive arena by building their thematic leadership in the market. We analyze the potentials, opportunities, and weaknesses in the topic portfolio of your company.

  • What does your company already stand for today and what topics do you want to stand for?
  • Do you want to shape your own topic and establish it in the market?
  • How can customers find you in the digital age?
  • What are your Google rankings like and what content do you lack to be at the top of your customers' list for potentially interesting topics?

We find out together and support you in the implementation - from concept to execution, as your external strategy and marketing partner.

  • We build your topic leadership on the Internet - with thought leadership strategy, content marketing and public relations.
  • We improve your visibility on the web - through social media marketing and search engine optimization of your website.
  • We help you to develop your website into an active center of your lead generation and customer acquisition - with marketing automation and conversion optimization.