How To Measure Thought Leadership: 9 Metrics To Gauge Success

At any given time, dozens of brands are vying for your ideal customer’s time and attention — and attention is scarce these days. This means you may need to go beyond topical blog content to reach your audience in a meaningful way that ultimately builds brand awareness and loyalty.

We’re talking about thought leadership.

Thought leadership helps individuals and brands stand out, allowing them to demonstrate expertise and authority by creating content beneficial to their target audiences. It also comes in many forms — whether it’s a social media post, industry podcast, or blog post that gets SEO traffic.

Each channel can help drive qualified leads to businesses, helping them meet their business goals.

But how do you measure the success of thought leadership…?

Here, you’ll learn why measuring thought leadership can be challenging and a few key metrics to track to help you measure your thought leadership initiatives.

Why measuring thought leadership success can be challenging

Measuring thought leadership isn’t easy. It’s often a long-term play — meaning traditional digital marketing Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) may not apply and will be harder to track. There are several ways this impacts metrics:

• Subjectivity: Individuals view thought leaders in different ways. The way a lead perceives a leader may put off another potential customer, making it harder to establish universal metrics for success.
• Qualitative vs. quantitative data: Effective measurement means balancing hard numbers and soft numbers. The hard data may tell you something isn’t working when the opposite is true, so you’ll need to balance the hard data with information you can’t measure.
• Attribution problems: Traditional attribution metrics often don’t work well with thought leadership. For example, thought leadership content often doesn’t rank well in SEO, so search traffic may not be a great measure of success. Social media is another challenge, where high engagement may not lead to a large traffic increase to a website.

It will come down to sticking to the process long-term. You may not see the results in the short term, but you should notice trends over time as your authority grows and people begin seeing you or your brand as a leader in the space.

Quantitative metrics: Measuring reach and engagement

Quantitative metrics are the hard data available that help you measure the effectiveness of your leadership campaigns.

The great thing about quantitative metrics is that they are easier to measure. You have tools available that provide data — allowing you to see any direct results from your efforts.

There are some common quantitative metrics available for thought leaders:

1. Traffic

Website traffic is one of the key indicators that tell you how well your thought leadership campaign performs. It measures your visibility from all sources — from SEO to social media visitors.

Higher traffic can indicate more authority. If you rank higher on Google, it’s a sign that your website has more trust and ranks higher as a result.

You’ll need software to measure website page views. Tools like Google Analytics and Google Search Console will help you track visitors, where they come from, how long they stay, and other information.

To increase website traffic:

• Use SEO to optimize your website for search engines.
• Collaborate with other thought leaders to expand your reach and get backlinks.
• Produce high-quality content and share it on social media and other traffic sources.

2. New subscribers

A growing follower or subscriber count is a good sign that you’re growing as a thought leader. It means people trust you enough to give you their contact information or subscribe to your profile on a website.

You can monitor your subscriber count by looking at the numbers on your email list and social media platforms. Track the total number of subscribers, growth over time, and subscriber churn. These will tell you your overall subscriber count and whether you’re becoming more popular or losing steam.

Try the following tactics to grow and maintain your subscriber count:

• Offer an incentive to sign up.
• Regularly engage with your audience.
• Cross-promote on several platforms.
• Use calls-to-action (CTAs) to encourage people to subscribe.

3. Likes, comments, and shares

Social media engagement metrics are what you’ll measure to determine how your audience interacts with your content. (The engagement will depend on the platform you use.) 

Generally, you want to see an increase in the number of likes, comments, and shares you receive: 

• Likes are the bare minimum you’ll get and will show you the general attitude people have toward your content.
• Comments will give you more insight into what people think. Are people speaking positively about what you have to say, or are they pointing out problems and errors that you should address? 
• Shares will be one of the metrics to look forward to the most, as they boost your content to your audience’s network and expand your reach.

Track these metrics over time to see how your content performs. You should start seeing patterns emerge when doing this. You’ll learn what content your audience likes, which helps you determine what to create next.

There are a few ways you can improve engagement:

• Create fresh angles and perspectives not seen often by looking at what people are searching for in your industry or new trends.
• Ask questions about the topic to encourage engagement.
• Regularly respond to comments and questions to establish a relationship with your audience and encourage future engagement.
• Use appealing formats like infographics (with text, graphs, and other visual formats) in easy-to-digest images with stats, guides, and other talking points.

4. Downloads

Many types of thought leadership content require downloads, like:

• Whitepapers
• eBooks
• Software
• Podcasts

Measuring downloads will tell you how valuable your audience finds your content. Downloadable content is often a bonus for signing up for email lists and other purposes, so the number of downloads shows how well your campaigns are running and how valuable people find your content.

Specific tools are available to help measure downloads. If you host content on your website, use website tools like Google Analytics or file management software to track downloads. Other assets, like podcasts, have metrics available in their control panels that let you know how many downloads you have. Look for a steady stream of downloads over time or an increase as a sign that you’re growing.

You can increase downloads in several ways:

• Use CTAs to promote downloads by giving someone the next action they should take (ex: “Get started today,” “Download your free guide here”).
• Offer previews of gated content that show people what value to expect when downloading.
• Promote downloads on several channels like your website, social media accounts, and video platforms (like TikTok or YouTube) to reach as many members of your target audience as possible.

5. Backlinks 

Backlinks are the links you see that point to another webpage. They’re a sign that a website trusts your content enough to send its traffic your way to view your content — a sign that you’re an authoritative source of information.

Even better, it’s a sign to Google that you’re more trustworthy, which can boost your SEO rankings.

Tracking backlinks is a little trickier since there isn’t a reliable way to view them all. However, a few tools, such as Ahrefs and Semrush, scrape the internet to track backlinks.

You can boost your number of backlinks in several ways:

• Create a content strategy with content worth linking to by examining the common questions people look for on Google and building the best resource possible.
• Work with other leaders on projects by creating content together and asking for links in the content.
• Reach out for mentions on similar websites by using Google Alerts to look for brand mentions and asking for a link from the ones that don’t have one..

Qualitative metrics: Measuring industry authority and audience trust

Qualitative metrics are less data-driven than quantitative metrics. You may not see these results in hard numbers, but you will see them over time as people notice your efforts and begin following your work. They paint a more complete picture of your content’s impact.

Although there isn’t hard data available for qualitative metrics, there are some signs of success to be on the lookout for:

6. Media mentions

Media mentions are a growing sign of your influence because it shows that other authoritative sources trust you as a source for important topics. Journalists and publications now count on you so they can publish accurate information about new product launches and industry events.

Monitoring media involves setting up monitoring tools to look for keywords on news sources and other popular websites. Google Alerts is a popular tool for this. You can set up any keyword you want to watch for, and Google Alerts will send an email notification whenever it finds a mention — something extremely useful for SaaS companies that rely on their online presence to promote products and learn what customers think.

Increase your media mentions by:

• Establish relationships with journalists and other publishers by making your company available for comment on industry topics.
• Offer valuable insights with unique reports that news organizations may have an interest in reporting on.
• Monitor your inbox for information requests from the media by using email filtering tools to tag potential contact requests and regularly searching for media requests each week.

7. Podcast invites

With the number of podcast listeners reaching record highs, they’re an amazing way to reach a new audience. Listeners tune in to podcasts to learn about industry trends, product releases, and insider insights.

…And being on a podcast will help establish you as one of those thought leaders. 

Keep track of the number of podcast invitations you receive over time to measure the success of your efforts. You can also consider the number of listeners your podcast features get to get an idea of how much your reach has increased.

You can increase your chance of podcast invites in a few ways:

• Engage with podcast hosts on social media by following their accounts and commenting on their posts with valuable content (and consider including links to your own — but don’t be spammy).
• Listen to other podcasts and create similar types of insightful content that may be interesting topics of discussion for your audience.
• Start your own podcast and invite industry leaders to make your organization stand out — and position you as an attractive guest for other podcasts.

8. Speaking engagements

Speaking engagements are perhaps the ultimate sign that you’ve made it as an authority in your industry because of the value the organizers see in you. In many cases, you may even be paid for your attendance at these events!

Track the number of invitations you receive over time to measure your thought leadership efforts.

Consider:

• Size of the event to make sure you’re able to expand your reach over time
• Industry relevance to make sure the people you speak to are the right audience and willing to listen
• Prestige to see how well-regarded you are in the industry and if other leaders trust you enough to have on stage

You can increase the chance of speaking engagements in a few ways:

• Understand the content and format of events by attending them yourself, allowing you to correctly position yourself as someone who should speak on the topic at hand.
• Network with other professionals who attend events online and at other events to make yourself known to event organizers.
• Create a speaker profile (and update your professional online profiles, like your LinkedIn page or bio page on your company website) to highlight your industry expertise and event history.
• Reach out to event organizers with proposals about industry topics that the event attendees may find valuable.

9. Audience authority

Understanding your audience can help you understand the impact of your thought leadership efforts. You’re not going for a general audience that isn’t relevant to your industry — you want professionals in your field and, ideally, other thought leaders in your industry. You want them to like, comment on, and engage with everything you post.

Create a list of the other leaders in your industry. Look at your followers to see if any of them are there. Monitor your followers over time to see if any you recognize follow to determine how widespread your efforts are taking you. Once you see them following you,  you’re in a better position to reach out and look for ways to connect with them — giving everyone a chance to keep growing.

Build sustainable thought leadership with authority content

Measuring thought leadership successes may not be as straightforward as other forms of marketing. However, there’s some highly relevant, important, and insightful information — quantitative and qualitative — you can glean by using the right tools and paying attention to the right metrics.

While measuring thought leadership initiatives is crucial, it’s important to remember to keep those initiatives evolving and improving based on what you find. That dedication to improvement is how you continue investing in thought leadership to stand out in your industry.

True, it’s not an overnight process. But with the right partnership, a thought leadership strategy can pull your brand ahead of the competition and position you as an authority in your industry.

Helping brands develop and nurture their thought leadership strategies is just one of the many ways Ten Speed can help B2B SaaS businesses grow. Our team is well-versed in creating great content and strategies, and we’ve helped countless brands achieve their thought leadership goals. 

Ready to add thought leadership to your marketing strategy but aren’t sure how? Let’s talk about how to get you where you want to be.