How to Get Started With Thought Leadership: The Small Business Guide

Many small and mid-sized businesses hesitate to invest in thought leadership, assuming it requires vast resources. But competing on ideas doesn’t demand a Fortune 500 budget. To get started with thought leadership, you need a structured, scalable approach to capturing and sharing the expertise you already have.

1. Excavate Your Best Ideas to Get Started With Thought Leadership

The first step is to create a system for surfacing and structuring the best thinking already happening inside your organization. One effective approach is to appoint a “Concept Ghost” — a skilled editor tasked with listening for and drawing out ideas during strategy sessions with experts, client work, or team debriefs.

One company began by recording internal interviews in which subject-matter experts were articulating how they solve real client problems. These recordings, once transcribed, became rich raw material. From there, they created a central dashboard — a kind of internal idea library — where insights could be tagged, organized, and revisited later for use in articles or client presentations.

Rather than waiting for inspiration to strike, this method ensures a steady stream of high-value ideas ready to be transformed into content or offerings. Organizing ideas in this way also makes it much easier to share ideas across company divisions.

Takeaway: Thought leadership doesn’t start with invention — it starts with excavation. To get started with thought leadership, you’ve got to know what you know by taking stock of your ideas and existing intellectual property and organizing them in a way that makes them easy to access and share.

2. Build and Run a Thought Leadership Engine

Ideas are only as powerful as their execution. That’s where your editorial capability comes in. Consider assigning an “Article Ghost” — a writer who partners with internal experts to shape raw ideas into polished, publishable content.

Before writing, use structured briefing templates to ensure alignment between the content and your business priorities. That way, every article, report, or opinion piece serves a strategic purpose.

Small and mid-sized businesses need to build a portfolio of content types: short-form opinion pieces that can be published quickly in response to happenings in your niche, and deep-dive white papers to demonstrate authority. This mix helps your company build visibility quickly, while also laying the foundation for long-term credibility.

Takeaway: The problem isn’t a lack of ideas — it’s a lack of process. A dedicated editorial function turns scattered insights into strategic output and is a critical step to get started with thought leadership.

3. Oversee Research and Own the Process

High-quality thought leadership is anchored in evidence. Consider finding and hiring a Research Editor — someone responsible for gathering case studies, analyzing trends, and overseeing third-party research that will reinforce your firm’s perspective.

The Research Editor should also be tasked with making sure the research results flow back to the organization and teams are enabled to build the research into their client presentations and the offerings they are creating.

Rather than relying solely on internal knowledge, consider pairing internal subject matter experts (SMEs) with external research partners, overseen by the Research Editor. This model can provide depth and ensure your research is both credible and aligned with your brand positioning.

In addition, when you’re ready to commission that research, you’ll need to establish a rigorous research governance process. This means being deeply involved in the research process - from the inception of the hypothesis, the designing of the research methodology, and the interpretation of the findings, through to the report’s final draft.

Takeaway: Even smaller firms can build credibility — if their insights are backed by data and real-world examples. A Research Editor will help you get started with thought leadership the right way.

4. Get Started With Thought Leadership With Generative AI

Generative AI should be embedded into your thought-leadership program and processes — not to replace human insight, but to augment it. Using tools for summarizing transcripts, generating content outlines, and even drafting initial versions of articles speeds up production considerably.

Consider training your teams on AI-assisted writing. This ensures the output retains a human voice and stays anchored in your company’s expertise, even as you embrace these new efficiencies.

By integrating AI into early drafts and ideation, you can create capacity for deeper work—allowing your experts to focus on refining their arguments rather than generating first drafts from scratch.

Takeaway: AI won’t do your thinking for you — but it can help you scale your ideas.

5. Make Thought Leadership a Cultural Priority

To embed thought leadership into your company’s DNA, it’s important to create a safe space where experts can gain confidence in articulating their ideas for general audiences. Consider what type of long-term training and support you can offer, such as a writing incubator. The environment you create can help uncover hidden talent and foster a culture where contribution is expected—not optional.

Encourage team members to share ideas in external forums — speaking on panels, contributing to podcasts, and engaging on LinkedIn. Written content is just one channel; verbal storytelling can amplify your firm’s voice and help subject-matter experts build public presence.

Over time, thought leadership can become ingrained in the organization — a shared value.

Takeaway: To sustain thought leadership, it must be everyone’s business — not just that of marketing.

By implementing this focused, five-part system to get started with thought leadership, small businesses can build high-impact programs without launching a media empire.

The key is to start small, build structures, and make thought leadership part of how you work—not just how you create brand awareness.

Connect with an Old National Small Business Banker for more insights to help your business grow.

This article was written by Rhea Wessel from Forbes and was legally licensed through the DiveMarketplace by Industry Dive. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@industrydive.com.