Most B2B leaders would reasonably get a root canal than give a keynote speech. But someway, we’ve satisfied ourselves that thought management requires changing into the following Simon Sinek.
However what if the best thought management technique by no means includes getting on a stage?
I just lately sat down with storytelling coach Jay Acunzo, a two-time keynote speaker at our Experience Inbound occasion, and what he shared affected my occupied with thought management methods for our advanced B2B purchasers.
It’s true, many enterprise leaders break into a chilly sweat on the point out of “thought management.” That’s partially as a result of they image themselves sweating via public talking engagements — a concern proper up there with loss of life for many individuals.
However my dialog with Jay confirms, it is a self-limiting mindset we have to shift. The best thought management methods for industrial firms don’t essentially require levels, spotlights, or public talking.
Try our dialog on The ChangeOver podcast under — or for those who’re quick on time, learn the abstract and are available again to it later:
Watch episode 27 of The ChangeOver, then subscribe on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, Weidert.com, or your favourite podcast app.
Why Industrial Experience Alone Isn’t Sufficient in 2025
Right here’s what industrial leaders want to know: even in extremely technical industries, experience has turn out to be commodified.
Your rivals know the identical:
- Manufacturing processes and methodologies
- Regulatory necessities and compliance requirements
- Technical specs and business certifications
- Provide chain optimization strategies
“Experience is foundational — like a reporter understanding the details. However you possibly can’t cost a premium for it anymore.” — Jay Acunzo
What separates a profitable $200M industrial distributor from its rivals isn’t what they know; it’s how they consider business challenges and assist clients suppose otherwise, too.
The Real AI Threat to Industrial Marketing
While everyone panics about AI replacing content writers, the bigger threat is more subtle. AI is flooding the market with more mediocre “how-to” content, technical guides, and industry insights. The winners will use AI to synthesize their proprietary data — customer feedback, operational insights, market patterns — and free up their human experts to share the breakthrough thinking AI can’t replicate.
Your 20-year plant supervisor’s expertise troubleshooting advanced gear failures? Don’t let or not it’s merely experience — make it your mental property.
Constructing Your Industrial IP Pyramid
As an alternative of simply sharing technical data, industrial firms have to develop mental property round their distinctive perspective. Right here’s a mannequin that follows Jay’s framework:
Basis: your industrial premise — Consider this because the one core perception that reframes how clients ought to take into consideration their challenges.This isn’t a tagline, it’s a contrarian take that challenges typical business knowledge:
- “Preventive upkeep isn’t sufficient. You want predictive resilience” (challenges conventional scheduled upkeep)
- “Provide chain optimization begins with understanding your provider’s suppliers” (goes past first-tier visibility)
- “Security incidents are signs, not root causes; repair the decision-making setting” (reframes security from compliance to tradition)
To check your premise, full this sentence: “Everybody in our business thinks X, however we imagine Y.”
Stage 2: your language — Outline phrases that make your clients sound smarter of their boardroom conferences. Give them the vocabulary to articulate issues they couldn’t title earlier than.
For instance, a predictive upkeep firm would possibly outline:
- “Failure debt” (the hidden price of deferred upkeep choices)
- “Upkeep velocity” (how shortly you possibly can reply to predictive alerts)
- “Asset resilience rating” (a metric combining reliability, maintainability, and flexibility)
What issues do your clients battle to elucidate to their management? Create phrases that make these conversations simpler.
Stage 3: your methodology — That is your distinctive, step-by-step, repeatable course of for fixing advanced industrial challenges that comes solely out of your particular expertise. And it’s essential to make it memorable: use acronyms or alliterative phases that stick in clients’ minds.
Stage 4: Your Visible Frameworks — Break your methodology into a visible framework that turns into a key screenshot in your clients’ displays to their management groups. These frameworks rework your advanced processes into easy, memorable diagrams that assist clients justify choices and talk worth internally. Consider codecs like:
- Maturity fashions displaying development from fundamental to superior states
- Resolution bushes serving to navigate advanced gear or course of decisions
- Comparability matrices positioning options towards key standards
- Course of flows visualizing your step-by-step method with clear handoffs
Then put it to the whiteboard check: if somebody can’t sketch your framework from reminiscence after seeing it as soon as, it’s too advanced. The perfect industrial frameworks turn out to be business shorthand — like “lean manufacturing” or “Six Sigma.”
Peak: Your Buyer Tales — these are the particular transformation narratives proving your premise works in actual industrial environments, full with measurable outcomes. Construction these layers into the tales:
- Problem: What typical method wasn’t working?
- Perception: How your premise revealed the actual downside
- Answer: Your methodology in motion (with particular techniques)
- Outcomes: Quantified enhancements (uptime, price financial savings, effectivity good points)
- Quote: Buyer testimonial that reinforces your premise
Psst: Try Jay’s advice on asking for customer testimonals here.
Thought Management for Firms That Hate the Highlight
This might need been the vital perception from my dialog with Jay: thought management doesn’t demand your CEO turn out to be the following industrial convention circuit star.
The ability of a number of, specialised voices turns into clear when you think about how industrial patrons really analysis options. A plant supervisor researching predictive upkeep doesn’t need to hear out of your CEO about quarterly progress. They need insights from somebody who’s really carried out these varieties of methods in comparable environments.
For industrial firms, this distributed experience method delivers three key benefits:
- Deeper credibility — When your upkeep engineer speaks about gear reliability, prospects instantly acknowledge genuine expertise vs. company messaging
- Broader market protection — A number of specialists can interact completely different purchaser personas concurrently throughout numerous business publications and boards
- Aggressive differentiation — Whereas rivals showcase generic “options,” you’re demonstrating precise operational data
Right here’s how an organization would possibly put it to work in apply:
- Your operations director owns lean manufacturing in advanced environments and turns into the go-to voice for operational effectivity insights
- Your provide chain supervisor turns into recognized for provider relationship optimization and will get quoted in logistics publications
- Your security coordinator leads conversations about security tradition transformation in business security boards
- Your high quality assurance lead focuses on predictive high quality methods for content material on manufacturing excellence
Every specialist reinforces your organization’s broader premise whereas constructing private authority of their area. When prospects see a number of staff members contributing considerate insights throughout completely different points of business operations, it alerts depth of experience that rivals can’t simply replicate.
Better of all, the impact compounds: a prospect would possibly first encounter your security coordinator’s article on tradition transformation, then see your operations director’s LinkedIn publish about lean implementation, then discover your provide chain supervisor quoted in a commerce publication. This multi-touchpoint publicity builds belief quicker than any single govt might obtain alone.
Managing the “What If They Go away?” Danger
That is the most important concern I hear from industrial leaders: “What if we spend money on constructing somebody’s private model and so they go to a competitor?”
Jay’s response challenged that perspective. He identified that media firms face this actual situation; their belief comes from particular person voices, not logos. They handle it by constructing methods that shield their mental property.
For industrial firms, this implies:
- Documenting your methodologies and frameworks in model pointers
- Creating content material templates that preserve consistency throughout staff members
- Constructing a repository of buyer success tales that any spokesperson can reference
- Creating a number of voices so that you’re not depending on anybody individual
Jay’s Three-Step Framework for Industrial Thought Management
Some sensible recommendation from our dialog was Jay’s “We Need, We Want, We Hope” messaging method, tailored for industrial contexts:
- We Need: “You need your operations to run predictably with minimal surprises”
- We Want: “You’ll want to suppose past reactive upkeep to predictive system optimization”
- We Hope: “Think about operations so well-tuned that issues remedy themselves earlier than they influence manufacturing”
We’re not speaking about aspirational advertising and marketing, however about main clients via a logical development to reframe how they consider their challenges.
Why Curiosity Issues Extra Than Technical Information
Jay’s parting perception targeted on this chance: we’re coming into an period the place asking higher questions issues greater than having prepared solutions.
In industrial B2B, this implies the businesses that win can be people who assist clients see their challenges from new angles, as a result of clients are shopping for greater than services or products, they’re shopping for your perspective on how to consider their enterprise otherwise.
That perspective, grounded in your particular industrial expertise, is what creates true aggressive differentiation.
A Sensible 30-Day Industrial Thought Management Launch Plan
For those who’re trying to construct extra visibility on your experience within the business, right here’s an easy strategy to get began:
Articulate your perspective. Most firms skip this step, however it’s the inspiration for every little thing else. What have you ever realized from years of fixing issues that challenges typical business pondering? It doesn’t have to be revolutionary, simply sincere and completely different.
Ask your self: When clients name with issues, what do you end up explaining that surprises them about how issues actually work?
Establish who must be the voice. Search for the individual in your staff who already does this naturally. It’s usually not essentially the most senior individual, however the one clients ask for by title once they have advanced questions. Discover the staff member who can clarify sophisticated processes in ways in which make sense to non-technical stakeholders.
Select one place to focus. Quite than making an attempt to be in every single place, decide the channel the place your excellent clients really spend time once they’re researching options. Which may imply LinkedIn for reaching decision-makers, or pitching to the commerce publications your prospects already learn.
Doc what you already do. You’ve developed problem-solving approaches over years of expertise. The objective isn’t to invent one thing new; it’s to articulate what you already do in a method that clients can perceive and bear in mind.
Lead with outcomes. While you begin sharing content material, start with what occurred on your clients, not what you’re able to doing. Folks in industrial markets care about outcomes, not capabilities.
The objective is not to turn out to be well-known. It’s to turn out to be the apparent selection when prospects face their most advanced challenges.
Hear to my full conversation with Jay on The ChangeOver podcast for a deeper dive into his frameworks for serving to specialists talk breakthrough pondering — no convention levels required.
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