Whitepaper
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It is no coincidence that companies like Netflix, Apple, and the major AI players are currently hunting for the best storytellers. In markets where content is becoming interchangeable, visibility more fragile, and products easier to copy, communication is becoming a strategic asset.
This is exactly where thought leadership comes in: not as nicely packaged personal branding, but as systematic intellectual leadership. In this whitepaper, we show why trust collapse, visibility collapse, and product collapse describe the new status quo—and what companies should concretely take away from this.
We provide a practical playbook for thought leadership in the AI age, along with concrete learnings and case studies from getpress—including work with rightmart, TeleClinic, and trivago.
For those who don't just want more visibility, but want to carry weight as a voice in their market. Read it for free now.
Viel Spaß beim lesen.
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For decision-makers (CEO/CMO/Head of Comms/PR Lead) and experienced communication teams at growth companies, digital SMEs, and transformation-focused businesses who don't need "more visibility"—but want to build more relevance, trust, and public impact.
It is no coincidence that companies like Netflix, Apple, and the major AI players are currently hunting for the best storytellers—and paying up to $775 million for them. These companies have understood that communication is becoming perhaps the most important asset for standing out from the competition.
And thought leadership is one dimension of this essential communication. A goal, if you will. While the term is often used quite broadly for anything between CEO positioning and LinkedIn posts, it describes quite precisely what it is actually about: intellectual leadership. Usually, this refers to a person or company considered a leading authority in a specific field. As the term suggests, a thought leader guides others in their thinking on a particular topic. This isn't about having the loudest opinion. And it isn't about nicely packaged personal branding. It is about sharpening, positioning, and publicly contextualizing expertise in a way that creates genuine reputation.
In the AI age, this is becoming even more relevant: because generic content is increasing, visibility alone is losing value, and external validation, recognizability, and credible sources are becoming more important—all while products are easier to copy than ever before. Thought leadership is thus becoming a strategic communication discipline for companies that don't just want to be visible, but want to be perceived as the leading voice in their market.
The rules of communication have shifted. Not just a little, but quite fundamentally. Three developments are currently unfolding simultaneously: Trust collapse, visibility collapse, and product collapse.
With AI, content can now be produced faster, cheaper, and in significantly larger volumes. At the same time, the amount of AI slop is growing—content that is generated quickly but is barely vetted, interchangeable, or simply unreliable. This makes it harder to tell at a glance what is credible and what is not. Distrust is becoming the default. This is precisely why verified sources, credible analysis, and external validation are gaining weight.
More and more search queries end without a click. Answers come directly from AI overviews, chatbots, or other AI summaries. For companies, this means that it is not just their own content that counts, but above all whether and how they appear in trusted external sources. And this logic follows a clear recency bias more strongly than before. A big hit from three years ago helps much less today than a continuous presence in the sources that people and systems trust.
In many markets, products, features, and workflows can be copied faster than ever before. A technological edge remains important, but it has become more fragile. When offerings are easier to replicate, the deciding factors become who enjoys trust in the market, who remains visible, and what story about a company sticks.
It is precisely in this tension that thought leadership gains importance. Anyone wanting to be perceived as relevant in a market does not need to be everywhere—but they must be clear, consistent, and credible where it counts. Because when trust becomes more fragile, visibility is controlled by third-party systems, and products are more easily copied, it is no longer just about communication. It is about whether a company remains distinguishable in the market or becomes interchangeable.
Thought leadership emerges where expertise, a clear perspective, and public relevance and external validation come together. It is not about saying as much as possible, but about being recognizable, substantial, and relevant on a specific topic.
Thought leadership does not mean simply posting on LinkedIn regularly, firing off quick opinions, or producing a bit of CEO content. Visibility alone is not enough. Thought leadership also does not arise automatically through classic expert communication, because expertise alone does not make a perspective publicly effective. That only happens when it is sharpened and translated in a way that media, the market, and stakeholders can actually use.
Rather, thought leadership means precisely owning a topic, contextualizing developments, and making a perspective visible so consistently that it provides orientation in the market. The key is not to be everywhere, but to be recognizably associated with a topic. And that does not happen in a few weeks, but over a longer period—through repetition, consistency, and the building of trust.
That is exactly what we built, for example, together with Marco Klock, CEO of rightmart . The decisive factor there was not a single big moment, but consistent work over a long period: regular analysis, reliable data foundations, transparent presentation, and a clear sense of which perspective is truly relevant for which medium. This resulted in, among other things, a portrait in the FAZ, an interview in Capital and appearances on podcasts such as “Business Punk – How to Hackwas born. The real proof came a year or two later: when journalists began reaching out proactively, increasingly based on recommendations.
Today, thought leadership pays off on several levels simultaneously.
In complex markets, people aren't just looking for information; they are looking for guidance. Especially when it comes to topics like AI, regulation, transformation, or industry shifts, voices that can provide context carry more weight. That is why it is important for individuals (and brands) to share not just what they know, but what they stand for.
This is where CEO positioning is one of the most powerful levers. At the C-level, a company’s strategy, values, and priorities are distilled into one or a few individuals. A CEO can contextualize developments, make decisions understandable, and give a company a clearly recognizable voice. This is exactly what builds trust—with customers, investors, the media, and other relevant stakeholders—and contributes to a resilient reputation.
As products, features, and content become easier to copy, reputation becomes more valuable. Thought leadership helps companies establish a presence in the market not just through their offerings, but through a distinct perspective. In the age of AI, strategic communication is a form of corporate defense.
Having a clear position makes you a more compelling partner for interviews, guest contributions, panels, or podcasts. Thought leadership not only increases a company's visibility but also makes it more relevant to key debates, ultimately driving new business inquiries.
For AI visibility, it’s not just about your own content; it’s about how firmly established a brand is in the public eye. When asked what helps make a brand more visible, Niklas Buschner, founder of the agency Radyant, says in our podcast episode: "Basically, everything that has a positive impact on your brand perception and awareness applies." His take: "I always say: try to become a household brand." He doesn't mean size for the sake of it, but rather recognizability. The more firmly a brand is anchored in the market, the more likely it is to appear in new search and response logic. At the same time, the recency bias plays a bigger role than it used to. Individual strong hits from the past are losing their impact, while continuous, current mentions in trusted external sources are becoming more important.
If you want to speak clearly in public, you have to think more clearly internally. Which topics belong to us? What position do we really hold? Where do we have solid experience and where don't we? Thought leadership forces companies to answer these exact questions earlier and more precisely. It sharpens narratives, priorities, and perspectives. And it often creates more clarity internally before it even has an impact externally. A nice side effect.
Owned channels are important. But they don't validate themselves.
A LinkedIn post can offer perspective. A whitepaper can provide depth. A podcast can build rapport. But PR does something different: it shifts how a statement is perceived in the market. When a publication like Handelsblatt identifies an individual or a company as a relevant voice, it carries a different weight than if you were to claim it yourself. That is precisely why PR is so central to thought leadership.
PR is therefore not an add-on, but essential if expertise is to be transformed into public impact. Thought leadership rarely emerges from mere frequency. It arises when knowledge is turned into a clear narrative: with the right topics, a perspective that sticks, and placements that carry this story into the market. Good PR ensures not just that something is said, but that it is told in the right context, repeated, and validated by external sources.
Or as Adriana Hofer, Senior PR Consultant & Team Lead at getpress, puts it: "Many people think of campaigns or events when they hear PR. Ultimately, it’s about trust – and that is built through smart stories, clear messages, and good timing." PR helps not only to publish perspectives but to place them in contexts where they can unfold their relevance.
Not every visible voice becomes a reference point. Strong thought leadership has a few very clear quality markers.
Companies that want to comment on everything are rarely associated with anything. Thought leadership requires focus.
A voice doesn't become strong just by providing information. It becomes strong by providing context to developments.
This is exactly what we have been doing, for example, with TeleClinic for over 1.5 years: We take up relevant health policy topics and provide a well-founded analysis that goes beyond pure product PR. Contributions in, among others, Tagesspiegel, heise and e-health.com show how we are strategically positioning TeleClinic as a voice that provides clear context for current debates surrounding telemedicine, takes a strong stance, and offers guidance.
If you would like to dive deeper into our PR strategy for TeleClinic, you can find the case study here.
Relevance is not born from a desire to share opinions, but from experience, observation, data, or reliable practice. Laura Lewandowski, former journalist and founder of Smart Chiefs, puts it very clearly in our podcast episode : "People want real use cases and best practices."
Thought leadership requires recognizability over weeks, months, and years.
Authenticity doesn't mean sharing everything unfiltered; it means communicating with a genuine voice, a clear stance, and without an artificial persona. This makes a real difference, especially at the C-level: when a company's strategy, values, and priorities are embodied by one person, it quickly becomes clear whether that voice is credible or just a performance.
A good internal perspective isn't enough. Thought leadership must be crafted in a way that makes it useful for the media.
Thought leadership isn't successful just because your own network applauds; it succeeds when your perspective resonates outside of your immediate circle.
Thought leadership rarely fails due to a lack of expertise. It fails more often because there is no clear structure behind it.
What should thought leadership contribute to? Reputation, trust, category leadership, recruiting, CEO profiling, or investor confidence?
What do you want to stand for? And more importantly: What can you credibly stand for?
What is your core thesis? Which questions can you answer better than anyone else? As Laura Lewandowski puts it in our podcast episode: "It is extremely important to develop a clear narrative."
Not every topic automatically belongs on the CEO's stage. Some topics require founders, some need subject matter experts, and others call for a corporate voice. Credibility is what matters, not titles.
Thought leadership requires statements that are quotable, debatable, and journalistically relevant. This means not just perspectives that are factually correct, but ones that are genuinely interesting to a specific medium and its readers. While content for a broad portal needs to be relatable and accessible, it can be significantly sharper, more specific, or more strategic for a business publication.
PR, guest contributions, interviews, podcasts, white papers, LinkedIn, panels, corporate voices: thought leadership must be consistent across multiple channels to be credible.
Thought leadership is not a one-off activity. It requires recurring formats, good timing, relationship building, and persistence. This also includes touchpoints that do not immediately result in a publication. Background conversations, quick responsiveness, and reliable availability often pay off exactly when editorial teams are looking for context or an expert voice on short notice.
Don't just count reach, but relevance signals: media quality, follow-up communication, citations, speaker invitations, topic association in the market, and signals that contribute to search and AI visibility.
Together with trivago, we worked on re-establishing the brand more clearly as a relevant voice in the travel market – through thought leadership, CEO positioning, and strong earned media placements instead of mere product communication.
Instead of just talking about product features, we focused on travel trends, AI strategies, consumer behavior, and the company's comeback story. We strategically positioned CEO Johannes Thomas in business media and podcasts as a voice capable of explaining change and providing market context. This was complemented by robust data analysis, which established trivago as a data-driven expert in the travel market.
trivago was featured in outlets including WirtschaftsWoche, Capital, Business Insider, ntv, WELT, on the OMR Podcast and in Die Stunde Null.
Why this matters for thought leadership: The brand didn't just become more visible; its thematic focus became much sharper. Product communication evolved into market analysis. Sporadic appearances turned into recurring commentary. And a well-known brand that had been underperforming in its communications once again became a voice that shapes relevant debates.
If you want to dive deeper, you can find the full case study here.
In the age of AI, thought leadership is a response to three very real developments: more content, more interchangeability, and more uncertainty about what is credible.
To be visible today, you need to provide context, be recognizable, gain external validation, and own a topic over time. That is how reputation is built.
Visibility without credibility remains fragile.
Expertise without positioning remains internal.
And thought leadership without PR often remains just self-assertion.
The good news: thought leadership is not a vague communication project, but something that can be developed systematically – with clear topics, strong voices, relatable perspectives, and anchoring across relevant channels.
Do you want to find out which topics, voices, and narratives in your company have real thought leadership potential? Then let's talk..
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