Thought leadership has become part of how business buyers understand vendors, evaluate expertise, and build internal support for a purchase. The 2025 Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report found that 64% of hidden decision-makers and 63% of target decision-makers in its U.S. study spend more than an hour each week consuming thought leadership. The 2024 report also found that 73% of decision-makers and C-suite executives considered it a more trustworthy basis for assessing capabilities than marketing materials and product sheets.
Table of contents
- How much attention thought leadership receives
- Why it can influence buyers outside the sales process
- What buyers want from high-quality content
- How thought leadership affects vendor choice
- Its role in RFPs and internal advocacy
- Where producers struggle to measure value
How much attention thought leadership receives
The available findings show that thought leadership is not a marginal reading habit for business audiences. In the 2025 U.S. study, 64% of hidden decision-makers said they spend more than an hour per week consuming it, compared with 63% of target decision-makers. These are separate audience groups reported by the 2025 Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report; they should not be treated as a single combined percentage.
The 2024 Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report measured time differently in two reported findings: 52% of decision-makers and C-suite executives spent an hour or more per week reading thought leadership in one result, while another result reported 54%. Because the supplied findings do not explain the distinction between those figures, both are retained as reported rather than reconciled.
Attention matters because it creates repeated opportunities for an organization’s ideas to be encountered before a formal buying conversation. Yet attention alone is not evidence of commercial impact. The same 2024 report found that only 15% of decision-makers considered the overall quality of most thought leadership they read to be very good or excellent. A substantial reading habit therefore exists alongside a quality problem.
Why it can influence buyers outside the sales process
Thought leadership can reach people who are not in regular contact with sales. In the 2025 Edelman-LinkedIn report, 71% of hidden decision-makers said they have relatively little or no interaction with sales. That makes editorial content particularly relevant to the audience members who may still participate in evaluation without being visible in the conventional sales funnel.
The trust findings are strong across both reports. In the 2025 study, 64% of hidden decision-makers trusted thought leadership content more than marketing materials and product sheets when assessing capabilities and competencies. The corresponding figure for target decision-makers was 73%. The 2024 report similarly found that 73% of decision-makers and C-suite executives considered thought leadership a more trustworthy basis for this assessment than marketing materials and product sheets.
The content can also change what buyers investigate. The 2024 report found that 75% of decision-makers and C-suite executives said a piece of thought leadership led them to research a product or service they had not previously considered. Separately, 54% of decision-makers said thought leadership prompted them to seek more information about a vendor’s offers or capabilities.
The reported downstream actions are notable, but they describe different groups and should not be added together. Sixty percent of decision-makers said thought leadership led them to begin buying from or working with the organization that produced it. Among decision-makers who had been led to research a previously unconsidered product or service, 23% said they began buying from or working with that organization. The 2024 Edelman-LinkedIn report also found that 60% of people exposed to strong thought leadership said it made them willing to pay a premium to work with that organization.
What buyers want from high-quality content
The 2025 findings emphasize usefulness and freshness. Ninety-one percent of hidden decision-makers valued fresh insights into their industry or business, while 81% said a hallmark of quality is helping them uncover challenges or needs they had not recognized. In other words, content is expected to add perspective, not simply restate a company’s existing offer.
The 2024 findings add more specific quality signals. Fifty-five percent of decision-makers identified robust research and strong supporting data as a characteristic of the highest-quality thought leadership. Forty-four percent valued content that helps buyers better understand a business challenge or missed opportunity, and 43% valued concrete guidance and case studies. A prominent, well-respected expert was associated with average or above-average thought leadership by 62% of decision-makers.
Format and voice also matter. In the 2025 study, 60% of hidden decision-makers valued a unique format or style. Fifty-one percent preferred primer-style content with quick takeaways over academic-style content, and 65% preferred a more human, less formal tone over an intellectual one. Among target decision-makers, 57% preferred primer-style content with quick takeaways. These results point toward accessible expertise: evidence and substance remain important, but the presentation has to help a busy reader act on the ideas.
| Reported buyer preference or quality signal | Share | Measurement period and audience |
|---|---|---|
| Fresh insights into industry or business | 91% | 2025; hidden decision-makers |
| Uncovering unrecognized challenges or needs | 81% | 2025; hidden decision-makers |
| Robust research and supporting data | 55% | 2024; decision-makers |
| Concrete guidance and case studies | 43% | 2024; decision-makers |
| Unique format or style | 60% | 2025; hidden decision-makers |
| More human, less formal tone | 65% | 2025; hidden decision-makers |
How thought leadership affects vendor choice
The 2025 report connects thought leadership with the broader criteria buyers use to choose a vendor. Eighty-five percent of hidden decision-makers said having a leading expert in the relevant product or service area is very or moderately important in the final vendor choice. Seventy-four percent gave the same importance level to understanding trends affecting their industry, and 68% to understanding their business’s challenges and needs.
Strategic fit was important at a similar level: 76% of hidden decision-makers rated it very or moderately important. Cultural fit was reported at 56%, while being the “safest choice” was reported at 41%. These figures describe decision criteria, not the percentage of purchases caused by thought leadership. Their relevance is that thought leadership can demonstrate expertise, awareness of industry change, and understanding of the buyer’s situation—the same areas buyers say matter in vendor selection.
The 2025 report found that 71% of hidden decision-makers said thought leadership is more effective than traditional marketing or sales materials at demonstrating a vendor’s potential value. It also found that 73% said an organization’s thought leadership is one of the best ways to judge the type and caliber of thinking it will deliver to clients. The report included the same 73% figure in another finding describing thought leadership as one of the best ways to gauge the type of thinking a company will deliver to clients; these overlapping statements support the same reported conclusion and are not counted as separate effects here.
The effect can extend beyond brand familiarity. Fifty-three percent of hidden and target decision-makers in the 2025 study said that when an organization produces high-quality thought leadership, brand recognition matters less. This does not mean brand recognition becomes irrelevant. It indicates that strong ideas can reduce the relative importance of prior familiarity for some respondents.
Its role in RFPs and internal advocacy
Thought leadership can influence the internal process around a vendor, not just an individual’s first impression. In the 2025 study, 86% of hidden decision-makers said they would be more likely to advocate for a vendor’s proposal in the RFP process if the vendor consistently produced high-quality thought leadership. A related result reported that 79% of hidden decision-makers were more likely to champion an RFP proposal from such a company.
The 2024 report measured the RFP expectation from both sides of the market. Thirty-eight percent of thought leadership producers expected their organization’s content to get it invited to participate in an RFP process, compared with 86% of decision-makers who expected strong thought leadership to have that effect. In the same 2024 report, 86% of decision-makers said they would be moderately or very likely to invite a company with strong thought leadership into an RFP process.
The gap between producers and buyers is one of the clearest findings in the available statistics. It suggests that organizations may underestimate how much buyers connect high-quality ideas with consideration for a formal opportunity. The audience is not merely consuming content; some readers are using it to make a case internally. Among hidden decision-influencers in the 2025 report, 51% said high-quality thought leadership helps them convince C-level executives to support their vendor choice, while 52% said it helps them convince other decision-makers during the vetting process.
Executive involvement is also reported in the 2025 study. Forty-one percent of hidden decision-makers said a C-suite executive had encouraged them to consider a vendor after engaging with that vendor’s thought leadership. The corresponding figure among target decision-makers was 35%. These results describe reported encouragement after engagement, not a forecast of future conversions.
Where producers struggle to measure value
The producer-side findings show why thought leadership performance can be difficult to assess. Half of thought leadership producers in the 2024 Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report said being under-resourced was their main barrier. Thirty percent said their organization does not really know how to use thought leadership as a sales or marketing tool.
Measurement practices remain heavily focused on reach. Forty-two percent of producers said they still measure effectiveness by looking for more traffic to websites and social pages. Only 29% said they can link sales leads back to specific pieces of thought leadership. This creates a practical measurement gap: the audience reports effects such as research, vendor consideration, advocacy, and willingness to pay a premium, while many producers primarily track traffic.
The statistics do not establish that every piece of content produces these outcomes, nor do they provide a single conversion rate for thought leadership. They do show a consistent pattern across the 2024 and 2025 Edelman-LinkedIn reports: business audiences spend meaningful time with the material, often trust it more than product-oriented collateral, and connect quality content with expertise and vendor consideration. For organizations working across media, that makes the central editorial challenge clear—create research-backed ideas in formats and voices that help readers recognize problems, explain them to others, and evaluate what a vendor may be able to deliver.