By “Ghostwriter” is often something of a pejorative title. Two concepts usually come to one’s mind when they hear the word—either it’s of an opportunistic writer taking a paycheck to write someone’s memoirs for them or it’s that of the high-functioning speech writer, crafting addresses full of lofty language for politicians to pass off as their own. Either way, there’s a bit of a negative connotation to the job.
However, there is real dignity to the task of ghostwriting. It is, in many ways, the ultimate in research writing, as it involves synthesizing cogent writing in persona emptoris from a client’s raw knowledge and personality. And, in recent years, that task of professional proxy writing has expanded beyond the realm of Hollywood and political staffers and into the business world.
Using a ghostwriter for B2B inbound material focused on thought leadership is a way to effectively produce expert-level content without diverting the attention of executives from the task of overseeing operations and growth.
B2B content marketers know what needs to be produced but may not have the skills necessary for long-form writing, video production and the like. Between marketing agencies and freelancers, the modern requirement of churning out solid content has created a persistent need for quality writing of all types, including ghostwritten essays, articles and e-books.
Good writing is the backbone of B2B content marketing. Buyers and the various decision-makers who assess B2B solutions need informative, engaging and useful content to confidently purchase from your company. The workload, though, is mighty, and the need is constant to the point where companies need writers to shoulder more of the load, taking on pieces of content that may traditionally come straight from your company’s managers and executives. The company blog becomes the beast that must be fed in order to keep up with editorial calendars and campaign schedules.
The biggest hang-up for the C-suite and B2B marketers on the whole is a perceived disingenuousness of the very act of ghostwriting—the idea that words attributed to someone of authority weren’t written by that person raises some sort of red flag in many people’s minds. But, in reality, isn’t the need to distill intelligent viewpoints into equally intelligent, well-constructed pieces of writing a net positive? Just as a good manager knows what elements of their job to delegate in order to maximize productivity and efficiency, so too should a thought leader utilize a good writer to get their thoughts properly organized and explained on the page.
Having a quality ghostwriter at your inbound agency on retainer will lessen the stress of crafting keystone content.
A ghostwriter is not in the business of injecting their own bias into the work they do. In reality, writers who take on ghostwriting gigs are in it for the love of writing and the challenge of creating an accurate representation of another’s thoughts, feelings and personality. Using a ghostwriter for B2B inbound material focused on thought leadership is a way to effectively produce expert-level content without diverting the attention of executives from the task of overseeing operations and growth. In many situations, it’s not that an executive lacks the ability to write long-form pieces; it’s that they lack the time to draft, organize, edit and publish them on a frequent and consistent basis.
Ghostwriters are conduits for transmitting high-end content from your company leaders and as such are extraordinarily valuable for maintaining a healthy inbound presence. Take time to find one that gets your company’s voice and has the drive to craft smart pieces that are representative of your viewpoints. Having a quality ghostwriter at your inbound agency on retainer will lessen the stress of crafting keystone content and can help find new angles for your future B2B material through their research and insights. In the B2B content marketing world, “ghostwriting” no longer has to be a dirty word—now, it’s simply an extra tool for keeping your inbound marketing efforts humming along by intelligently outsourcing important content to a trusted, skilled author. 
