Turning industry expertise into thought leadership for pulp and paper

The challenge was not a lack of expertise. ABB had decades of experience in pulp and paper, deep technical knowledge and strong perspectives on where the industry was heading. The challenge was how to communicate that expertise in a way that felt relevant, credible and human.

Rather than relying on a corporate voice, ABB needed to connect industry issues with the people closest to them. Leaders, engineers and operational experts had the knowledge and experience buyers wanted to hear from. The opportunity was to bring those voices forward and turn ABB’s expertise into thought leadership around innovation, reliability and the future of the sector.

Human Digital developed and managed an integrated thought leadership programme combining content strategy, audience targeting, LinkedIn distribution, performance analysis and ongoing optimisation.

The programme centred on ABB specialists and industry perspectives, using video to translate technical expertise into accessible and credible content for the pulp and paper sector. LinkedIn was used to distribute this content to defined professional audiences based on industry, organisation, role and decision-making relevance.

Paid media extended the reach of these individual voices beyond their existing networks while preserving the expertise and context that gave the content its authority. This gave ABB a targeted and measurable way to increase the visibility of its thought leadership without relying solely on corporate publishing or organic reach.

The strongest content moved beyond explaining what ABB does and instead created a platform for people within the organisation to contribute their expertise to wider industry conversations. ABB leaders shared perspectives on sustainability, digitalisation, automation, operational performance and the future of pulp and paper, giving the campaign a level of credibility that is difficult to achieve through corporate messaging alone.

Human Digital amplified these perspectives through LinkedIn Thought Leadership content, using paid distribution to connect relevant expertise with carefully targeted professional audiences. This approach demonstrates an important principle in B2B communication: when the objective is to build trust and authority, the people with the most useful knowledge can become some of the organisation’s most effective media channels.

From Paid Reach to Peer Amplification

One of the more significant signals came from what happened beyond the initial paid engagement.

Several posts were reposted by other industry professionals with their own commentary. One generated 87 reactions, one comment and nine reposts, while another attracted 60 reactions, one comment and six reposts. In both cases, people went beyond clicking or reacting and added their own perspective before sharing the content with their networks.  

That behaviour matters because it represents a different form of engagement. The audience was not simply consuming ABB’s message. Some professionals considered it relevant enough to incorporate into their own industry conversations.

Reaching the Industry That Matters

The campaign also reached employees from major pulp and paper organisations. Within the pulp and paper industry itself, the campaign recorded a 1.96 percent click-through rate.  This gave ABB visibility not merely at scale, but among organisations and professional audiences relevant to the campaign’s strategic objective.