Thought leaders are those who generate thoughts that attract others’ interest, adoption, and advocacy. Here is an excerpt from an article written by Dorie Clark for the Harvard Business Review blog. In it, she shares her own no-nonsense thoughts about thought leadership, accompanied by several specific suggestions. If only one of her insights or recommendations proves helpful to you, she will be gratified and you will be rewarded for reading her article.

To read the complete article, check out other articles and resources, and/or sign up for a free subscription to Harvard Business Review’s Daily Alerts, please click here.

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It’s gospel that you have to cultivate your personal brand, particularly if you have designs on the C suite. But because everyone has a brand nowadays (Tom Peters describes it as “your promise to the marketplace and the world”) simply having one is insufficient if you want to advance. You can’t just be known as “the guy who speaks Spanish” or “the programmer who can explain things well” or “that woman in legal who gets things done fast.” That’s nice — but there are a million of you, and in a globalized world, your company can find an alternative to you fast. That’s why you need to establish yourself as a thought leader. Good employees and good executives are nice to have. Thought leaders are irreplaceable — and indispensible.

So how do you build a reputation as a singular expert — someone who doesn’t just participate in the conversation, but drives it? In a word: leverage. No matter how brilliant and talented you are, you won’t be sufficiently appreciated within your organization or by your customers until the broader public recognizes you. This outside reinforcement becomes an echo chamber that brings money and respect. How to get it?

Follow these six steps to jump-start your thought leadership. Not all avenues will be open to you at the start, but most will in time.

[Here are the first three. To read the complete article, please click here.]

1. Create a Robust Online Presence. Not everyone can immediately jump to international prominence (CNN probably won’t book you as a talking head if you’ve never been on local TV). But everyone can start here, with an online beachhead. Blogs are particularly good because they showcase your knowledge — and search engines prize the frequent stream of fresh content. Most blogs are unloved and unread — but yours can be different with a little time and elbow grease. Good content is key, of course, but so is making friends (online and off) with other bloggers to create a virtuous, networked circle. Some of the best advice is from Chris Brogan, an otherwise unfamous guy who has been blogging for a decade, made himself a critical cog in the blogger world, and has turned it into big-time book contracts and bestsellers.

2. Flaunt High-Quality Affiliations. This one is often more about luck than anything else (I might be blogging this post from the White House if I’d been a high-ranking staffer for Barack Obama instead of for Howard Dean), but if you’ve got well-known connections, flaunt them and leverage them. Ivy League pedigree? Stint at McKinsey? Testimonial quotes from industry celebs? It’s credibility by proxy.

3. Give Public Speeches. Given the terror that public speaking instills in most people, your street cred will automatically skyrocket when you take the stage. Start with Rotary and the local Chamber of Commerce, and work your way up to associations, conferences, and in-house gigs for major corporations (you can literally write them a letter, suggest a topic, and ask to be considered). Buy the National Trade and Professional Associations directory to find out who to contact, and double-dip the benefit by promoting your engagements relentlessly (showcasing your desirability to others), and recording everything so you can cross-post like a maniac on Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. Your goal is ubiquity.

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Dorie Clark is a marketing strategy consultant for clients including Google, Yale University, and the National Park Service. Read her blog here or follow her on Twitter.