Expertise Samples

Create "Wow Moments" that convince prospects you are the expert they need

Show—don't tell—what sets your firm apart

Do clients hire you for your expertise?

Expertise is intangible—so it takes more time to show prospects why they need what you know. In fact, you may be the only person who can communicate what you do—and why it matters—as well as you do.

So you spend precious time describing your expertise to prospects when you should be using it to help clients.

Spend less time pitching your expertise to prospects—and more time using it with clients

Do you feel like you are producing a never-ending stream of marketing content and new business pitches?

This free course helps you get off the content marketing treadmill by adopting a sustainable method to convince prospects that you are the expert they need.

Expertise Samples use your expertise to advise prospects what to do now on a topic important to them—by delivering your insights and advice in automated, personalized, mini-consulting engagements on your blog or website.

You will learn:

  • How to answer the burning question that is on every prospect's mind
  • How cognitive bias creates Expertise Sample Wow Moments
  • How to build Expertise Samples that create demand for your paid services

The course includes:

  • An interactive self-assessment of whether your firm is ready, willing and able to use Expertise Samples for new client lead generation and prospect engagement
  • A personal review of your website and private email response with an Expertise Sample topic suggestion based on your firm’s strategy and expertise.


No time to try something new? Do this.

Use this course for a quick orientation. Then source your Expertise Sample creation, hosting, and management with Sample Your Brilliance—and keep your team focused on client service delivery.

Even if you aren’t ready to go all in with an automated Expertise Sample deployment—take a few minutes to skim these course notes.

You will come away with ideas you can use today—to increase your bid:win ratio, and reduce the time you or your team spend pitching your expertise.


Your Instructor


Keith Patterson
Keith Patterson

Keith founded and led an advertising agency and web consultancy that created marketing solutions for top Silicon Valley technology firms, service providers, and subject matter experts in diverse industries. Clients include Xerox, Microsoft, Philips, Lucasfilm Games, Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Pioneer, Kao and numerous startups.

That experience inspired Keith to co-found Sample Your Brilliance to develop a repeatable process for marketing subject matter expertise. The result was Expertise Samples—an interactive consulting mini-engagement that advises blog or website visitors what to do now about a topic important to them based on your assessment of their answers to a few short questions. This course teaches you how to use that process to create and publish your own Expertise Samples.

Keith is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.


"Everyone is trying to juice their content. Your tool enables this. It is instantaneous “engagement” with the target audience."

- Susan Scrupski, Founder, Big Mountain Data

"This looks like a terrific idea. It is pretty well done!"

- Dr. Bena Kallick, Chief Academic Officer, Eduplanet21

"The product looks really awesome—it definitely fills a need in the market. I like the idea of assembling a custom outcome from pre-built segments."

- Arthur Gutch, Chairman, Infinity Publishing

Course Curriculum


  Win clients with Expertise Samples
Available in days
days after you enroll

Frequently Asked Questions


What is an Expertise Sample?
An Expertise Sample is an interactive tool that advises blog or website visitors where they stand and what to do now about a topic important to them—based on your automated assessment of their answers to a few short questions.
How do Expertise Samples work?

Ask a few short questions to discover where readers need help to solve a problem or reach a goal and qualify them as a prospective client, customer or fan.

Assemble a personalized outcome for each user from your pre-stored expert content that:
  • assesses the situation
  • provides your expert advice on what to do now
  • presents appropriate offers
Who is this course for?
Consultants, service providers and other subject matter experts—working independently, or in consulting firms, startups, or enterprise teams—who desire a fast, effective, affordable way to convince prospects that you are the expert they need.
How do Expertise Samples differ from content recommendation widgets?
Tools like Contextly, AddThis and Brightinfo recommend published content based on reader browsing history or other rules. That’s not precise enough for people who want to solve a problem or achieve a goal. Expertise Samples use the answers to a few short questions to produce personalized reports that deliver your specific, expert advice on what to do now.
How do I know if Expertise Samples are right for me?
Enroll in our free course. Use the self-evaluation in Lesson 1 to discover whether you have the “right stuff” to make Expertise Samples work for you, and experience it as a user.
How do I publish Expertise Samples?
The Sample Your Brilliance team builds Expertise Samples for you. We use a collaborative online workshop format in which we produce all the deliverables—then host, maintain and optimize it for you as a managed service.
How long does it take to build and deploy?
Typically, about 30 days from start to launch—if you have available expert content, and you promptly review the work in progress in our private, collaborative online work space. The process is described in detail in the free course.
Can I build my own Expertise Samples?
An experienced web designer can create Expertise Samples using the framework and concepts presented in the free course. As with any marketing initiative, producing a compelling user experience requires creative and digital media skills. We suggest you work with us to produce a successful outcome quickly and economically with our low touch managed service.
Why should I use your team to create it?
Creating Expertise Samples is not rocket science. But it does requires creative and marketing skill. And Expertise Samples are not used in isolation. They are orchestrated with the other tools in your marketing toolkit—and across your customer lifecycle, from awareness to engagement, fulfillment, and retention.

We provide custom Expertise Samples as a managed service—not a self-service tool—enabling consultants to remain focused on client service delivery. The Sample Your Brilliance team are experts in creating strategy, concepts, content—and now Expertise Samples—for professional services. And uniquely qualified to perform that service for you.
How do I protect my intellectual property?
We sign an NDA before we get started and your IP remains with you.
What does your service cost?
Our service consists of an initial solution development fee plus an ongoing subscription for hosting and performance optimization. Prices are quoted based on project scope, and are competitive with digital media blogging and email campaigns. We are offering a 6-month waiver of the monthly subscription fee to visionary early adopters and the marketing agencies who serve them as we groom our service for wider release.
How much time will I need to commit?
We designed our service to accommodate the busy and unpredictable schedules of consultants. Our repeatable process and software development platform provide online transparency in a low touch experience. The development phase requires some knowledge transfer, but our process enables collaboration and work in progress review asynchronously, online, at your convenience.

Get started now!