White Paper Pundit

Have you noticed how widespread the use of white papers has become as a mainstream marketing vehicle?

Ten years ago, the concept of using a white paper for non-technical business marketing was both a unique and innovative way of gaining a competitive advantage. Today, just about every business sector and company has embraced this medium. In fact, if you execute a Twitter search for the word “White Paper”, you’ll quickly notice the number of companies that are actively leveraging white papers to gain additional exposure for their solutions and brand. Any uniqueness associated with distributing a white paper for marketing purposes is now long gone.

Along with the proliferation of white papers is the impact of the recession on white paper quality. As the price of developing a white paper has fallen in response to recessionary cost containment needs, the overall quality of white papers has plummeted. In an effort to appease price-sensitive customers and keep the price of white paper low, white papers writers are resorting to either shorter white papers, or ‘all-text’ formats that are absent any graphic elements or page layout design. As a result, it’s safe to say that the net result of the recession has been to lower white paper quality and innovation and in some cases, diminish its effectiveness.

So in the face of this abundance of plain, all-text white papers, how will you compete and gain a new, unique competitive advantage?

Actually, the prospects are quite bright. Today the clear differentiators favor new white paper designs and formats. Not only are these a way to gain a competitive advantage, but they also are more effective in delivering your strategic business advantage message.

Take a look at these two versions of Concluding Summary pages. Which one do you think your customer will notice, read, and remember? When that customer is presented with a stack of plain, all-text white papers, along with the one on the right hand side, which one do you think will have the greater chance of influencing your reader’s purchase decision?

Saving money is great in tough economic times, especially when it comes to commodity purchases. White papers aren’t one of them. White papers are the way that you represent your corporate image to your customer. What impression do you want to make? Don’t let the goal of reducing costs also reduce the effectiveness and general impression that your white paper will have on your customer.

In light of these challenges, here are three ways that you can create a competitive advantage with your white paper:

1. Differentiate Yourself! - This may seem trite, but no one gets ahead by mimicking their competitors. Look at what they are doing with their white papers and establish clear differentiated lines. Will your white paper do that by topic? Design? Approach? Content Flow? Tone? Person? Once you have selected HOW you will differentiate, stick with it and keep at it! Over time your audience will see that clear differentiated strategy.

2. Understand Your Reader - Who is your reader? How do they assimilate information? If they’re a C-Level executive, chances are they don’t have a lot of available time to read a 20 page white paper. With this audience make sure you have items that appeal to their time-sensitive schedules. Items such as Executive and Concluding Summaries are essential. Add a case study to provide realistic business examples that will engage them. On the other hand if your reader is a technical professional, make sure your content has the technical ‘nitty-gritty’ that they seek.

3. Don’t Discount Design - Just because it’s a white paper doesn’t mean that your information has to be stark black Courier fonts on a white background. See samples of other similar forms of information that your target audience reads to gauge the type of design that will appeal to them. Examples such as similar websites, books, periodicals, and articles will provide you with a glimpse at the level of design your strategy must follow. Stick with that design and come up with your own similar structure. Then repeat, repeat, repeat!

These are examples of the concepts that will be discussed in my upcoming book, “Crafting White Paper 2.0: Designing Information for Today’s Time and Attention Challenged Business Reader”, this Fall.

This book will be an essential tool for those who want to gain a competitive advantage by using visual elements to differentiate their white papers from the sea of plain, all-text vanilla papers.

I hope you enjoy it when it comes out!

This entry was posted on Monday, September 7th, 2009 at 5:31 am and is filed under Design & Format, Social Media, Twitter, WP Marketing, White Paper Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.