White papers can generate leads, position your company as a leader, gain interest from the media, and educate customers and prospects.

With benefits like these, what’s not to like about white papers? Well, for one, the term white paper has become corrupted. Historically, white papers have been educational in nature, tackling a technical or business challenge using a relatively straightforward and objective problem/solution approach.

I say ‘relatively’ because a white paper is still a marketing publication intended to advance the goals of your organization. And sadly, many white papers are nothing but terribly disguised sales pitches. Think: fake nose and glasses. Write a fake nose white paper and your audience will suffer. Then you will suffer when your white paper is trashed and your company’s name cursed.

My best advice: Leave out the marketing speak, set your sales briefcase down, and take an educational approach to white papers. Here’s how:

• Choose a topic that’s relevant to your audience. Focus on an approach to solving an important customer problem. It may be your company’s approach, but you don’t need to advertise that. Develop the paper along the lines of problem/solution, or cause/effect, or compare/contrast.
• Looking for good topics? Conduct customer and prospect surveys about industry challenges and approaches to solving them, then compile the data and report it in a white paper.
• Be topical. Focus on issues that are current.
• Come up with a title that says exactly what the white paper is about: “Pragmatic Business Strategy: Nine Ways to Make Marketing Work in Challenging Times.”
• Your title and first few paragraphs are the most important. Make sure you have a hook that grabs the reader’s attention. The above mentioned white paper includes a hook that draws the reader in and promises a benefit:

 “. . . how can your company be one of those success stories that market and grow their business during challenging times?”

• Use visuals such as charts and graphs to support your main points.
• Use clear, straightforward language. Stay away from jargon and buzzwords.
• Choose typefaces and sizes carefully to separate sections and make for easy reading on the eyes.
• Have your white papers professionally researched, written and produced! (Talk to Klein)

How to Use White Papers

• Publish white papers to your Web site in PDF format. You might provide open access to an executive summary or excerpts, then require user registration to view the entire white paper. This way, you generate leads.
• Send white papers as an attachment to e-mail campaigns or provide links in e-mails back to your Web site
• Print and send white papers to customers and prospects.
• Distribute white papers at trade shows or other events.
• Submit white papers to other industry Web sites that seek educational content for their audience.
• Offer white papers as a call-to-action in a marketing campaign, such as an e-mail sponsorship or even a search engine ad.
• Use white papers to attract interest from media contacts.