Author: J.C. Cross

White Papers for Dummies held me a little more when it talked about promoting your white paper after you have created it.

First up, the must-do’s have all the things that I did in my marketing department position:

1. Create a landing page with an abstract
2. Feature it prominently on your site
3. Mention it in company newsletters
4. Email your salespeople/partners/in-house opt-in list
5. Tweet about it on Twitter
6. Blog about it
7. Announce it in LinkedIn groups
8. Publish a press release
9. Send it to relevant journalists and bloggers
10. Get mentioned in channel partner newsletters (and vice versa for them)
11. Post it on (Scribd.com, slideshare.com, slideboom.com, mybrainshark.com)
12. Create a slide deck and send it to sales and channel partners

So I have to remind myself:

1. Write every day
2. Challenge the belief that you can’t learn any more about being a good writer
3. Read the classics often
   The Elements of Style (illustrated one like I have)
   The AP Stylebook (all the way back to undergrad!)
   Writer’s Market (100th anniv this year)
   
   I’ll update this now and then today.

2:51 PM –
4. Just remembered Faulkner’s advice for writing: kill all your darlings, i.e. don’t be afraid to cross out that turn of phrase or word that you really think is great. Something better may come out of it.

 

For me, the most important part of White Papers for Dummies is where you need to have a vision where there was none. Your product or company needs to differentiate itself by providing a new solution, or a new approach to a problem.

Traditional solutions do this wrong. Your offering does this instead. Clearly say what your company (or client) is doing and why your company does it best. You can prove through statistics and research. Sum up the problem, show how the competing offering doesn’t work, and then show your new and improved solution.

In a problem-solution paper, don’t mention your solution until the very last minute. This may sound counterintuitive, but the reason is to promote you as a trusted advisor and expert on your area.

Just creating my white paper with the following pages:

1. Cover page

2. Content index and copyright notice

3. Executive summary, which I mentioned

4. Introduction to the industry-wide problem

5. Traditional solutions and how they don’t work (or work optimally)

6. Our new solution

7. Product buying guide

8. Case study (optional)

9. Conclusion and call to action

10. About the company (1/2 page)

11. End notes and bibliography

Again, these are adapted from White Papers for Dummies

In learning how to write white papers with White Papers for Dummies and other sources, I got the idea for this post.

To make a company stand out, you must present a next gen solution to a problem. In a paper I am writing right now, the client has a product that is not just an iteration, but something that is going to change the game.

I have already written an executive summary. This is geared to physicians and hospitals, and I need to come up with a great title. The book says that it should mirror the issue being discussed. I don’t know the client’s wishes yet or reactions to this initial summary, but I do know that a problem being presented needs a solution that only you can offer. I am trying to figure out a metaphor or just start with a question.

This seems really technical though in the prior white papers of theirs. Marketing has a better set of ideas than what they appeared to have done previously. It’s all about getting them into the top of the sales funnel (or perhaps later).

I don’t know if they will like a problem/solution white paper that is a hard sell–but that’s what I gave them. Hoping for some guidance.