Getting More From Your White Papers

October 9^th 2012 Sally Ormond blog posts from white papers, repurposing white papers, white papers

There are lots of companies out there who generate loads of white papers. These documents are used to outline a particular issue faced by their customers and how it can be resolved. The are a mix between a brochure that highlights the benefits of a product or service and an educational article, conveying technical information in a marketing format.

But once published they are all too frequently left to gather dust in an archive somewhere.

The information contained within the white papers is hugely valuable, so surely it makes sense to make the most of it?

Make your white papers go further

White papers can be relatively short, or they can go on for 50 pages or more; that’s a lot of information.

One of the best ways to get a bit more mileage out of them is to re-purpose the content for your corporate blog. After all, finding enough ideas for posts it tough, so having a ready bank of usable information is gold dust.

The only problem you may find is that the language used in the white paper may be too technical and dry to be effective on your blog, so you’ll need to do some re-writing. But it’s well worth doing as a single white paper can generate several posts.

So how do you convert them?

Well, here’s a few things to bear in mind before you start:

Think about your audience, they will be different from those who are likely to read the white paper so write in for them
Come up with a strategy to cut up the information to provide self-contained posts that link to each other
Try to come up with new ways of presenting some of the information (such as graphics and diagrams) to add variety and interest

In no time at all you’ll have a whole stack of blog posts just waiting to be published.

So, what was once a forgotten about white paper collecting dust in your website’s archive can now offer you a stream of new marketing materials, which can be used to pull in a whole new audience.

Whether you have the expertise (and time) to do this in house, or you bring in a copywriter, it’s a great way of generating content.