Want to influence key decision makers at large companies? Thinking about sinking some dollars into webcasts? The verdict is in and the white paper is the trick—by a long shot. This is even more important if you are targeting larger companies.

A new study by ITtoolbox revealed that large companies are significantly more reliant on and influenced by white papers. In the 2006 IT Purchasing Survey, more than 2300 IT-related decision makers, such as analysts, developers and project managers weighed in.

White Papers Strong as Online Content

When asked what online content is used to make purchasing decisions, the study found white papers (64.5% reporting) were just a notch below research (69.7%) on the influence scale, and better than news (59.80%), discussion groups (54.7%), webcasts (28.2%) and blogs (26%).

Here is a demographic breakdown of the influence of white papers:

• Overall: 64.5% rely on white papers
• United States: 68.8% rely on white papers
• Large corporations: 70.1% rely on white papers
• Mid-sized corporations: 62.7% rely on white papers
• Small corporations: 58.9% rely on white papers

White Papers King as Advertising Vehicles

Shifting focus slightly from white papers as online content to white papers as advertising vehicles, the study showed white papers triumph.

White papers (70.5% reporting) were overwhelmingly the number one advertising approach to influence IT people, followed at a distance by webcasts (40.4%), email ads (37.3%), sponsorships/microsites (34.3%), banners and rich media (32.4%) and text links (21.3%).

Here is how white papers break down demographically:

• Overall: 70.5% are influenced by white papers
• United States: 74.7% are influenced by white papers
• Large corporations: 76.3% are influenced by white papers
• Mid-sized corporations: 71.7% are influenced by white papers
• Small corporations: 63.9% are influenced by white papers

I spoke with George Krautzel, president of ITtoolbox, and asked him why he thinks white papers are so influential. He said:

White papers are now a standard part of the IT purchasing cycle. Both decision makers and influencers utilize these assets to gain knowledge on a specific topic or practice. Advertisers have increasingly used white papers to generate quality sales leads because they directly engage potential buyers. With ITtoolbox, our advertising partners can take that value one step further. Using our contextual matching engine, our advertising partners can now place their white papers directly in front of relevant users while they are engaged with a topic that matches their white paper’s topic.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 20th, 2006 at 5:16 pm and is filed under Lead Generation, Statistics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.