White Papers Win Again (According to MarketingSherpa)
By Michael StelznerMarketingSherpa recently posted a case study from Arbor Networks.
It examined the power of podcasts and many other forms of lead generation, along with white papers.
They did tie ins with white papers and podcasts, along with traditional syndication of educational white papers.
Here are some the results:
The team tracked the percent of sales leads they received across all advertising media through the year. (Please bear in mind that all media buys were not equally large, nor is brand awareness measured, so these numbers are not apples to apples, but rather general indicators.)
49% White paper offers
25% Banner ads
21% Email newsletter sponsorships
2% Text links
2% Glued-in inserts in print magazines
1% Print ads
Summary: The white paper is still the strongest lead generation tool.
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February 16th, 2007 at 11:15 am
Why do so many whitepapers have no author name on them? Would you recommend leaving out the name, or including it? I personally hate reading a disembodied whitepaper…don’t know if someone put some thought into it, or it is a contracted piece of hack. Makes me wonder if the author is ashamed of putting their name to it.
What do you and your blog visitors think?
February 16th, 2007 at 11:24 am
Gary - It is usually not about the author but rather the sponsoring company. If the author has no significant credibility, it is better to leave the name off. With highly technical papers, they might include an author. However, more business focused papers tend not to have them. 99 percent of the papers I wrote for my clients do not have my name on them. - Mike
February 16th, 2007 at 11:32 am
Gary,
Most companies don’t want the reader to think that the content came from anywhere other than inside the organization. They hire an outside writer to be a “ghost writer” for them.
The only circumstances where a company will put a name on the cover is when that name can lend credibility to the paper, such as a well-known industry resource, analyst, specialist, or Phd. (for what its worth).