How Ebooks and whitepapers help you generate leads and grow business

Ebooks and whitepapers are the best way to generate a large number of interested prospects quickly and at a rather low cost. Here is how it works.

The B2B buyer of today is quite different from what you would see some years back. Today’s consumers carry out independent product research and value the different offerings based on the content they interact with.

In fact, Gartner has found that B2B buyers spend 45% of the time on independent research, while only 17% in meeting with potential suppliers. Under these conditions, marketing content, such as whitepapers play a critical role in helping buyers make a decision.

Content builds credibility in the eyes of your audience and increases trust in the company’s offerings. As such, it’s an integral part of your marketing and lead generation efforts.

Savvy content marketers leverage high quality, optimized content to generate leads. According to recent studies by the Content Marketing Institute, up to 85% of B2B marketers acknowledge that the most critical objective of content marketing is lead generation.

You need content with high potential of hitting your lead generation goals. Those that encourage your audience to volunteer providing crucial details like their names, email address, and other information on the registration forms. It also has to be substantial, providing information that can’t be easily found anywhere else.

Whitepapers and ebooks hit the sweet spot between the cost of production, lead willingness to register for access to these materials and trust-building qualities of this content. Moreover – in contrast to webinar, production works can be done by third party specialists.

While cost can vary dramatically between industries and markets, we have seen that in Europe advertising cost per download of whitepaper or eBook ranges from 6 – 18 Euros. That is a very low cost to get contact details of audience interested in your topic!

What is a whitepaper?

In essence, a whitepaper is an authoritative, well-researched, properly structured and referenced document that communicates a fair level of details about its subject. It’s usually targeted for prospects that expect a deeper understanding of a particular matter.

The form of marketing content is appropriate when justifying product claims, especially if your audience requires technical argumentation and specialist knowledge to understand them.

Besides explaining complex subjects, you can also use the approach to introduce not-so-obvious ideas. The volume is usually between 2000 to 5000 words, and it’s prepared for prospects who want to spend their time and efforts reading.

Why publish whitepapers?

Generally, marketers have three crucial reasons why they publish whitepapers: to nurture prospects, generate leads, or help close sales. Other companies use whitepapers to attract their audience and prospects attention, redefine their space in the market, or for staking out their position as a reliable industry leader.

It is very important to make sure your whitepapers are well research and contains a sufficient amount of supporting data to back up your claims. I strongly advise against labelling anything that is not well researched and structured document of over 2000 words a whitepaper. (I have seen companies call their datasheet a whitepaper. You don’t want to do that!)

Strategically, whitepapers fit into the continuously growing trend of content marketing. The model acknowledges that sceptical consumers are craving for a service provider that doesn’t just peddle their products, but one that can also be their trusted advisor. Well written whitepapers can do a remarkable job.

Essential components of a simple whitepaper

Whitepapers can serve different purposes, therefore their structure can vary. I recommend making sure you have a proper Go-To-Market strategy in place before producing marketing content.

A very simple approach to whitepaper is to cover at least the following:

• You must identify the main problem that your customers face then describe how it could impact their operations – like cost increases, lost market share, or a damaged reputation.  
• Describe different solutions and approaches that have been used previously to address the problem and point out their benefits and setbacks. After this, you’ll then present your solution then show your audience how it helps other businesses, and why it beats the other alternatives. Your description must demonstrate the enhancements in detail before a conclusion rounds it up.
• Make sure you’ve backed your arguments with research and statistics from reputable sources or original research to build credibility.

What is an Ebook?

Most companies face hardships generating leads, hence have a more challenging time filling sales funnels, and this is where the eBook comes in.

This marketing approach uses shorter and lighter content that’s created in a much simpler language and takes less effort to read. The content also includes more illustrations, and the target audience is those looking for a general understanding of a particular idea or subject. A typical length of eBook is around 750 – 1500 words, however, we recommend to aim to around 1500 words or more demanding readers might feel cheated.

Why use EBooks?

EBooks serve as a great lead magnet and are less expensive to produce than whitepapers, which typically required significant research.

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B2B companies that are out to reach larger audiences and grow the number of prospective leads often need to provide content, that makes it easy to understand a few not too complex ideas.

EBooks work well to create awareness in earlier stages of the customer journey by supplying them with easily consumed useful information that showcases your brand’s credibility.

How EBooks benefit your company

EBooks can impact your company in many ways. Here are the primary benefits enjoyed by your business if you create this content:

• You’ll generate more leads at reasonable costs – ebooks are effective lead magnets that can help you improve your brand’s lead generation. It’s easier to expand your mailing list and attract more clients by sending them valuable information at no cost.
• You will build trust and reputation – companies face a challenging time proving themselves when their following is still minimal. Attracting the right prospects and growing your brand takes time, but you can quickly boost your credibility by supplying them with knowledge.
• Loyalty – your existing customers will value your relationships more and quite possibly would be interesting in exploring more of your offerings. They are also more likely to recommend your content to their peers.
• At end of the day – it generates sales – even if the eBook isn’t for sale, availing the insights to your audience for free can quickly move a user down the sales funnel. They’ll grow more familiar with your content and brand. When you align the content with the buyers’ journey, your audience will feel ready to buy.

Which content marketing approach should you use?

There are two content marketing approaches that you can use in your whitepaper and eBook content. 

The first one is to offer quality content while maintaining a low sales push. The information usually respects the buyer and offers valuable insights to help. Whitepapers and eBooks also provide whatever was promised, and there’s no aggressive follow-up. Instead, a thoughtful automated nurturing campaign is used.

This approach helps build the trust and respects the buyers. Moreover, it maximizes marketing efficiency, because prospects that are not ready to buy right now are continuously educated until they are ready to buy.

Another approach is to use content purely as the lead magnet. Here, you’ll offer big promises and use punchy headlines, a lower word count and lower value for information. This is followed-up by a very active sales follow-up.

Both approaches are practical. The first strategy works best if you want to build trust and generate leads for complex and expensive products, such as innovative technologies for B2B. The second approach, on the other hand, can help quickly fill in the sales pipeline, thus helping to close first deals faster.

Key Takeaway

Content is a crucial part of your company’s marketing and has a significant role to play in your lead generation. Brands are judged by the content they provide to their audiences. From the customer’s perspective, you are the content you offer.

Your content choices, key messages and arguments should be based on your GTM strategy. Therefor it is highly recommended to make sure you have a sound strategy before starting to produce marketing content.

Below are some recommendations when to use ebooks and when whitepapers.

Offering	Ebook	Whitepaper
Complicated innovative product		X
Known product or upgrade to known product	X
Selling well known third party’s product	X
Selling to a technical audience		X
Complex buying project involving multiple people on buying team	X	X
An innovative product that attracts lots of buyer scrutiny (e.g. safety or compliance concerns)		X

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EBooks and whitepapers are among the content types with the most lead generation potential. Compared to blog posts, these are more expensive and would take up more time and expense to create. But whether your focus is to generate leads, educate your audience, or increase your brand awareness, valuable content will help you collect more client information. I certainly recommend using these types of content.

We at IBD Consulting have a robust process of marketing content creation which involves technical experts. Because of our focus on technology marketing, we are very experienced of explaining complex technical subjects to business or technical audience.