Creating a whitepaper for your business can be a little confusing since the definition varies greatly from industry to industry.
Historically, it was an explanation and support for a particular political solution found in a legislative document.
In tech, a whitepaper usually describes a theory behind a new piece of technology. Even a business whitepaper can serve a variety of uses and audiences -- some more product-focused than others. Despite being put together like an ebook, they are written quite differently.
We're here to help you understand what a whitepaper is in the context of business and what you should do (and not do) when creating one. In this article, we discuss:
- What is a whitepaper?
- How to write a whitepaper
- Whitepaper examples
What Is a Whitepaper?
A whitepaper is a persuasive, authoritative, in-depth report on a specific topic that presents a problem and provides a solution.
Whitepapers are created by marketers to educate their audiences or explain a particular approach. They are guides for solving advanced problems. Whitepapers typically require an email address to download (most require more information than that), so they are great for capturing leads.
What Isn't a Whitepaper?
A product pitch.
According to Investopedia, whitepapers are "informational documents published by companies to highlight the features of a solution, product, or service," however, beware of overtly promoting your own products.
It is the purpose of a whitepaper to inform and persuade based on facts and evidence, not to explain why people should buy your product right now.
How Are Whitepapers Different From Blog Posts and Ebooks?
Speaking of what a whitepaper isn't ... it's not the only way to present your value to the industry quickly and interactively. Additionally, ebooks and blog posts differ from whitepapers in various ways.
Each of these products is distinguished by its size, appearance, and time commitment. The process of writing and polishing a good whitepaper can take anywhere from a few weeks to a few months, compared to blog posts and ebooks. In comparison to blogs and ebooks, they're less flashy, more serious, and more heavily researched.
Here's a comparison. Below is one of our own ebook templates (which you can download for free). This is a thorough but simple read:
The following is a whitepaper based on our latest research on emerging technologies for small and mid-sized businesses (see the web version here). As you can see, whitepapers can go into great detail, both in text and images:
The same template can be used for ebooks and whitepapers. Ultimately, whitepapers are marketing content's academic papers. In addition to solid research that is fully referenced, readers expect high degrees of expertise.
eBooks, on the other hand, are usually extensions of topics you cover regularly on your blog. A business topic can be unpacked through diligent research, but they appeal to a wider audience.
This makes them seem a little boring in comparison -- most people don't want to read whitepapers, but they do it anyway in order to gain insight into an operation before taking action.
Because of this, they tend to be very detailed and informative, authoritative, and written by industry experts. These qualities can make some decision makers feel better about a future purchase.
What Makes a Good Whitepaper?
Technically, whitepapers are not required to meet any minimum requirements. Any document can be called a whitepaper, but that doesn't mean you should. We run the risk of confusing and losing credibility if we don't set some boundaries on what constitutes a whitepaper. Here's what an A+ whitepaper looks like:
- Length: No fewer than six pages, including illustrations, charts, and references. It can reach 50 pages if the topic requires that much detail. (Chances are, it won't.)
- Structure: There is usually a title page, table of contents, short executive summary (optional but helpful), introduction, several pages educating the reader about the problem, several pages hypothesizing a solution, several pages offering an example of a company that used that solution to achieve results, and a conclusion.
- Density: Denser than an ebook. Most whitepapers aren't easy to skim -- in fact, readers usually need to reread them more than once to get all of the information they need.
- Format: PDF in portrait orientation (8.5" by 11").
- Style: Professional, serious, well written, and well edited. I'd recommend hiring a graphic designer to design page layout, images, fonts, and colors as well.
Whitepaper Examples for Lead Generation
Why do marketers create whitepapers if they are so boring? In addition to being a great resource for your prospects and sales team, they also help you build credibility and trust with your readers. Additionally, those who download whitepapers are often further along in their buying cycle as compared to those who don't.
With that in mind, here are two use cases for a whitepaper:
A Technical Case Study
As with ebooks, case studies are different from whitepapers. Some case studies, however, are long enough to be packaged as whitepapers.
As a result of a partnership with another party, a case study tells the story of how a customer has reached a goal. Metrics that the customer has agreed to measure success on are the best way to convey this success. Additionally, the more research and detail other potential customers want to see as they continue their buyer's journey, the more technical or complex the service is that they received.
By providing a real-world example of how a concept helped someone succeed, case study-based whitepapers can demonstrate thought leadership on a dense concept.
A Reference Guide
Imagine you work for a company that sells kitchen cleaning equipment to restaurants and you write a whitepaper about the maintenance and inspection of commercial kitchens.
There is probably so much information in that whitepaper about legal requirements for exhaust systems, cooking equipment, and cleanliness documentation that it could put even the biggest kitchen maintenance enthusiast to sleep if read cover to cover.
Also, it serves as a great reference for restaurant owners who want to know how to maintain their kitchens to pass inspection. Since they see you as a helpful, detail-oriented, credible source, they're likely to buy some expensive cleaning equipment from you once they learn how clean their kitchens need to be.
For this reason, many people create whitepapers so that their leads can learn more about their trade. Ideally, the better they become, the more qualified they are to work with the organization that provided them with the whitepaper.
Having learned what whitepapers are and how they differ from ebooks, it's time to get started on your own. Here's how you can produce an excellent whitepaper for your audience based on the above best practices:
1. Identify your audience's pain
Even though you are a subject matter expert, you must consider your audience and what is going on in their lives. You will be better able to generate demand for your whitepaper if you create a whitepaper that addresses (and solves) their needs.
To do this, consider creating a buyer persona. This activity will help you put yourself in their shoes. After that, you'll want to consider what type of information would attract them, how they would use it, and how it would solve their pain.
2. Do your research
Whitepapers are informational in nature, and you should determine how to provide your audience with information they cannot find elsewhere. To do so, follow these steps:
- Running an original study/survey
- Compiling unique case studies
- Describe a unique project or process
Consider using statistics from government and/or survey organizations and analyzing them in a unique way (and citing your sources).
3. Create an outline
Considering whitepapers are long-form in nature, an outline can help you organize your thoughts. You might consider sketching out your topic as follows:
- Introduction and Synopsis - Introducing the topic of the whitepaper, explaining why it's important (from the standpoint of the audience), and what the whitepaper sets to do, convey, or solve.
- Overview - Defining some of the key terms you intend to use, detailing the variables or parameters involved, and summarizing what you'll discuss.
- Body - Laying out all the key points and highlights you'll hit.
- Conclusion - Explaining the key take-aways from the body and any action items the reader should take.
4. Put pen to paper and flesh out your outline
Utilizing the outline as a guide, expand on the ideas you have by using an informational and factual tone. Moreover, each paragraph should contribute to the overall goal.
5. Use imagery to support your points
As whitepapers cover extensive research and analysis, charts, graphs, and tables can help you present information visually and make the paper easier to read.
6. Get feedback
Your readers deserve the best write-up you can provide. The higher the quality, the more authority you'll have in the eyes of your audience. To catch typos or other issues with readability, ask someone you trust for feedback.
7. Invest in the formatting and design
It isn't necessary to get too flashy with your whitepaper, but color, layout, and imagery certainly make it more appealing.
Whitepaper Examples
To provide even more inspiration, here are modern examples of whitepapers that illustrate great whitepaper execution (and why):
HubSpot compiles data from experts and partners every year to convey modern trends in marketing. A marketer can use these statistics to create marketing and sales content as well as learn from macro shifts taking place in the industry. This information is presented in the whitepaper with attractive graphs, short editorial summaries, and links to more in-depth articles.
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It's Not You, It's My Data, Custora
This whitepaper explains customer churn, why it's important, and how it can be prevented. It offers the reader tangible value (revenue savings from preventing attrition) backed by a wealth of data and actionable advice. Even better, the whitepaper is modern and attractive, so reading it is enjoyable. In this way, long-form content can be consumed without friction by the reader.
In this whitepaper, Google's authority is used to persuade the reader to adopt AI. Google provides readers with a methodology at the start of the article so that they can understand how AI can be applied to their business. Afterwards, the whitepaper dives into more technical information.
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Employees and Cybersecurity, Excedeo
Excedo aims to educate businesses about the security risks improperly trained employees may unknowingly pose. Today's IT policies and training are essential, according to the whitepaper.
Whitepapers have a long history, and their uses have continued to change. If you are going to spend months producing a whitepaper, make sure it will actually serve your audience. In some cases, an ebook will suffice. On the other hand, long-form educational content has a place in your content strategy.