A Collection of Thoughts About White Papers

A White Paper is an expert treatise on any matter of pertinent and timely interest that you are, as a result of your professional activities, in a position to prepare. The White Paper is itself merchandisable and publicizable, and helps establish you as an authority. The tone of a White Paper is slightly on the sophomoric side of conversational, somewhat on the personable side of academic. It's intended as a briefing for the uninitiated on a topic you would be expected to know all about. For example, we might, from our perspective, prepare a white paper on the application of facsimile communications to publicity, its problems and opportunities.

The press is being unusually responsive to white papers, often treating them with the same news value as a new product. We encourage you to issue white papers on timely and relevant issues and topics. They're inexpensive to create and distribute, easy to promote, good for news and great for your authority.

We've mentioned white papers several times recently. This week, we'll spend some of our time getting more familiar with them.

Any treatise on any subject can fit in the definition of a white paper. In spirit, a white paper presents a somewhat scholarly, somewhat expert, somewhat educational, somewhat adversarial, somewhat objectively substantiated, somewhat subjectively opinionated, somewhat noteworthy view of a particular phenomenon. It must not be a simple collection review of generally known information, nor a purely opinionated or political diatribe. You wouldn't talk about why your own product is better, but you might review technology choices available to you and how your research into them (or other forces) led to differences in features of the product and benefits to the user. Even better, talk about surveys into the problems that bother users of earlier alternatives, and share some highlights from your data. You run things more seat-of-the-pants? Wake up one morning with a sudden inspiration? Tell the story.

There are a lot of similes for a good white paper. It may read like a great interview, a terrific fireside story, a wonderful dinner anecdote or a really interesting magazine article. It may remind you of some of the most stimulating discussions you've ever had in product planning meetings or just plain old bull sessions; these are, by the way, great sources for white paper material. If you can think of a story that begins, "There's a really interesting side to all this that most people never get to hear...", you have the makings of a great white paper.

The first step is always gathering source material. There may be some good ore in your internal marketing memos, in speeches your people deliver, in your R&D team's notebooks or in the compilation of customer service reports. By far, the most likely sources will be verbal: things you overhear at meetings, lunch, coffee breaks, parties and so on. Make a note of the subject, and who will know the most about it. Get that person to talk to a cassette recorder - alone or with you there to prompt him or her - for at least 10-20 minutes, or as long as it takes. Invite others to attach their own notes and comments, or perform the whole session in a conference room environment.

The next step is to transcribe the tape into a draft of a white paper. You may want to do this yourselves, ask us to get involved or arrange for a third party's services. Some writers work well direct from a tape; others may prefer to have a steno transcribe the recording onto paper, or into a file. If you work with a transcription, give it another pass around everybody who's been involved to see if anybody has anything to add. This works best if you don't treat the document as a major project, but rather as a fun and productive task.

The difference between good writing and bad writing often comes down to a question of organization and story flow; great writing tells a story in a way that involves a reader's interest without challenging his or her ability to associate disjointed elements. Does your manuscript pass that test? It may help to make a copy, mark each section with a couple of words that identify what it says, cut the copy apart and reorganize it for better story flow. Some people make good use of outlines for this purpose. Some sections may seem not to fit at all; they probably don't.

Why are we doing all this? There are several good reasons. Editors look for issues in a marketplace as linchpins for continuing coverage. Issues require at least two factions, each of which has a position upon which a white paper may expound. A close and fundamental association with one side or the other in an issue that receives continuing press attention yields continuing and often, in the eyes of their readers and your prospects, compelling forum. The success of a white paper in securing this forum depends primarily on two factors: whether the press regards the issue as big-deal newsworthy, and whether you are ahead of the pack in identifying and going on the record about the issue.

Readers look at companies who take the lead in identifying important issues as authorities - even if they happen not to agree. This is useful prestige. Did you ever notice that you pay more attention to outspoken people, whether or not you agree with them? Being in the vanguard on issues plays an important role in building authority.

The white paper is itself, by its very nature a product of interest to your audience. It creates visibility for you through news, product and literature coverage, and gives you repeated forums for expressing your viewpoint as it gains distribution. Even if its subject is anecdotal ("How we imagined a better mousetrap after the airport lost our baggage," perhaps), you still can make a positive impression as a human, creative company, a team of good souls.

Prevention. Reflection. Invention. Contention. Extension. Direction. The six "p.r.i.c.e.d." cues are priceless triggers to the thought processes that can lead to interesting white papers.

White papers present too broad a range of possibilities for us to cover thoroughly here. As always, we're available to help you determine what your best options are and how to accomplish them.

Whatever channels you choose to pursue, your choices inevitably create a channel stance, and that means you're taking sides on one or more issues. Are you pro or con on other channels? Has history taught you any channel lessons? Is loyalty a factor? Margins? Do you have anything good or bad to say about the channels you're in, those you're not in or those you want to be in? This is food for a market-positioning "quotes" release, or for a White Paper, or maybe for an "us versus them" debate forum in a particular magazine's editorial format.

Somebody once said (perhaps you know the source), "Be careful of what you wish for; you may get it." This is often an appropriate reminder for newcomers to publicity, who may be lulled, seduced or misled into thinking of certain kinds of appearances as "big scores" when, indeed, they turn out to be "big snores." We thought it might be appropriate to review a few examples.

First, though, some time-proven basics. The four phases of accomplishment in marketing communications - visibility, credibility, authority & leadership - each requires its predecessor. There's no one mention once that can help you or harm you enough to make much difference in the long run. And today's news wraps tomorrow's garbage. At the moment, these may sound like bumper stickers, but do keep them in mind as we go through our examples.

Imagine you have a brand new company with a brand new Whatzis. You jot down a few alternatives to consider as goals for your publicity program: Interviews with your CEO. A company-authored article in a magazine that accepts them. A five-city press tour. A cable video news spot. A radio talk show appearance for your president. All five should prove fantastic flops; let's look at why.

In the vernacular, "spitting in the wind" offers a fair explanation why an interview with your CEO is out of sequence. CEO interviews are a wonderful way to build a company's authority, but first you have to establish the credibility of the CEO's and the company's position or what little interest you may muster will be tempered by skepticism. In turn, you can't well expect to establish any credibility for an unknown company or product or individual, so visibility is a necessary first mandate. Isn't this true - in every case - for the interviews that you read - and certainly for the ones you care about? So why, you may ask, do so many publicists try to leapfrog those first two steps? There are several answers to this last question, but none of them are flattering to publicists.

Consider the magazines you read that accept vendor-authored articles. Do you trust these articles? Do you believe them to be objective? Do you hold these magazines in high regard? Are they the magazines you'd turn to first when making a purchase decision? With a very few exceptions (notably academic, scientific and medical professional journals), there is no such magazine that its readers hold in very high regard; however, the same subject in the hands of an accomplished journalist, often balanced by coverage of other vendors in the market niche, are among those most trusted by readers. The energy it takes to create a single authored article is better when channeled into a White Paper or press briefing that can reach the many authors, journalists and freelancers who cover the subject - especially those who write for the top publications in the market.