How to turn "should read" into "must read" and – eventually – "did read."
It’s hard to measure the percentage of white papers and e-books that are downloaded but never read. Don't let yours be among them.
By Jonathan Crossfield
It’s a common refrain: “We’re a B2B company. We can’t do the same things those B2C funsters get up to.”
Another good one is: “Our product/industry/niche is just too serious and boring for content marketing.”
But it’s worth pointing out that shedloads of content are published every day for which “boring” might be a polite description (“predictable” and “unnecessary” would be others.)
I regularly see reports, white papers, and articles that would require me to stab myself repeatedly in the leg with a fork simply to stay awake beyond the opening paragraphs.
I’m sure the marketers publishing this content wouldn’t say it’s boring. Perhaps they don’t realize it is. Perhaps internal feedback convinced them the world is desperate for an academic thesis on interlocking flanges … or something.
Perhaps the content was written to satisfy an internal audience – a C-suite eager for the brand to appear smarter than the competition.
Meanwhile, prospective customers just want to solve a problem or learn something new without feeling like they're studying for a Ph.D.
“Aha,” I hear some of you cry. "Boring doesn’t necessarily mean bad! Lots of things can be boring and still offer value. People don’t download and read a white paper on flanges to be entertained, right? They download it because staying on top of flange technology is useful in their jobs."
And, finally, this: "If lots of people are downloading the white paper or whatever it is, perhaps being boring isn’t really an issue."
Let me rebut by getting up onto one of my favorite old soapboxes.
Ahem …
Surely the goal of all these white papers, reports, and e-books isn’t to capture unqualified leads whether or not anyone reads the content.
That’s like a movie studio claiming its new blockbuster is a raging box office success despite audiences walking out of the cinema after the first few scenes. Marketing may have sold tickets and put bums on seats, but the content still needs to hold the audience’s attention until the credits roll.
My wife is always at me to eat more fruit. I’d like to eat healthier too – or at least I know I should.
Good intentions fill my fruit bowl each week. But good intentions don’t mean my snack preference is a plum or a banana.
I just finished off a packet of wine gums someone (read: me) recklessly left near my desk (read: purposely put in the drawer ). Those good intentions aren’t working too well right now.
Eventually, I’ll throw out the uneaten and overripe fruit before stocking up again with more of what I should eat – but probably won’t. Cheesy and sugary snacks never seem to reach their use-by date in our house.
I’m the same with white papers. I regularly download interesting-sounding reports and e-books, filling my
iPad with content I “should” read. The information they promise is directly relevant to my work or the research is pertinent to my areas of interest.
But when I have a few free minutes, I’m far more likely to choose something I want to read rather than what I feel I should read.
Those worthy and good-for-me reports and white papers stay unread until the information within them gradually passes the best-before date.
It’s 2021. That detailed report on digital trends for 2019 is probably not that useful anymore. Delete.
So how do you turn “should read” into “want to read” and eventually into “did read?"
Your content shouldn't be only relevant or even only interesting. It also should be compelling and irresistible.
How will your white paper make the reader stop whatever they’re doing to devote time to it now? Or, failing that, what will make the reader unable to resist returning to it later?
If the topic, product, or industry seems boring to you, of course, it might feel impossible to produce interesting, creative, and engaging content.
And when you’re working on the business side, you may be asked to focus on what the product is rather than what it does. Viewing a product primarily in functional and technical terms can be quite different from the customer’s viewpoint.
But remember: Products and things aren’t inherently interesting. People make them interesting. People give them meaning.
That’s why a central tenet of content marketing is that the product isn’t the story – people are. B2C marketers know this. B2B marketers sometimes have trouble thinking the same way.
Is your content about things? Or is it about people and what they can do with those things? Instead of writing in the abstract, place your content in the real world. Their world.
Or, if the real world of people working with flanges is still a tad too pedestrian, take your content a step further. Blend some fiction in with your facts to create a hyperreal world your audience will happily spend a little time exploring.
I don't often get to write lines like this in B2B content: “I’m sure we’ve all had days when carefully laid plans suddenly change, and you unexpectedly find yourself defusing a nuclear device while hanging upside down out of a brothel window in Marrakesh.”
Doesn’t sound very B2B, does it? It’s from one of the most fun projects I’ve worked on, a collaboration with Sydney agency McCorkell & Associates (M&A) on an e-book for Oakton (now NTT) to promote its business intelligence tools.
Oakton asked the agency to come up with a content-led strategy that would stand apart from the myriad data service organizations targeting the same audience of CMOs.
Sam Marks at M&A suggested a secret-agent theme that drew an extended analogy between James Bond’s Q Branch (which equips agents with the gadgets and intelligence they need in the field) and the data management capability within a large organization.
Supported by a series of sponsored LinkedIn posts and a LinkedIn Pulse article, the campaign easily exceeded its target for landing appointments with high-value leads.
Colorful analogies like these can be effective ways of explaining otherwise boring technical concepts. They can also make the content irresistible to read.
Better still, every little pun, every unexpected twist, every wry joke may help to make the content more memorable. Humor can be a great tool to maintain a reader’s attention.
Laughter, or even mild enjoyment, is associated with an increase of pleasure hormones like dopamine, which aids the creation of memories, and a reduction in stress hormones like cortisol, known to impede memory.
Does all of this seem less professional and more frivolous than it should when targeting enterprise decision makers? Professionalism isn’t defined by a tone of voice – serious, formal, and academic – but by how effectively the job is done.
If everyone gives up on your white paper after two dreary and boring paragraphs, how can it be classed as professional?
The next time you’re admiring the impressive download results from your latest white paper, ask yourself how many of those people actually read it.
How many people acted on the information and advice contained in it? How many people made it to the call to action on the final page?
Too often, content teams want white papers to appear valuable whether or not they deliver on their promise.
Focus instead on the reader’s natural interests and behaviors. Add a little more creativity. That way, your next piece of content will have more chance of being plucked from the fruit bowl while it’s still fresh. CCO
Jonathan Crossfield describes himself as a storyteller because writer, editor, content strategist, digital marketer, journalist, copywriter, consultant, trainer, speaker, and blogger wouldn’t fit neatly on a business card. He has won awards for his magazine articles and blog posts on digital marketing, but that was so long ago now it seems boastful to keep mentioning it. Follow Jonathan on Twitter @Kimota.
