A Quick Guide to White Paper Promotion

So you’ve produced an awesome white paper. Now what? For it to become an effective lead-generation tool, you’ll need to promote it effectively. Here are a few white paper promotion tips for getting the word out without buying costly ad campaigns.

Create a Landing Page

First things first: You need an effective landing page to get the contact info of people reading your paper. If you have basic and web design skills, you can do this yourself.

If not, don’t fret. You can still use a landing-page generating service for cheap. Sites like Unbounce  let users create single pages with the help of templates and step-by-step guides.

There’s a whole science behind landing-page design, but in general, pages should:

• Only ask for essential information – such as name and email.
• Feature short and action-focused copy.
• Reassure readers that their information will be kept private.

Write a Press Release and Use a Free Distribution Service

A press release announcing  your white paper as if it were a new product is an effective way to attract readers.

There are two ways to get a press release published for free. The first is to submit it to a free press release distributor, such as a ClickPress.com, PR.com, or Free-Press-Release.com. For additional $150 or so, the sites will give added benefits such as permanent archiving and better placement.

The second way to get your press release distributed for free is to find a journalist that reports on the same subject or industry as the white paper and pitch them on writing a brief news story about your white paper. Old-fashioned, but it still works.

Promote Using Blogs and Other Social Media Assets

Your own blog and social media channels are a great way to build buzz for your white paper’s release.

You can also leverage the visibility of the blogs of others by offering to create some content for them. Reach out to bloggers in your industry and offer to write a guest post adapted from the white paper. The posts will help them diversify article topics and enhance their SEO.  For you, guest posting will help you promote your white paper for free by building visibility, providing backlinks to your landing page, and gaining publicity for yourself and your company.

Use a Free White Paper Distribution Service

Many of the places that conduct paid white-paper distribution services will also host your white paper for free. Examples include TechRepublic and FindWhitePapers.com.

The sites will host your paper, but in most cases it will only be visible to site visitors searching the directory by topic. Paid-promotion campaigns can cost between $15-100 dollar per lead, and usually have a minimum spending limit of thousands of dollars.

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