Not sure what a white paper is in copywriting? Don’t worry, here’s the lowdown:
White papers are a type of research report that isn’t published in a traditional academic journal. The information is considered to be of a higher quality and more relevant to industry than most other academic papers. Because of this, organizations sometimes use white papers to make their opinions known to industry leaders, decision makers, and other influential people in their field. To grab some quick business examples, here are some of the most influential white papers in recent history:
The Case For All-Digital Marketing (2018)
If you’re looking to grow your business in the digital sphere, you’ll have to look no further. This year’s #1 most influential white paper, The Case for All-Digital Marketing (sponsored by HubSpot) explores the transformative power of digital marketing and how your competitors are implementing strategies to stay ahead of the curve.
The Case for All-Digital Marketing highlights a total shift towards more digital marketing methods, such as display advertising, SEO, and content marketing. Several marketing research firms (including HubSpot) predict that 80% of all future marketing budgets will be put towards digital methods by 2020.
While there are undeniable benefits to digital marketing, there are also some drawbacks. For example, the fact that most people know what digital marketing is and can easily Google search for relevant content makes it easier for customers to find the information they need themselves. This, in turn, can lead to reduced sales productivity if your employees aren’t doing the finding and analyzing of marketing data. Another potential pitfall is that having a purely digital presence can make it harder for potential customers to find you. For instance, when was the last time you saw a fax machine at a business office? Although these are legitimate concerns, if you’re looking to grow your business you’ll undoubtedly want to consider investing in digital marketing.
5 Marketing Predictions for 2022
With the world changing around us, we examine how marketing will evolve over the next five years.
- Digital Marketing will continue to grow in 2022
- In 2022, marketers will prioritize content creation over buying ads
- Marketing analytics will continue to evolve
- Pricing will become less of a concern for marketers
- In 2022, marketers will focus more on engagement than acquiring new customers
As we’ve established, white papers aren’t your usual academic research paper. This is why they’re typically associated with business — they’re a way of presenting valuable insight to key decision makers while also being authoritative and respected. But that doesn’t mean that every white paper will be meaningful and helpful to your business.
To determine the value of a particular piece of academic research, you need to consider 3 factors:
The Relevance Of The Research To Your Industry
This is fairly self-explanatory, but nonetheless worth mentioning. Without a doubt, white papers that are relevant to your industry are more useful to your business than those that aren’t. Why? Because the former can provide you with the knowledge and understanding of what your customers need and want. The latter can only provide you with general information that might be useful to you but not necessarily your customers (or potential customers). For example, if you’re an apparel company and the research suggests that men aged between 16 and 25 will more often than not buy hoodies rather than sweatshirts, you can bet that you’ll want to study the reasons behind this.
Since your customers are the people that you’re ultimately aiming to serve with your products, it stands to reason that you should try to understand them better.
The Quality Of The Research
Here, we need to step back a little bit and define what makes for good quality research. As mentioned by the name, high quality research is typically characterized by its accuracy, originality, and its relevance to a specific audience. When determining the quality of a particular piece of research, you should look for a body of work that can stand up to rigorous peer review and the scrutiny of experts in your field. That is what makes scholarly articles different from, well, regular articles.
In general, the more original and rigorous the research, the more value it will have to your business. But that doesn’t mean that every piece of academic research is gold. Take the time to identify what makes this particular research valuable and useable by your audience and, hopefully, you’ll be able to apply the same approach to future studies.
How Effective Is The Research In Moving The Dialectic
This refers to the ability of the research to provoke thoughts, discussions, and, in some cases, actions. When determining the effectiveness of a particular piece of research, you need to look at how well it fulfills its stated aims. To put it simply, if you can’t use the information to enhance your existing knowledge, it’s pretty much a waste of time.
For example, let’s say that you’re a marketer for a consumer goods company and that the research suggests that men aged between 16 and 25 prefer chocolate over vanilla ice cream. You can’t argue with the facts, but maybe the context in which these facts were presented — using an ice cream brand, for example — was such that it provoked a different response from you. In these situations, you can say that the research moved the dialectic and made you think a little bit harder about your product choices. In the grand scheme of things, this is exactly what matters.
When To Use These Research Documents
White papers are typically used when you want to make your thoughts and ideas known to interested parties while also being able to back up these thoughts and ideas with some sort of evidence. Since these pieces of academic research aren’t widely available to the average person (think obscure journals, professional conferences, and pricey university libraries), companies sometimes use white papers to get around the lack of access. This is why you’ll sometimes see a news article with a quote or two from an influential white paper buried in there somewhere.
As an example, let’s say that you’re the CEO of a large company that makes children’s clothing and you notice that popular trends on social media are moving away from the traditional cotton fabrics used for these sorts of garments to materials that are more eco-friendly. You determine, based on your extensive research, that faux fur is the way forward in terms of sustainability. Since you can’t just decide to change your company’s entire manufacturing process, you decide to draft a white paper presenting your findings and ideas on how to make this change happen.
As a result, you’re now able to add a new line of clothing to your collection that is not only more sustainable but also looks and feels more like real fur. This is what a white paper can do — give you the ability to explore new ideas, back them up with research, and move the discussion forward.
Hopefully, this was helpful. Now that you know what a white paper is and how to identify one that is valuable to your business, you can look for more information online or in the library.