What if there were no stop signs.

What if a corporation (perhaps one of your clients or your company) was tasked with coming up with the “new” stop sign.

Watch this really funny video!

Ever been on a project like this? I swear this is one of my old clients!

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According to Larry Chase, “When done right, nothing pulls in qualified sales leads like a well-targeted offer for a juicy white paper.”

I would strongly agree.

Larry recently crafted a list of white paper marketing tips. Here are a few of his better tips (with my commentary). Read the rest of this article »

Can a two page document be properly labeled a white paper?

While researching for a client, I came across this white paper.

Its length: Two pages.

Add a cover page and a full page of author biographies and it brought the count to four. I’ll let you examine it in a few seconds.

A few weeks ago we had a very lively discussion on the length of white papers.

Now I actually have a really short one as a case example.

Here is the link: Download this paper now.

So I ask you, is this really a white paper??

If you are a blogger, marketer or a writer you face a very serious challenge.

What’s the problem: People don’t pay attention anymore (I am a prime example).

Think about it:

• Hundreds of TV channels to surf from home (at home and on your cell phone)
• Your email inbox crammed with a never ending-stream of messages
• Millions of possible websites to surf
• A mailbox full of junk mail, catalogs, …
• More commercials (on TV, the radio, …)
• Music over radio, satellite and TV
• Did I mention voicemail and newspapers?
• Let’s throw in social media, like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn

All these choices create a huge problem for you. But there is a solution. Read the rest of this article »

It was July 3rd 2oo6 when I first launched this blog.

Man what a ride!

I want to thank everyone who has contributed to the more than 3400 comments and 425 articles that have been posted on this blog!

Here’s a little treat from Target Marketing: 6 Ways to Optimize B-to-B Free-Content Offerings (yours truly was interviewed for this article).

Thanks everyone!

One of my early predictions for this year was a spike in the demand for white paper writers this year. Or said another way, I predicted marketing folks were going to be demanding more white papers for their campaigns.

Speaking from my own personal experience, the demand for my white paper writing services has never been greater.

If this trend goes beyond me, here are three reasons there’s a spike in white paper marketing: Read the rest of this article »

My days seem to be getting shorter and the “to do” list keeps growing!

For the last few weeks I feel like I have been running in overdrive. No time to relax.

No time to write on this blog. Little time to Twitter.

Certainly no time to read. Not other blogs, not the newspaper, not the magazines piling in my office.

Am I alone? Are these times ultra-busy with no end in sight?

I thought the computer was supposed to simplify our lives??

It only seems to make things worse.

Here’s an interesting story about an experience I had today. Read the rest of this article »

Are you responsible for generating leads for your business?

If so, you might be able to relate to this new finding:

The biggest challenges for marketers is filling the pipeline with leads, according to MarketingSherpa’s new Business Technology Benchmarking Guide.

To address this problem head on, Marketing Experiments has put together a VERY interesting video.

Read the rest of this article »

Want your white paper to go viral? Yet you still need to collect that lead??

What is a marketer to do?

My friend, David Meerman Scott, is a big proponent of letting your white paper (or ebook) live unrestricted, not bound by registration forms.

However, many marketing and sales folks need leads. Their argument: If you let the paper go you never get the lead.

Is it possible to accomplish both? You might be surprised…

Read the rest of this article »

Ok folks…

Take a look at the picture here.

Your task: Create a killer caption for this image.

I would like to reward the person who comes up with the best caption by giving him or her a free copy of my book Writing White Papers: How to Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged in e-book format.

Contest winner announced Thur. July 3rd.

THE WINNER: Congrats to Kyle Tully.  The winning caption: “Delete… DELETE…” he screamed, as the instructions from tie-a-tie.net went so horribly, horribly wrong.