How to repurpose a white paper by creating a landing page

Here’s the final part of my series on how to repurpose your white paper.

You can see the earlier parts here:

• Part 1 on the original white paper
• Part 2 on repurposing as a press release
• Part 3 on repurposing as a set of blog posts
• Part 4 on repurposing as a slide deck

I have never considered a landing page as “content” in its own right.

It’s simply the destination where prospects go to download your white paper.

That’s why I wanted to include it as part of this series.

Here’s a graphic of the landing page for the white paper featured in this series.

For some great tips on creating landing pages that really work, see this earlier article from veteran B2B copywriter Ivan Levison.

Now let’s look at how this landing page uses many of the best practices described by Levison.

Tip: Keep the landing page copy short and sweet

“The landing page is not the place to be long-winded,” says Levison. “Get in, get out.”

This landing page surely follows that advice, using about 100 words to provide:

• A detailed headline
• 3 sentences that sum up the paper’s argument
• 4 bullets with specific points that the paper covers
• A simple call to action

All the text is crisp and concise.

This page presents intriguing highlights and a clear benefit to B2B readers who download the white paper.

Tip: Use a minimalist registration form

The debate is still raging: To gate or not to gate.

Levison says every landing page should include a registration form. Not every marketer agrees; it all depends on the goals of the business.

For a longer discussion about gating content, see our two-part article.

But everyone, including Levison, agrees: Don’t ask for too much on your form.

“Ask for the minimum information you need,” advises Levison. “The more you ask for, the more people you’ll turn off.”

This white paper was intended to generate leads, so a registration form was a must.

Even so, the form on this page is minimalist. It asks just six questions:

• name
• company name
• e-mail
• phone
• number of employees
• country

Notice there’s nothing about mailing address, which is one of my pet peeves.

It’s a personal peeve because I know that companies don’t ask for snail mail addresses so they can start sending me letters and packages.

They want my address to slot me into some sales guy’s territory. Sigh. Here comes another funnel!

If you want to be even more minimalist, you can ask just four questions:

• name
• company
• work email
• zipcode

From the zipcode, you can find the location of that prospect.

And if they do enter their work email, you can see the company there too.

Problem is, many prospects are tired of getting sucked into funnels, so they use a junk email on forms. They may well use a fake company name too, like Acme Software.

Tip: Show the cover

From my discussions with Levison, I know he recommends showing a picture of the content you will get if you register.

That makes the asset you’re looking at seem real.

For white papers, this is usually the cover. And this landing page shows it.

Tip: Test different landing pages

Levison also suggests testing different landing pages.

Like most B2B marketers, our client didn’t do that. They figured this one page did the trick.

As a startup, they probably didn’t expect to generate enough traffic to justify any testing anyway.

Tip: Ask yourself if you really need a captcha?

One unusual feature of this page is the captcha to prevent robots from downloading the white paper.

Few of my clients use any captchas.

Personally, I find them irritating: I never know if they expect me to type in the spaces or capital letters.

Or if that little squiggle at the corner of a photo is a fire hydrant?

So it often takes me several tries to get it right.

This can add frustration to your registration process for little gain.

So what if robots can access your white paper? Even if they post it to a free site in Russia, will that actually ever hurt your company?

If you follow these five tips, your landing page should work.

So there you have it: A clear and effective landing page for a sample white paper.

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