Skip to content
priest giving sermon

Quick tip: Teach, don’t preach

What’s the #1 problem with too many white papers?

If you said “too much selling,” you’re right.

There’s a time and place for a sales pitch. But a white paper is neither.

I first heard this 20+ years ago when I interviewed executives from the two largest white paper syndication services at the time.

“The best white papers come at it from an educational tone versus a preachy approach,” said Jay Habegger from Bitpipe.

“We’ve seen the most success with people who use white papers to educate and teach, as opposed to selling,” said Jeff Ramminger from Knowledge Storm.

Too many sales and marketing people want to skip over the education portion and rush into their pitch.

But that’s like sending around the collection plate before you deliver the sermon.

If you try that, your prospects will keep their wallets closed and head quickly for the exits.

 


For more quick tips like this, get my free newsletter

 

About Gordon Graham

Worked on 328 white papers for clients from Silicon Valley to Switzerland, on everything from choosing enterprise software to designing virtual worlds for kids, for clients from tiny startups to 3M, Google, and Verizon. Wrote White Papers for Dummies which earned 60+ 5-star ratings on Amazon. Won 16 awards from the Society for Technical Communication. Named AWAI 2019 Copywriter of the Year.

If you liked this post...

laptop with text being sent over a brick wall

Quick tip: Get to know your designer

When you're working with a designer, do you just "throw your text over the wall?"...

-Quick tip: How to use tables in your content

What is a table? We all know a table when we see it. but how...

-Quick tip: In a problem/solution, cover doing nothing

If you ask B2B salespeople, many will say their toughest competitor is not another company....

Leave a Comment