- E-books: A Hip and Stylish Younger Sibling to the Nerdy Whitepaper

I've been fascinated recently by the power of e-books. My own e-book, The New Rules of PR: How to create a press release strategy for reaching buyers directly, has been downloaded a remarkable 75,000 times since it was released in January. Imagine how much you would have to pay to get an equivalent number of people to pay attention to an advertisement! Millions of dollars perhaps.

E-books are a tremendous resource for buyers who want to learn about solutions to a market problem. But for many people and organizations, an e-book also has an effect that's less tangible: E-books do much more than just sell product; they directly contribute to an organization's positive reputation by showing thought leadership in the marketplace of ideas. This form of content brands a company, a consultant, or a nonprofit as an expert and as a trusted resource to turn to again and again.

So what is an e-book? For the purposes of marketing using web content, I define an e-book as a PDF-formatted document that identifies a market problem and supplies an answer to the problem. The best e-books don't sell a product; rather, they brand an organization as a thoughtful leader in a defined market space.

E-books have a bit of intrigue to them. People instantly see the value in what they have downloaded for free. In the B2B world, e-books are like the hip and stylish younger sister to the nerdy whitepaper.

I recommend that e-books be presented in a landscape format, rather than the whitepaper's portrait format. Well-executed e-books have more white space and interesting graphics and images; the copy is typically written in a lighter style than the denser copy of whitepapers. In my view, e-books (as marketing tools) are free, and I strongly suggest that there be no registration requirement.

Here are some examples of successful e-books to get your creative energy flowing:

Start With a Lead: Eight critical success factors for lead generation by Brian J. Carroll
Flipping the Funnel: Give your fans the power to speak up by Seth Godin
The Balanced Life: How to put fun, family and financial freedom into your business and personal life by Clay Nelson
Search Engine Marketing for Publishers: The art of being found online by Pam Springer
The new rules of PR: How to create a press release strategy for reaching buyers directly by David Meerman Scott

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David Meerman Scott, B2B marketing powerhouse and fandom strategist, spotted the real-time marketing revolution in its infancy and wrote five books about it including The New Rules of Marketing and PR, with more than 400,000 copies sold in English and available in 29 languages.

Now, David says the pendulum has swung too far in the direction of superficial online communications. Tech-weary and bot-wary people are hungry for true human connection. Organizations have learned to win by developing what David calls a "Fanocracy"—tapping into the mindset that relationships with customers are more important than the products they sell to them.

Prior to starting his own business, he was vice president of marketing for several publicly traded B2B technology and information companies.