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Writing Insights from 'Readability Expert' Rudolph Flesch
By Kevin Gault

We've all seen this type of white paper: Well-researched and well-organized, but so wordy and overloaded with business jargon that reading it gives you a headache.

No matter how complex your topic—or how sophisticated your reader—to be instantly understood, your copy must be easy to read. In his book, The Art of Readable Writing, author Rudolph Flesch, a readability expert and writing consultant, gives tips on making your copy effortless to read.

Heard of the Flesch Readability Score? If you run a grammar check in Microsoft Word, you will see his work in action.

In his book, Flesch lists more than 20 "Rules of Effective Writing." Here are some highlights that may be familiar, but are worth revisiting:

* Write like you speak
* Use contractions
* Use the active voice
* Keep sentences and paragraphs short

Flesch states that a key factor in readability is the average length of sentences. Writing that is easy to read has sentences that average 8 words. Writing of standard difficulty goes to 17 words per sentence. Difficult-to-read writing runs on for 29 or more words per sentence.

Flesch adds that writing to be understood takes more than using short words and short sentences. He recommends putting the "human factor" into your writing.

His "human-interest quotient" is the number of personal words (e.g., personal pronouns) and quotations you use, and how often you engage the reader by challenging, questioning or directly addressing him or her.

To capture the reader's interest, Flesch gives these tips:

* Focus on your reader, not on yourself
* Help your reader read (emphasize, anticipate, repeat, summarize)
* Don't write down to your reader
* Rearrange paragraphs for emphasis

Flesch considers another tip so important that it rates an exclamation point in his book: Specify! He says using specifics is "the most important rule to follow in all of your written communications."

"Stay away from generalities in all of your writing," he advises. "Concentrate on giving details-names, dates, places, facts and figures. Focus on the visible, audible and measurable. Pass on your direct experience, rather than your thoughts, opinions and general ideas."

The next time you sit down to write a white paper, keep this readability expert's tips in mind. Use conversational tone. Be careful about sentence length. Engage the reader. Use specifics.

As Flesch says, it's easy to write convoluted copy that's a struggle to read. Writing clearly is much more difficult: "Making the simple complicated is commonplace," he says. "Making the complicated simple, that takes creativity."

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How Great Layout Creates Greater Impact
By Kevin Gault

White paper writers slave over their words to convey the right messages. But it's not just the words that influence; it's also the way they're presented on the page. An effective layout can give your words more impact.

According to white paper specialist Jonathan Kantor of the Appum Group, the layout should convey professionalism. "A professional-looking design will make your white paper stand out in a crowded field of plain or boring papers. The design should enhance the client's image by providing an enterprise-class look and feel."

"It should also be attractive to the eye," says Kantor. "Warm colors and pleasing design elements draw the reader into the content."

Make It Easy to Read
When it comes to page design, Michael Stelzner, author of Writing White Papers, says readability is the key.

"To make the written word more digestible for the reader, I take my cues from the world of sales letter copywriting," explains Stelzner. "The basic layout and formatting techniques I employ include using short paragraphs and bullets to create white space that makes the copy easy to read."

Stelzner also recommends these techniques:

* Use call-outs to fill some white space and draw the reader's eye to important quotes or information.

* Every three or four paragraphs, break up the text with a subhead. Besides making the copy easier to look at, this lets "skim readers" jump to the next section if they want to.

* Leave a 2.5-inch margin on the left side of the page. This makes the copy narrower on the page (and gives readers a place to jot down notes).

Design Is a Powerful Weapon
Another way to make your layout more effective is to work with a graphic designer. Roger C. Parker, author of Looking Good in Print and Design to Sell, gives these tips for making the partnership work:

"Hire someone with experience in print-publication design. Even if your white paper will be distributed in PDF from your website, it's still a print publication. Publication design is different than logo design or website design."

"Start the design process with a creative brief that spells out project goals, expectations and deadlines. Attractive, easy-to-read white papers are rarely designed and produced under last-minute deadlines. Give the designer enough time to do the job right."

Parker offers these other design tips:

Line length—Use an easy-to-read, multi-column page layout that limits line length. Lines should contain between 30 and 42 characters, or 7 or 8 words.

Typeface—Serif typefaces are easier to recognize. Times Roman, Garamond, Bookman and Century Schoolbook are easy-to-read typefaces.

Type size—Type that's too large or too small is hard to read. Type must be large enough for word shapes to be recognizable, but small enough to allow several left-to-right eye scans per line.

Line spacing—This is as important as type size, sometimes more important. Line spacing should separate lines enough to let readers focus on one line at a time.

Your painstakingly crafted words convey your white paper's business message and a great layout can give them more power. Use both elements well and your paper will stand out from the crowd.

For more information on graphic design for white papers, check out Michael Stelzner's book Writing White Papers and download Roger Parker's no-cost report, White Paper Design That Sells: 16 Easy-to-Implement Best Practices.

Editor's note: If you want to learn more from design guru Roger C. Parker, be sure to attend this month's teleclass: Mastering White Paper Layout and Design.

A New Spin on White Paper Syndication: NetLine's Second Touch Program
By Howard J. Sewell

Competition in the content syndication marketplace is becoming so fierce that, as a demand generation vehicle, white paper syndication is in danger of becoming a commodity, a program that advertisers evaluate on price alone. "If I can buy a lead from this vendor for $40," the argument goes, "why would I pay another vendor $50?"

As any student of economics will tell you, when a product becomes commoditized, prices (and margins) fall. In response, syndication vendors are pulling out the stops to layer value-added services onto their programs and better differentiate themselves from their competitors. For example, some companies will offer to call leads for you, scoring and qualifying those prospects so (presumably) you're not just dumping raw inquiries onto your sales force.

In this category of value-added services comes a new offering from NetLine, the company whose Lead Source program syndicates white papers and other advertiser content via www.Tradepub.com and a network of more than 4000 B2B websites.

NetLine's new Second Touch service is, in essence, an automated lead nurturing program that delivers follow-up emails, at client-defined intervals, to prospects who download advertiser content from the Lead Source network. Superficially, the service might seem redundant to advertisers who have Eloqua, Market2Lead, Vtrenz, or another lead nurturing platform already in place, but for those who don't, or perhaps for those who would rather not take the time to set up a separate offer track for white paper downloads, the service is a convenient, and potentially powerful, tool.

NetLine provides a simple email template that includes the advertiser's logo, four call to action buttons (linking to offers that the client defines), and editable "contact me" or "price quote" buttons (to drive requests for immediate contact). When a prospect clicks one of the buttons, he or she is taken to a prepopulated registration form, and when that form is submitted, NetLine generates a real-time email alert to a selected client contact.

Second Touch is available from NetLine as an add-on for qualifying lead generation programs. The company says that the pricing is designed to make it feasible for a client to add Second Touch to all their offers, and includes an initial setup cost with a nominal charge for each additional offer.

NetLine claims that the service helps to identify and engage with hot prospects, shortens the selling cycle by generating quote requests and other immediate opportunities, drives prospects to relevant areas on the advertiser website, and stimulates further interest in additional products and services.

What I found particularly compelling about the email template that NetLine provides is that they recommend the first call to action button be a link to the very same content the prospect just downloaded. This seemed counterintuitive at first (why would I offer something the prospect just downloaded?), but upon further review it makes sense:

* Some prospects may complete the registration process but, due to technical issues or just plain distraction, fail to download, save, or print the content.

* Others may download the content but then put it aside and forget about it. Sending a link to the same content serves as a convenient reminder (especially for those, like me, who use their email inbox as a "to do" list).

* Sending a link to the same content offers a convenient way for the prospect to share the information with colleagues and peers (thereby increasing downloads).

Designing any kind of follow-up or lead nurturing strategy almost always involves the question "OK, what do I send them NOW?" In an inspired move, NetLine is saying that your follow-up communication doesn't always have to be about another offer, more content, contacting a sales rep, or a "next step" in the selling process. Just possibly the best immediate follow-up is a courtesy message that simply serves to ensure the prospect was able to download the paper, and providing a convenient way to download the information again if needed. Brilliant.

My Assessment: Second Touch may not be for everyone, but it's a convenient, effective way of ensuring prompt, effective follow-up to leads generated from content syndication.

About the Author: Howard J. Sewell is president of Connect Direct Inc. (CDI), a full-service agency specializing in demand generation for high-technology companies. Named one of the "Top 100 Agencies" for 2007 by BtoB Magazine, CDI maintains offices in Silicon Valley and Seattle. Howard also writes a blog, Direct Connections, on demand generation best practices. Full disclosure: Connect Direct is an authorized agency partner of NetLine.

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About Stelzner Consulting: Stelzner Consulting is the parent company for WhitePaperSource and specializes in writing and producing white papers. We have written more than 100 papers on topics ranging from artificial intelligence to homeland security. Our clients include Fortune 500 companies such as Microsoft, HP, SAP, Cardinal Health, FedEx, Monster and Motorola, as well as small emerging startups.