Many people and companies wish to offer e-books as products in their content strategies. However, in the midst of this process, uncertainties may appear to clash over your revolutionary digital book project still in the planning stage.
This is because ebooks have in-depth content, are complemented by formatting and graphics from start to finish. In short, they are more expensive and scarce products, which few people will be able to produce and publish if they do not have confidence in the possible results.
Therefore, the success of this material is directly related to the e-book briefing. The production stage begins only after a considerable amount of clarification about the theme, references, common doubts and about the person to whom one writes.
After elucidating these points, the chance of your e-book going wrong tends to decrease considerably. While producing a briefing seems strenuous, this is a surefire method for good results.
In this post, you will see good practices for creating an effective, fast and uncomplicated e-book briefing. Check out our tips below!
Determine the purpose of the e-book
Take a small test: Ask any reputed writer why he wrote this or that book. It is probable that he does not know how to respond, after all, he was just giving vent to his inspiration or felt like writing on a specific topic.
In the case of an e-book - which is an essential piece for content marketing - the answer must be accurate. The content must directly meet the needs of the persona for its value to be perceived. It is worth remembering that whoever downloads it will provide information such as name, surname, and email, for example, in exchange for the material.
To better understand this process, we elaborate the flow below:
- Assuming the persona is a college student who spends a lot of money on transportation between home and college;
- The purpose of the e-book is to help the person find cheaper ways to get around the campus;
- Therefore, an e-book title to attract this persona would be "Guide to carpooling for university students".
Choose an attractive title
Just like a post on a blog, the title of the e-book needs to be extremely attractive, to make the reader separate a long time to read the file.
Remember that when the eBook is downloaded, the persona is usually on a level of interest and education a bit more advanced on the subject. So she wants to go deeper and have a more specific knowledge on the subject. Therefore, the title of the material also needs to meet those expectations.
"Practical Guide", "Definitive Guide", "Everything you need to know about ..." and similar terms usually draw the attention of the person, passing the idea that there is a rich material and with more concrete and applicable information, compared to a post.
Do not forget that the persona has already consumed content on the blog and is downloading the e-book for more information. So even though the subject is the same, the title needs to clarify what the "something else" this type of file has to offer.
Another important point is that the title need not be limited to 67 characters or contain a keyword, as recommended in a post that needs to be ranked. But it is necessary to be objective and clear in its elaboration.
Keep in mind that e-book is not post
First of all, it is not the number of words that determines if a post is long enough to become an e-book. In the blogosphere, there are posts of up to 3000 words - and yet they do not stop receiving new paragraphs in order to generate better positioning in the search engines.
What determines the difference between e-book and post is precisely the goal that leads to the production of one and the other. Depending on the stage of the sales funnel to which it is directed, a post is intended to be interesting enough to attract visitors and generate organic traffic for a particular domain. According to this logic, size is not so important, the highest expectation is about answering the person's doubts.
Already the e-book has the function of making these same visitors turn into leads, through the offer of value in exchange for the conversion. In the case, it would be a lot more dense content than a 500 or 1000 word post could offer.
Answer or reason in each chapter
Let's go to the format of the briefing: the idea is to think of the e-book as a collection of posts, each of them being a chapter aimed at solving a doubt of the person. A very common mistake made in the preparation of the briefing is to worry about telling a story, in the line "introduction - development - conclusion". This story, although entertaining, does not always meet all the yearnings of the persona - much less serves to break their objections to the subject of the e-book.
Whoever consumes the contents of an e-book is not interested simply in knowing a little more about the subject, but rather finding a solution to a problem or the answer to a doubt. If the persona has come to download, it is because you need relevant content.
It should be remembered that an eBook does not necessarily have to quote the name of the company or product to be sold at the end of the consumer journey, but rather list a series of relevant information that will be of interest to somebody at some point.
The objective to be achieved, in principle, is not the sale, but access to the information of a potential customer so that the product is then presented in a more direct way since the consumer already recognizes the company as an authority on the subject.
The description of each topic
It is important to remember that an e-book agenda is not just about the title and topics to be addressed. This part of the briefing is extremely important, but you need to go into more detail so that the writer has no doubts and can be guided. Therefore, it is important to write a brief description.
To facilitate the work of the writer, ensuring that the expected information will be included, and reducing the number of adjustments, a quick description should be made on each topic. About two lines are more than enough, just for the purpose and, if necessary, items to be quoted.
It is also important to make a brief overview, with the objective and main focus of that e-book, to make sure that the focus will be given on the information that really interests the company that produces it.
Definition of the number of words
Remember to tailor the number of topics to be discussed to the size of the e-book that is to be produced. If a 2,000-word material has 10 topics, the content will be entirely superficial and probably with irrelevant information.
The ideal for a content of the size quoted would be about 4 topics, in addition to the introduction and conclusion, that are broader and enable the writer to unravel them in subtopics, ensuring greater depth and lower chances of getting away from the subject.
The funnel stage of an e-book
An e-book as an offer for funnel top (or stage of awareness in the journey of purchase), requires attention to the index: does it address all the doubts that you have about a certain topic? If your answer is positive, you can already think about how the introduction and conclusion will be in order to give consistency to the e-book.
Already in an e-book offered for funnel medium (or stage of consideration), the necessary question is: does my index offer sufficient arguments for the persona to choose my solution?
If you plan to make a funnel bottom e-book, everything will work in a different way. This file will contain exclusively institutional information, which will show the person the main characteristics of the product or service to be marketed. There must be a bridge between the solution it offers and its possibilities of use. A successful case is a prime example of this case.
In this last option, it is recommended that the content is produced by experts working in the company itself. After all, who will know better about what is sold if not the very company that produces it?
We created some models to exemplify a sequence of ideas to be addressed in the index, according to the stage of the funnel. Look:
Top of funnel or stage of awareness
EBook Title: Basic Content Marketing Guide-
Index
- Introduction
- What is Content Marketing?
- What can Content Marketing do for your business?
- How to implement a Content Marketing strategy?
- Conclusion
Half of the funnel or stage of consideration
E-book title: How to choose the best postgraduate degree for your resume
Index
- Introduction
- Know the post courses offered by Company Z
- 3 advantages to doing post-graduation in Company Z
- Why Company Z is the best option on the market
- Conclusion
Funnel fund or decision stage
E-book title: How Company X Increased Sales of Y with Content Marketing
Index
- Introduction
- The work of company X
- As company Y doubled e-commerce sales in 6 months
- 3 marketing tools used
- Conclusion
Adaptation to the person's profile
Remember that the e-book is made to offer rich information about a certain subject to the person. Therefore, it is important to carefully read the profile defined in the strategy to understand their needs and meet their demands.
Now that you have understood the stages of the funnel and how they should be handled in an e-book, it is much easier to structure the ideas because you already have enough knowledge to define the buying journey to be undertaken by the potential consumer.
This information should also guide the style of text, language and tone to be worked on throughout the e-book. So stay tuned!
Search by references
Now that you already know that the e-book briefing is not a guessing game and is always chained to the strategy, understand that the index is able to win the persona if drawn up based on reference searches.
Searching for references does not mean flushing the maximum number of URLs related to the content theme. Today, many articles available on the internet are outdated, unavailable or have errors.
So, try to read recently produced content, research data, and information that serves as the basis for the editor of the e-book. That way, it's possible for the writer to be inspired and do an innovative and fun work!
It is no wonder that the eBook is the rich material format most used in content strategies. In addition to being an easy solution to fit the sales funnel of any business, the e-book still carries with it all the charm of being a book, arousing the pleasure of reading, curiosity, interest, and feeling that those pages were written especially for the reader. You see, they really were ...
Editorial Notes for an eBook
Finally, the editorial notes. This is an extremely important field to be filled at the time of building the e-book. These are information that does not fit the description of the topics or the general purpose of the material.
This orientation is directed to the writer, who will take the briefing done by the content planner and produce the final text. It is necessary to explain which are the main points to be taken into account, which may be of different natures.
To better understand, see some examples:
- not to mention X, since it concerns the product of competition;
- do not use slang or regionalism;
- keep your tone relaxed to get a closer relationship between person and company; or not to use foreignisms, because the persona is quite simple.
This information is extremely important so that the result received is as expected, as to make sure that the language and items quoted will be exactly what the person expects to find.
It is a series of subjective points, that only the title and the topics to be produced would not be able to clarify.
And so, do you think this post will help you write the best e-book briefing possible? Still, have doubts?
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