Bringing Business White Papers to the Web
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Wednesday, Mar 4, 2009 / 11:54am View more articles
Many of iMarc's clients are technical or research oriented business. These companies tend to have a vast library of white papers or print-friendly research articles formatted as PDFs.
We're building a new site for one such client, who recently asked, "What format do you recommend for our white papers — pdf or html?"
While PDF white papers, sell-sheets, or articles are usually well designed and visually compelling, there is still a barrier to reading PDF that many users don't bother crossing. Everyone with a web browser can view PDFs, but most people* would rather not.
* Research only includes me and two iMarc developers.
Whether the PDF downloads or renders directly in your browser, you know clicking that "PDF" link is going to be a significant investment. PDFs take extra time to download or render. They look different from other web pages. They rarely have navigation or links. If a user is moving along, clicking through your site, the last thing you want to do is offer a dead-end PDF where their only option is to go back.
Obviously, some content suites the PDF format — a 20 page article, a technical document that requires precise formatting, a contract, etc. Most business PDFs, however, can be converted to web content. Items like a case study, a 5-page white paper, or a research article should be regular old HTML web links.
Even with the greatest CMS it will be time consuming to convert PDFs to HTML. Here are some rough guidelines for converting business PDFs to online content:
* First, free yourself of all design expectations. Your online content will not, and should not, look identical to the PDF. A web page is a different medium from PDF and content should be optimized appropriately.
* Copy all the content from your PDF and paste it into the CMS. Now remove half your content. I guarantee, you haven't read half of what I've written. If you're still reading this paragraph, you're either, (a) my mom; (b) me; (c) Google.
* Format the content in the CMS, adding bullet lists, bold, italic, headlines, etc.
* If your PDF has images or charts, add key images between the paragraphs. A print-ready PDF might design images as inserts with text running around them or called out in pretty boxes off to the side. If you're focused on optimizing for the web, instead of copying the design of the PDF, just add the most important images between the paragraphs they pertain to.
Assuming you started with a 3–5 page PDF, the end result should be a long HTML page with images sprinkled throughout, similar to the white papers at A List Apart. Compared to PDF of similar length, this article from A List Apart has very little formatting — just nice clean text and some images between the paragraphs.
Embrace how people read on-screen and don't try and mimic PDF layouts in your blog. Content administrators who put in the time to convert their business PDFs to web pages will be paid back by happy users who keep clicking — never encountering dead end PDFs.
We're building a new site for one such client, who recently asked, "What format do you recommend for our white papers — pdf or html?"
While PDF white papers, sell-sheets, or articles are usually well designed and visually compelling, there is still a barrier to reading PDF that many users don't bother crossing. Everyone with a web browser can view PDFs, but most people* would rather not.
* Research only includes me and two iMarc developers.
Whether the PDF downloads or renders directly in your browser, you know clicking that "PDF" link is going to be a significant investment. PDFs take extra time to download or render. They look different from other web pages. They rarely have navigation or links. If a user is moving along, clicking through your site, the last thing you want to do is offer a dead-end PDF where their only option is to go back.
Obviously, some content suites the PDF format — a 20 page article, a technical document that requires precise formatting, a contract, etc. Most business PDFs, however, can be converted to web content. Items like a case study, a 5-page white paper, or a research article should be regular old HTML web links.
Even with the greatest CMS it will be time consuming to convert PDFs to HTML. Here are some rough guidelines for converting business PDFs to online content:
* First, free yourself of all design expectations. Your online content will not, and should not, look identical to the PDF. A web page is a different medium from PDF and content should be optimized appropriately.
* Copy all the content from your PDF and paste it into the CMS. Now remove half your content. I guarantee, you haven't read half of what I've written. If you're still reading this paragraph, you're either, (a) my mom; (b) me; (c) Google.
* Format the content in the CMS, adding bullet lists, bold, italic, headlines, etc.
* If your PDF has images or charts, add key images between the paragraphs. A print-ready PDF might design images as inserts with text running around them or called out in pretty boxes off to the side. If you're focused on optimizing for the web, instead of copying the design of the PDF, just add the most important images between the paragraphs they pertain to.
Assuming you started with a 3–5 page PDF, the end result should be a long HTML page with images sprinkled throughout, similar to the white papers at A List Apart. Compared to PDF of similar length, this article from A List Apart has very little formatting — just nice clean text and some images between the paragraphs.
Embrace how people read on-screen and don't try and mimic PDF layouts in your blog. Content administrators who put in the time to convert their business PDFs to web pages will be paid back by happy users who keep clicking — never encountering dead end PDFs.
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"Everyone with a web browser can view PDFs, but most people* would rather not. * Research only includes me and two iMarc developers."
Often, I would rather read a PDF. Why? Because most web sites are noisy, nasty environments that distract the reader with things like animation, over-aggressive calls to action (think "chat with a sales rep now!" popups that appear over the content while trying to read), and just plain visual clutter.
In an environment like that, I'll jump to get a PDF. Because most of the time, that PDF will be quiet, well formatted, and easy to read without distraction.
Put another way ... PDFs are great when a web site is designed to fight against readers. PDF's are irrelevant when a web site is designed to work for readers.