In the near future, we’ll not only read white papers, we’ll listen to them as well.

A brand-new trend is slowly moving onto the marketing scene: Embedding audio clips into PDF files. As readers move through the paper, they can listen to audio, providing a human touch.

“Society is moving away from reading and moving toward watching and listening to things,” explains Michael Stelzner, author of Writing White Papers. “For example, when someone listens to a podcast, they usually give it about five minutes before abandoning it. When they read something, it’s more along the lines of seconds.”

“A human voice adds a personal touch that isn’t there when the reader is just scanning the words,” says Stelzner. “If you can deliver a compelling white paper with that human element added to it, it’s going to engage readers all the more and get your marketing message across. Because of this, we’re seeing more use of audio as an ‘engagement mechanism’ that draws today’s reader into a white paper.”

Audio Sidebars
Short audio clips strategically embedded throughout a white paper act as “audio sidebars” that have several uses. They can give extra background information that isn’t in the paper. They can provide a verbal case study that describes the benefits of a technology or product. And they can let the reader listen in on an interview with an expert delving deeply into a topic.

At the end of a white paper, an audio clip can send a compelling call to action that motivates the reader to move to the next step in the sales cycle.

One drawback of embedding an audio clip is that it increases the size of the PDF file. “The larger the file, the more challenging it is to email it,” adds Stelzner. “This decreases the viral nature of an email, because people might be reluctant to send a large attachment to their friends and colleagues.”

If you decide to add audio to your white papers, Adobe offers a tutorial on how to do it. Go to: www.adobe.com/designcenter/tutorials/pdfsound.

Of course, readers must have speakers to play sound files. PDFs accept sound-file formats that are compatible with these players: Apple QuickTime, Flash Player, Windows Built-In Player, RealOne and Windows Media Player.

Next time you’re creating a white paper, consider adding audio to make it more effective. In today’s culture, chances are that someone reading your paper would like to be listening to it as well.

Let Us Know
What about you? Have you used audio in your PDF white papers? If so, we’d love to hear what you think about it. Send us an email to give us your opinion.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 4th, 2008 at 2:12 pm and is filed under Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.