Opening up access to information

One of the things that always bugs me is having to register to get information from a vendor’s website, particularly basic product information such as brochures or webinars. I know that Marketing wants to collect potential lead information so that Sales can follow up, but I’m not sure how good the hit rate is on a cold call resulting from a website visit. Furthermore, there have been many times when I’ve not bothered to download product information because of a registration requirement, and I’m sure that a lot of people have had the same experience.

It makes sense to gather information if you’re distributing, for example, a Gartner report where you have to pay per download, but for the rest of it, why not just open up the information and let people see a bit of what you have to offer before starting to try to sell them directly?

That’s exactly what Lombardi’s done with their newly-revamped online BPM resource center: check out the videos of product demos available without registration. However, if you scroll down the page and request a brochure, you’re back to having to register — definite points off for that, guys. C’mon, it’s a product brochure, not some state secret, just give it away without a hassle.

5 thoughts on “Opening up access to information”

  1. Yes, and then they later send you emails with links to download free white-papers, but not before you enter yet again the same info, as if you had got there by accident.

    regards

  2. At Blue Prism we realised people hated this so everything is open on our website including white papers and case studies.

  3. The modes of marketing communications are changing: consumers want information that they control, not to give away their personal information in order to find out about a company’s products. This is why many people — including myself — are cancelling email newsletters wherever possible and replacing them with RSS feeds of the same information.

  4. Hi Sandy. Did you check out BEA’s BPM resource center that we launched about a month ago on http://www.bea.com/bpm?

    I of course agree with your perspective. BEA offers all data sheets for download without registration. Furthermore you can download free evaluation versions of all our software. So I’d say we’re taking the openness even further that what you’ve asked for.

  5. Jesper – the BPM Lifecycle Assessment (the most prominent thing on the page that you reference) does require registration, as do the white papers. Although it is a good resource center. 🙂

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