Promotional costs are fees or assessments that are incurred during the production and distribution of media messages to people or companies.

Promotional costs for white papers may include hosting costs, submission fees, listing fees, download registration fees and other fees. In some cases, the publisher may charge fees based on actual performance (such as per inquiry or per conversion) rather than charging for activity fees.

Hosting Costs - Hosting costs for white papers can include physical hosting and hosting access fees.

Physical hosting costs for white paper data storage and bandwidth usage are relatively low because white paper files are generally small to medium size files (5-10 MBytes typical). If hundreds of people download white papers each month, this can result in the usage of 500 MBytes to 2 GBytes per month. Storage and data transmission usually cost less than $1 per GByte.

Hosting access fees may be charged for listing on web site and can be relatively high. The hosting fees are charged for the value of the visitors rather than the cost of physically storing the content. Hosting fees can exceed $1,000 per month for highly targeted and popular web sites.

Submission Fees - A hosting company may charge a submission fee to review the possibility of including a white paper on its web site. This cost may not be refunded if the white paper is not accepted for listing.

Listing Fees - Listing fees (sometimes called item fees) are costs that are incurred as a result of submitting and including an item within an index of products or services. Each white paper or link that is included in an index may be assessed a listing fee.

Download Registration Fees (Sales Lead Costs) - Download registration fees are costs that are assessed to the sponsor of the white paper when a person requests to download a file (or completes the download registration page).

Some white paper hosting companies charge a fee for each person that downloads or registers for a white paper. This fee can range from $1 to $50 per download (per registration). When paying white paper registration downloads, some white paper publishers allow sponsors to dispute some of the download fees if they are determined to be from unqualified registrants or competitors, or found to be fraudulent. The host or publisher may allow the sponsoring company to simply identify names to dispute and remove the fees from the invoice.

Cost per Inquiry (CPI) - Cost per inquiry is the total cost of a promotion divided by the number of inquiries received as a result of the promotion. Some publishers may charge a fee for each inquiry (also called a cost per action) rather than fees for download registrations.

Cost per Conversion (CPC) - Cost per conversion is the total cost of a promotion divided by the number of orders or desired actions that are received as a result of the promotion.

Figure 1.x shows some of the costs associated with white paper promotion. The hosting cost may include storage fees and transmission bandwidth charges which can be relatively low ($0 to $5 per month). White paper hosting companies may charge submission fees for the review and provision of recommended changes ($0 to $300 per white paper). A white paper directory may charge fees for including white paper information and links on an index list or a web page ($0 to $200 per month). White paper directories and distribution partners may charge a fee for each download or completed white paper registration ($5 to $35 per registration). Some distribution companies may charge a fee per inquiry (instead of charging for each registration) for desired actions such as phone calls, inquiry form submissions or email messages ($0 to $200).