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How to Define Your Case Study Strategy (And Why You Need One)
Unfortunately, few companies have a defined customer case study strategy in place. Often, they’ll just identify a good customer or project (“This would make a great case study!”) and then fly at it. If they get that case study done, they may eventually turn to another good candidate and repeat the process. And that’s as far as it goes. But when you take this piecemeal approach, and overlook the strategy piece, you may run into the following problems: You struggle to...
How to Get Customers in Video Testimonials and Case Studies
How do you ask clients to be in a video testimonial? If you’re nervous about getting your customers to be in a video testimonial—congratulations, you’re normal. Whether it’s worrying about the potential inconvenience of getting them on camera or just not knowing what to say, asking for video testimonials can be nerve-wracking. But with a little planning, you can take the pressure off for both you, and your customer. Here’s how to get a “yes” the next time you ask...
How to Write Powerful Anonymous Case Studies
How do you write anonymous case studies that are worth reading? In a perfect world, every customer would let you tell the story of how you helped them succeed in a case study. But sometimes, customers are constrained by their legal departments—or the story is just too sensitive—and so they decline to participate. Other times, though, customers will agree to share their story as long as their name isn’t attached. Which means you’ll need to learn how to anonymize it. Here’s how...
How to Create Tension in Case Studies With No Before-After Comparison
What do you do when you’re writing a case study with no before-after comparison? A case study where you have no insights into the situation that existed before your amazing product or solution was implemented? How can you create tension or suspense in your case study without that? Because when you distill most case studies down to their bare structure, the story is: Bad thing happens (or, is happening) Solution is implemented Problem is solved. But what if your interviewee...
Is a Metric-Driven Headline Always the Best Choice for Your Customer Success Stories?
One of the golden rules of case study writing is to put an impressive metric into headlines instead of using qualitative descriptions of success. So instead of saying: “How [Customer A] Increased Sales With the Help of [Company B]” or “How [Customer A] beats back the competition with [Company B product/service],” you would say something like: “How [Customer A] Increased Sales by 25% With the Help of [Company B].” Of course, you won’t always have good metrics to worth with,...
Light Up the Brains of Prospects With These Innovative Case Study Filters
Here’s a CRAZY clever bit of copy and UX that I wish more companies were brave enough to try: Our client, KlientBoost, has a fantastic amount of customer success stories—so many that they need to help prospects find the ones most relevant to them. So here’s how they’ve set up their “results” page: As you can see, they provide users with two types of filtering systems. The first system (which I’ve circled in blue) follows conventional wisdom (read: logic). Users...
3 Reasons to Rethink Your Case Study Headlines
Having a good headline is important. After all, you only have a few seconds to grab readers’ attention. This is as true for case studies as any other type of marketing content, from blog posts to white papers. However, case study headlines can get a little… trickier. Because while you want to grab attention with your case study headline, you also need to make those headlines extra focused. Why? Because when prospective clients scan your case study headline, they’re looking...
Are Your Case Studies Too Similar?
Are all of your case studies starting to sound the same? If they are, you may wonder if maybe they’re getting a bit… heaven forbid… boring? We sometimes bump into this question when we write multiple case studies for clients (which we almost always do). For example, we have one client for whom we’ve written 60+ case studies! How can anyone make all those case studies unique? It might seem like a terrifying concern—but in reality, that’s the wrong way...
Outsourcing your case studies: what to consider (and why!)
So you’re sold on the value of creating and sharing your customer success stories. Excellent! But whether it’s a lack of capacity, the desire to scale your case study production, or just a need for a specialized partner, you’re wondering if outsourcing your case studies and video testimonials is even possible—or as good idea. b) A good idea! Outsourcing case studies can be a contentious issue, especially given the high-touch nature of customer success stories. How can you know your...