Case studies are the costliest content you'll ever create.
When companies start creating case studies, they struggle to get the job done consistently well.
They’re not clear on the story they want to tell. Or what information they need to tell it.
They’re unsure who to ask for an interview. Or they find a customer only to realize it’s a bust five minutes into the call.
If they get past that, simple case studies take months to produce, get lost in review purgatory, or both.
They slowly morph into the thing “we should do” but don’t, like flossing everyday.
Get the story right the first time.
I help you avoid all that with a process I’ve honed over eight years as a content specialist, marketer, and writer. I call this process The Customer Story Laboratory.
The Customer Story Laboratory is a structured but flexible blend of hands-on production and internal workshops designed to help you:
- Find the right story to tell.
- Identify the right customers to interview.
- Initiate outreach and secure customer consent.
- Prepare for and run an effective customer interview
- Produce a compelling, format-agnostic customer story.
- Systematize distribution of your case study across any channel.
The end goal isn’t just done-for-you case studies.
It’s a customer story engine that equips your sales and marketing team with the customer proof they need to attract leads, overcome objections, and close more deals faster.
At the same time I start producing stories for you, we’ll start working through my program to build a content engine that consistently churns out:
→ Killer customer quotes
→ Objection-smashing use case stories
→ Verifiable proof of your offer’s key differentiators
In the Customer Story Lab, every thing we do is in service of the story that sells your vision, differentiates your offer, and shortens your sales cycle.
“Chris weaves customer experiences into engaging narratives. He has a knack for making interviewees feel comfortable and asks the right questions, listens actively, and draws out stories that might otherwise go untold."
How it works
Phase 0: Onboarding
A short audit to determine where you’re at with your case study program so I can tailor the process to suit your needs.
I’ll evaluate any existing assets, outreach approach, and distribution plan you have in place. We’ll get aligned on messaging, potential story angles, and how we’ll get the story.
Phase 1: Find the story, cast your characters
Define key use cases, quantifiable results, and product features to determine the ideal story angle(s). Establish a clear vision for how these stories will be used across various channels and in various formats.
Phase 2: Start customer outreach, prepare for the interview
Identify a list of customers who may be good story candidates. Confirm that these customers have stories that fit your angle. Prepare for the customer interview. Secure your first customer’s consent to participate.
Phase 3: Draft the story
Create a story outline so you can provide feedback before the full story is drafted. Edit rounds are unlimited within reason.
Phase 4: Distribute the story
The story enters the distribution phase. It’s processed into different formats for sharing on social media, in slide decks, email newsletters, blogs, PDFs, etc.
Phase 5: Grow the program
Review the process for collecting, creating, publishing, and repurposing case studies and optimize your approach to maximize value.
Format-agnostic, story-driven case studies that sell your product and your brand.
If you’re going through the trouble to document customer proof, you might as well make sure it reaches its fullest potential. The trouble is, most marketers have a myopic approach to repurposing and distributing case studies.
1. The messaging is off
Most customer stories cast the customer as a side character and the product as the hero.
This kind of story sets up the salespeople and marketers who use it for failure.
Because there’s only so many ways you can say “Here’s how Customer A used Product B to increase sales by 103%”
When your story is framed in the customer’s emotions, pain, and challenges, your case study becomes infinitely more repurposable and easier for your prospects to relate to.
This transforms the story from a bottom-of-funnel asset that’s only relevant to in-market buyers into a brand-building tool that’s relevant to share in a variety of media.
2. The format is too inflexible
The traditional, challenge/solution/results case study monolith is too stiff, inflexible, and brittle. This prevents it from being tailored to your audience’s consumption preferences without breaking.
An effective story is created as a collection of components… quotes, key data points, visuals, narrative threads, interview clips, screenshots, and story summaries.
Instead of forcing the entire story into a PDF, you break it down into reusable components that feel native to social media, email campaigns, blog posts, and your website.
You meet your prospects on their terms. Which is especially critical when your market is unfamiliar with your brand.
3. It’s over-indexed on outcome vs. relevance
Most case studies over-index on outcome over relevance. Everyone wants the flashiest logos, massive results, and the catchiest sound bite.
But name drops aren’t how you get your prospects to care about your case studies.
In a survey of 619 B2B buyers, sellers, and marketers by UserEvidence, customer logos ranked 8th in the list of most important factors considered when reviewing customer evidence.
4 of the top 5 factors were relevance-related, i.e. the notoriety of your customers doesn’t matter to prospects if they can’t relate to them.
What’s more important than a logo is that your case study shows your prospects you have proof from customers who:
— Share a similar role
— Work in the same industry
— Have a similar use case
— Share a similar company size
The upshot is you can stop spending all your time chasing approvals and spend more time creating customer proof your prospects can learn from.
