In many ways, customer success stories are a marketer’s dream form of content. When used effectively, they merge the qualitative power of storytelling with the evidence-based pillar of hard data. They allow you to present real-world use cases and results that shift your product from abstraction to physicality in the minds of the readers.
However, in order to accomplish these goals, a customer success story must be well composed and positioned to provide the most value for the intended audience. Unlike some marketing and sales collateral, which can be assembled with a few hours of graphic design work, customer success stories generally involve several days or weeks of research and composition, making it paramount that they are optimally used to service your organizational goals.
What’s to be gained by writing customer case studies?
Creating customer success stories has been a time-honoured tradition in marketing for decades, but the digital revolution has created opportunities for companies to take their case study materials to a new level. Currently, nearly two-thirds of B2B marketers indicate that customer case studies are effective tools in their content marketing toolbox.
The main source of their efficacy is their position as a powerful form of social proof, taking a prospect through a journey that features a real-world problem and presenting a concrete solution. When these compelling narratives are backed by reliable data points and finished with a strong pitch and call-to-action, they provide the client with a compelling list of reasons to move to the next stage in the buying funnel.
In many ways, customer success stories are a marketer’s dream form of content. When used effectively, they merge the qualitative power of storytelling with the evidence-based pillar of hard data. They allow you to present real-world use cases and results that shift your product from abstraction to physicality in the minds of the readers.
However, in order to accomplish these goals, a customer success story must be well composed and positioned to provide the most value for the intended audience. Unlike some marketing and sales collateral, which can be assembled with a few hours of graphic design work, customer success stories generally involve several days or weeks of research and composition, making it paramount that they are optimally used to service your organizational goals.
What’s to be gained by writing customer case studies?
Creating customer success stories has been a time-honoured tradition in marketing for decades, but the digital revolution has created opportunities for companies to take their case study materials to a new level. Currently, nearly two-thirds of B2B marketers indicate that customer case studies are effective tools in their content marketing toolbox.
The main source of their efficacy is their position as a powerful form of social proof, taking a prospect through a journey that features a real-world problem and presenting a concrete solution. When these compelling narratives are backed by reliable data points and finished with a strong pitch and call-to-action, they provide the client with a compelling list of reasons to move to the next stage in the buying funnel.
Benefits of Case Studies and Customer Success Stories
- Niche specific
- Focus on your audiences problems
- Display the process
- Enable your site to stand out as an authority
- Modular and manageable
- Can be easy to create
Different types of customer success stories
Broadly speaking, there are a few different types of customer stories that you can use depending upon the specific business realities of your situation. You may choose to employ only one type of success story, or you may incorporate multiple categories. You may reserve one type for certain product lines or even mix and match for a single product to present a range of stories.
Text-based stories
The most traditional form of customer success story is the text-based narrative. These accounts generally read like normal case studies by laying out a problem, describing the solution that the customer implemented, and detailing the results to frame the narrative. In most situations, it’s preferable to include graphical representations of data at strategic intervals throughout the piece, as they draw the reader’s eyes to relevant information and provide memorable touch points through the course of the story. Text-based customer success stories are typically (but not always) written as third-person accounts.
Video stories
With increases in bandwidth and advancements in mobile streaming capabilities, video content is occupying a more prominent place than ever in the world of digital content. Cisco commissioned a study in which it predicted that 69 per cent of all internet traffic would be driven by video content by 2017. Even media empires such as Buzzed are taking notice; they recently announced an organization-wide realignment that would give their video development team a more prominent role within the site.
Given this trend, it’s not surprising that many companies are turning to video to make their customer success stories stand out in the contemporary climate. When video case studies look professionally produced and are crafted around an absorbing story, they have the potential to be even more memorable and attention-grabbing than text-based case studies. The possible downside of video content is that not everyone is adept at speaking on camera, and a lackluster video can cause viewers to dismiss the content out-of-hand.
Interview stories
Another common format employed in customer case stories is the interview, which can be produced either as video content or published as a text transcript. Interviews have the advantage of presenting the customer’s words directly to your intended audience, which can act as a powerful motivator.
Best practices for creating engaging customer success stories
Gather your evidence
Effective customer success stories can’t be written without high-quality evidence, so your first goal is to gather as much information as possible about potential candidates. This may involve researching your customer service archives, sending out feelers to clients, and interviewing your colleagues who have worked on previous accounts.
Tell a cohesive and compelling story
This strategy—whether you prefer the term “case study” or “success story”—is a form of storytelling, and the normal rules of storytelling apply. Your content needs to have a clear and logical structure, and the audience should have a solid understanding of who the main players are. Make sure you establish your characters and setting early on to give the reader a sense of context that they can follow throughout the presentation.
Tips for Creating an Excellent Customer Success Story
- Avoid jargon
- Be objective
- Incorporate quotations
- Give background information
- Format for skimming
- Be specific
- Be transparent
- Use visual content
- Make your customers relatable
- Consider different formats
- Keep it short
- Be accurate
- Address buyer readiness
- Summarize key facts and takeaways
- Use call-out text
- Feature compelling images
- Recycle quotations
- Edit for brevity
- Address budget and ROI
- Avoid excessive statistics
- Be transparent about your data
- Write a powerful conclusion
- Consider a peer review
- Reward your customers
- Encourage social sharing
The challenge of objectivity
One of the main ways that success stories can turn damaging instead of helpful is if the authors steer away from objectivity. The content is designed to showcase the value of your company, but it always needs to be based on accurate data and presented in a non-biased manner.
Length
Ideal length can be a divisive topic; different experts tout different recommendations. Going too long is a way to alienate your reader, but it’s possible to go too far in the other direction as well. While some people suggest a maximum of 500 words, it can be hard to tell a full story in such a short space. By sticking to 600 to 900 words and using data-heavy imagery to combat verbosity, you should be able to create content that paints a complete picture but can still be quickly absorbed by the reader. For video content, it’s best to break the story into several shorter videos, typically two to three minutes in length.
Create pull-quotes that stand out
Pull-quotes are an important part of both text and video case studies because they attract the eye and drive home critical talking points. They can also be used as excerpts to promote the story across your various social media channels.
Provide ROI as a touchpoint
Whenever possible, try to frame the results of your success story in terms of ROI. It’s a topic that every prospect will want to address at some point, and it will tie up the story in a context that can be applied to an individual’s own situation. Your audience will immediately translate the presented ROI results to their financial structure, giving them hard evidence as it relates directly to their company.
Work in the pitch
Success stories are a type of marketing collateral, and all marketing collateral must be accompanied by a CTA that tells the reader or viewer what step they need to take next to continue their journey. Whether it takes the form of a link to additional content, a subscription form, or other persuasive messaging, it should be clear to the audience and tie in with your marketing goals.
Questions to Ask When Creating a Case Study
- Who is the customer?
- What are their products and their niches?
- What was their problem?
- What challenges prevented them from easily solving the problem?
- How did the customer find out about your solution?
- Did they consider other providers?
- What criteria did they use to select you?
- What was your solution?
- How did it address the customer’s challenges?
- How did they implement your solution?
- How long did it take?
- What new challenges did the implementation create?
- What results did your solution give them—both anecdotally and measurably?
Maximizing the value of your customer success stories as marketing tools
Once you’ve written a compelling customer success story that is positioned to help you engage your intended audience, you must have an inclusive strategy for promotion. It is always helpful to have your promotional effort stretch across multiple platforms and outlets, but the key factor is making sure that the fit is always compatible.
First, your company’s social channels are obviously an excellent way to get the word out. When crafting social posts to promote your success stories, try to find engaging snippets and single pieces of visual content that will quickly catch your audience’s attention. For outlets such as Facebook and Twitter, brief excerpts, such as interesting pull-quotes accompanied by relevant graphics, are a sound strategy, while for Instagram and Snapchat you can use visually compelling infographics that tell an intriguing short story on their own.
In many ways, customer success stories are a unique form of content, and one strategy for taking advantage of their distinct benefits is to partner with the subject of the story in a promotional effort. While you are discussing the details of the case study format with your customer, consider asking them if they would be willing to share the finished product through their own social channels. Most companies will appreciate the chance to promote their internal successes to their audiences, and you’ll be providing them with a convenient package that includes all of the relevant data in a single piece of content. Additionally, your content marketing initiative will be exposed to an entirely new audience, with the credibility of your customer’s organization backing it up.
In addition to social, there are many online communities that you can engage with in an effort to find an audience for your case studies. By searching for discussions where your content can provide value, you’ll reach an audience that expands your followers for second- and third-degree connections.
It’s important to remember, however, that in the absence of value, content is nothing more than digital noise. Here, as with any of these social promotion strategies, the key is to always ensure that the success story is valuable to the reader based on the specific situation.
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