Let Your Customers Do the Talking: Creating and Leveraging Great Case Studies
Matt Volpi | Tovana Consulting, Inc.
You’re asking your customers to set out on a journey
You know where they’re heading… but they don’t
No one wants to feel like they picked the wrong route
What is Sales Doing?
Trying to get a meeting with anyone they can
What is Sales Doing?
Bringing out their entire box of tricks to see
what resonates
What is Sales Doing?
Giving demos to wow prospects with all the
great stuff your solution can do
What is Sales Doing?
Promising the moon to get the sale, hit their number
and get their commission
Your company is talking about FEATURES
Customers care how your solution will BENEFIT them
Image Credit: Sebastiaan ter Burg
B2B Customer Benefits
• Help them do something faster
• Help them do something cheaper
• Help them do more
• Help them stop doing something they don’t want to do anymore
• Help them do something new
• Help them use their resources differently
B2C Customer Benefits
• Make them happy
• Save them time
• Save them money
• Help them do something new
• Help them stop doing something they don’t want to do anymore
Prospects want to see other customers they relate to…
…and how they already succeeded at the same thing
Give them confidence they’re not alone on this journey
Finding the Sweet Spot
Benefit
Industry Company
Type
Benefit
Interest Customer
Type
B2B B2C
Preparing your interview guide
10 Interview Guide Questions
• Full name, title and responsibilities • What got them interested initially? • Were there concerns and how were they addressed? • How did they make their decision? • Who else did they have to convince? • Where did they find the money? • Did it deliver on the promised benefits? • What are the unexpected benefits/drawbacks? • What were/are the challenges? • What advice do they have for others?
Selecting case study candidates
Casting the star of your story
• Keep the Sweet Spot in mind
• Get suggestions from sales, account management and customer service
• Make sure there are no potential land mines
• Get their buy in and commitment to let you publish BEFORE you go any further
Conducting the interview
7 Interviewing Tips
• Stay conversational
• Let them go off on tangents
• Pay attention and think of follow-up questions
• Always look for the great quotes
• Dig for measurable successes and shareable stats
• Ask if there’s anyone else you should talk to
• Leave the door open for either side to follow up with more questions/information
Now you’re ready to craft a case study
Find a theme to focus on
Create a relatable narrative your prospects can relate to
Let your interview subjects be the stars of the story
Show the imperfect path taken to realize the benefit
Keep the audience of potential naysayers in mind
Image Credit: Leonardo Rizzi
Don’t forget the visuals
Celebrate your customer’s success
Get your customer to approve the final versions
Arm your salesforce and work it into their presentations
Use the raw components to create additional material
Broadcast it using all available channels
A Quick Word About Me and Tovana Consulting
• Tovana Consulting, Inc. – http://tovana.com – Providing market research, strategy & marketing/
content creation services since 2002 – Clients in a range of industries including technology,
financial services and education
• Matt Volpi – @mattvolpi – 20-years in product management and marketing – PM at (former) mobile & Internet giants
• CMGi, Nokia and Sun Microsystems
– Executive roles at two start-ups • BigBelly Solar • Modiv Media (acquired by Catalina Marketing)