This post first appeared in Anthony Bullick’s Daily Post column.
Embedding storytelling within your case studies will create more impact and build vital trust with your stakeholders.
Case studies are often created with the three core headings of objective, tactics, and result, and many have little to no information that grabs the reader’s attention and helps them resonate with your product or service.
Adopting a journalistic-style and beginning the story with the outcome will not only encourage your potential client to start reading but stay engaged to the final word.
Start with the success of the project as opposed to setting the scene about the brief. A first line that states a company has saved 35,000kg of CO2 emissions is more attractive than simply saying an organisation was looking to reduce its carbon footprint.
Include quotes from people impacted by the work to add a personal touch, emotion, and opinion rather than regurgitate any of the other information in the case study.
Upload the case studies to your site to help with search engine optimisation (SEO) and boost your visibility in the search results as Google rewards fresh, relevant, and authoritative content.
In addition, because many searches are motivated by education and learning, a case study is the perfect resource to answer their queries.
From a user experience perspective, ensure they are easy to find on your website to drive as much traffic as possible once people land on your site.
Repurpose the case studies to enhance tender responses and new business proposals as well as increase conversion rate chances. Review relevant awards and enter as awards bodies constantly advise brands to tell stories within their submissions.
Consider integrating the stories into wider material such as annual reports, ESG reports, company brochures, and sales and marketing literature.
During the case study production, gather testimonials in the forms of quotes and disseminate these across review platforms such as Trustpilot, Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Share in additional places including your website, social media, and email.
Tell the story visually with professionally taken pictures and explore multi-media case studies with news-style video interviews to cater for content consumption in a variety of formats.
As the story has been written in a journalistic-style, send to the media to secure coverage as editorial. Consider local, regional, national, and trade/industry media as well as podcasts to ensure it is seen and heard by as many as your stakeholders as possible.