• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

PropelGrowth

Human-to-human social sales training

Menu
  • Home
  • Who We Are
    • Why PropelGrowth?
    • Management Team
    • Acumatica Marketing Team
    • Privacy Policy
    • Close
  • What We Do
    • Marketing Strategy
      • Buyer Personas
      • Strategy Development
      • Acumatica Partner Marketing
      • Integrating PR
      • Creative Design
    • Marketing Programs
      • Content Marketing for the Buying Process
      • Content Marketing Programs
      • Thought Leadership In The Buying Process
      • Thought Leadership Programs
      • Lead Generation and Lead Nurturing
      • LinkedIn Sales Prospecting
      • Marketing Coaching Program
    • Marketing Content
      • Marketing Automation
      • Email Marketing
      • Website Content
      • Blogging and Article Marketing
      • Case Studies
      • White Papers and E-books
      • Research Studies
      • Live and Online Events
    • PropelGrowth LinkedIn Prospecting Mastery course
    • Close
  • Who We Do It For
    • Who We Serve
    • Client Case Studies
      • What This CEO Learned From Buyer Persona Research Transformed Her Company
      • Close
    • Close
  • Resources
    • Sales Resources
      • Solving the No Decision Problem
      • Close
    • Marketing Resources
      • B2B Lead Conversion Rates
      • Close
    • The TrendSpotters Podcast Series
    • Close
  • Blog
  • Contact
    • Close

How to Get Clients to Do a Case Study

By Candyce Edelen

PropelGrowth Blog - Financial Services Marketing

How to get a customer to agree to a case study.

A common question marketers struggle with is how to write case studies if the clients are not willing to be named. This is tough. In all cases, you get a lot more credibility if the client is willing to be identified. But if they’re willing to be named, they’ll also want to control how much information you disclose. In some cases, the key stakeholders might be willing to help, but the corporate communications department won’t approve the use of their brand or allow you to quote anyone. So how do you work around this? Here are 5 tips for getting your clients to do a case study and even allow you to publish it in a magazine:

1.  Keep the Case Study Anonymous

The easiest approach is to go anonymous. Then you can write just about anything you want, as long as you don’t give identifying information or disclose confidential material. For example, check out this article I wrote on automating the certification process for electronic trading. The key interview subject worked for a global, tier 1 investment bank. Their PR department is notorious about not letting vendors use the bank’s name. So we didn’t even try. The client gave me an interview on the condition that he remains anonymous. I leveraged portions of the interview to create the article. It worked well. The day this article was published, our client received a call from a new prospect who read the article. They closed a significant deal that they never would have known about had the prospect not discovered the article.

2.  Give the Client an Opportunity for Publicity

We’re working on a similar case study now.  Like the link I shared above, this case study will be written as an article and will published in a trade journal. In this example, the client is a new start-up exchange that needs publicity. For them, this article represents free PR. But even in a case like this, it’s important to be very sensitive to their communication needs. For example, after we interviewed the key stakeholder, we immediately booked a call with the head of communications and the head of compliance to discuss topics that were off-limits. This makes them comfortable that we’re going to stay within what they’re regulatorily permitted to say. We will make every effort to represent them in a positive light, even borrowing their positioning language. They will get an opportunity to review and comment before we publish, and if they don’t like how we’re representing them, they can always opt to stay anonymous.

Here’s another example of a by-line we ghost-wrote. It was a thought leadership article that included a mini case study about how a customer is leveraging our client’s technology. In this case, our core strategy was to position the customer (CEESEG) as a thought leader setting the standard by which their competitors should be measured. This approach made them comfortable with us using their name and quoting them. They did not want to be interviewed, so we gave them written questions to answer. They submitted responses, and we worked them into the article. Then we sent the article for approval. They made only minor changes before approving it for publication.

3.  Give the Client the Option of Anonymity

In another case, we’re doing a study about a Latin American stock exchange. Our client has been trying to get PR approval with this customer for some time without success, so we assumed that they would need to stay anonymous. We booked an interview with a key stakeholder under that assumption, clearly stating that all his comments would be anonymized. To my surprise, this exchange decided that they want to be named. After we discussed our plans for the article, they realized that it will prove beneficial to their marketing efforts. So now, we’re going through the same process I mentioned above, making sure we know what we can and cannot disclose.

Related: 5 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Customer Interviews

4.  Make the Client the Hero

In all of these cases, the client is the hero of the story. We focus the articles on how they’re improving their business using the capabilities they obtained with our product. Too many case studies are company-focused instead of client-focused. Our goal is to make the client look really good – demonstrating how their decision to use a specific product allowed them to deliver dramatic results to their organization. After all, that’s what your target reader is trying to do too.

Related: Is Your Client A Hero Or A Damsel In Distress?

5.  If You Can’t Get ROI Numbers, Use Other Quantifiers

In many cases, it’s difficult to document a solid ROI (return on investment) for your case study. Sometimes, it’s because you’re looking too high level. For example, many marketers will look for numbers that specify overall contribution to revenue or profitability for the company. In most cases, that will be pretty hard, if not impossible, for your client to quantify. So if you set up an unreasonable hurdle like this, they’re unlikely to want to do the work needed to arrive at a figure.

In this case study, I didn’t even try to ask how much money automation saved that bank. Instead, we focused on how fast they were able to reduce their backlog, how many man-days were reduced for each client on-boarded, and how many more clients they can now on-board at one time. We found out that the client was able speed up time-to-revenue for the average customer by as much as 6 months. But if I tried to assign a dollar value to that, I’d be sure to get it wrong. Because one customer might be worth hundreds of thousands in revenue to this client, while another might bring a pittance. So don’t give up if the client can’t give you hard numbers. Look for details. Let the reader do his or her own math and come up with their own ROI based on the information you provide. It will be more powerful that way.

The more honest and transparent you are with your case studies, the more your buyers will trust the content. But don’t join the troops of technology vendors who exaggerate the truth. Buyers don’t trust those vendors.

Wrap-Up

In summary –if your case study is all about you and your company, don’t expect your customer to get excited about participating. The more customer-centric you are in your approach for the case study and the more you make the customer the hero, the more likely your customer will be willing to go public. Always ask “What’s in it for them?”

Related: 3 Qualities of Customer-Centric Marketing Content

Need Help with a Case Study? Contact us

  • Author
  • Recent Posts
Connect
Candyce Edelen
CEO at PropelGrowth
Candyce is the founder and CEO of PropelGrowth. She brings more than twenty years of experience in managing technology companies and has founded four companies prior to PropelGrowth. For the past ten years, Candyce has focused exclusively in the capital markets industry, launching two financial technology companies. Now, she helps financial technology vendors improve their marketing strategy, publish compelling content, and drive revenue through marketing and sales enablement. Contact Candyce at +1 970-300-2280.
Connect
Latest posts by Candyce Edelen (see all)
  • 4 Steps to Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for Sales Prospecting
  • The Reality of Cold Calling for B2B Sales
  • Can Inbound Marketing Generate Enough Leads?

Filed Under: Content Marketing, PropelGrowth Blog Tagged With: case studies, case study

About Candyce Edelen

Candyce is the founder and CEO of PropelGrowth. She brings more than twenty years of experience in managing technology companies and has founded four companies prior to PropelGrowth. For the past ten years, Candyce has focused exclusively in the capital markets industry, launching two financial technology companies. Now, she helps financial technology vendors improve their marketing strategy, publish compelling content, and drive revenue through marketing and sales enablement. Contact Candyce at +1 970-300-2280.

Company Profile

PropelGrowth helps companies improve their marketing and sales. We start with in-depth buyer research. Then we develop a marketing and sales strategy and customer-centric messaging. Then we coach your team and help you execute on the strategy by developing thought leadership programs, content for every stage in the buying process, sales collateral, and tools to help buyers buy.

Figure out why and how your buyers buy

Develop a customer-centric marketing strategy

Get coaching from a senior marketing strategist

Recent Posts

  • 4 Steps to Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for Sales Prospecting
  • The Reality of Cold Calling for B2B Sales
  • Can Inbound Marketing Generate Enough Leads?
  • How to Fill Your Sales Pipeline Using LinkedIn for Prospecting
  • Tips from 8 ERP Resellers on How to Leapfrog Your Competition​
  • How to Win 74% of Your ERP Deals
  • Buyer Persona Research, the Key to Niche Marketing
  • 8 Ways a Niche Strategy Improves the Value of Your Practice

Connect With Candyce

View LinkedIn profile Follow on Twitter 

Connect With Phil

View LinkedIn profile Follow on Twitter 

Company Address

3209 Glacier Creek Drive
Ft. Collins, CO 80524
+1 970.300.2280

  • Home
  • Who We Are
  • What We Do
  • Who We Do It For
  • Resources
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Search

Copyright © 2022 PropelGrowth LLC · Designed by Phil Donaldson

  • Home
  • Who We Are
    • Why PropelGrowth?
    • Management Team
    • Acumatica Marketing Team
    • Privacy Policy
    • Back
  • What We Do
    • Marketing Strategy
      • Buyer Personas
      • Strategy Development
      • Acumatica Partner Marketing
      • Integrating PR
      • Creative Design
      • Back
    • Marketing Programs
      • Content Marketing for the Buying Process
      • Content Marketing Programs
      • Thought Leadership In The Buying Process
      • Thought Leadership Programs
      • Lead Generation and Lead Nurturing
      • LinkedIn Sales Prospecting
      • Marketing Coaching Program
      • Back
    • Marketing Content
      • Marketing Automation
      • Email Marketing
      • Website Content
      • Blogging and Article Marketing
      • Case Studies
      • White Papers and E-books
      • Research Studies
      • Live and Online Events
      • Back
    • LinkedIn LeadGen Master Class
    • Back
  • Who We Do It For
    • Who We Serve
    • Client Case Studies
      • What This CEO Learned From Buyer Persona Research Transformed Her Company
      • Back
    • Back
  • Resources
    • Sales Resources
      • Solving the No Decision Problem
      • Back
    • Marketing Resources
      • B2B Lead Conversion Rates
      • Back
    • The TrendSpotters Podcast Series
    • Back
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Search
    • Back