Planning a client case study - Use this template of interview questions
I’ve previously blogged about how to get started with asking clients for testimonials to put on your website and the importance of having these client case studies available for prospective customers to read.
This blog post goes one step further to provide a question template for service-based businesses to use when interviewing clients for case studies.
Asking clients for permission to write a case study when you’re a new business
If you’re just starting out in business, you perhaps don’t have any long-term clients that you feel you could write about. You will need to wait until you have delivered some benefits to the client before you can write a comprehensive case study.
However, what you can do in the meantime is ask that client for a short testimonial for your website and other marketing materials. Here’s my advice on how to approach clients for testimonials, and some wording you can use in your request.
Once you have worked with a client long enough to deliver on their objectives, you should approach them about writing case study.
Deciding which clients to approach about writing a case study
Perhaps your business has been up and running for some time and you’ve never written a client case study before. This is a great position to be in as you can look at writing the case study as an ideal reason to reach out to past clients. Seeking approval to write a case study is a great excuse to ask how business has been and remind your old clients that you are still here. This outreach could result in new work coming in!
Look back over pieces of work you have successfully completed for clients and organise them by type of project.
Next, you will need to look at your website and suite of marketing collateral and identify which parts of your offering would benefit most from being backed up by a client case study. It’s a useful exercise to create a simple table showing your offering and the corresponding gaps in case studies as supporting material which you would like to fill.
If your offering is fairly simple (one or two services) but you provide it over multiple verticals, you should list your verticals along one side of your grid and look to populate those squares with case study ideas.
Once you have documented all the areas you would like to produce a client case study to support, you need to go about identifying which clients (past or present) would be suitable candidates to write about. This is a useful exercise if you have the luxury of having completed similar projects for multiple clients.
Choosing the best client to approach regarding approval for a case study does in part come down to gut feel. If you look back and a project was a roaring success with an exceptionally happy client, this is a strong signal that this client would be willing to participate in a case study about their experience.
If things didn’t run so smoothly and there were challenges along the way, it might be that the project is best left alone and that past issues aren’t worth bringing up again.
However, this is not to say that you shouldn’t be asking clients for feedback when a project went less than perfectly. I’ve written before about asking clients for feedback and a testimonial as part of the project completion process and this is definitely best practice.
Don’t be afraid to ask for feedback – it can only improve your business as you go forwards. It is also common that even when projects were a bumpy ride, the client is still happy with the end result and will actually be more than happy to write a few words for your website about their experience. These clients are also an excellent source of constructive criticism. Don’t be afraid to ask! What’s the worst that could happen?
How to tee up clients to agree to a case study
After you’ve decided which clients you would like to use to showcase your work and expertise, you need to craft your request to them in a way that makes them feel at ease with your ask and agree to support you.
My top tip for doing this is to make the whole case study writing process as light touch as possible for you client. If you ask them to write something for you, it probably won’t get done. The solution to this is to ask them for a short (max 30 minutes if possible) interview with you where you can run through your case study interview questions and get the material that you need to be able to write it up yourself. All the client needs to commit to is a short meeting, or even better, a telephone call. Easy for them to do!
Here’s an example of some wording you could use in your request:
Hi Susan,
I hope you are well?
I’m updating some of my marketing materials and website and I’m looking to include some examples of projects to showcase my expertise and what I can do for clients.
The work that I did with you on X, Y, Z would be a great example of my services in action and I wondered if you be happy for me to write a short case study about our project?
If you are happy to contribute, it will just take a short call (30 minutes or so) for me to run through some questions and I’ll then type up the case study for your approval.
Are you happy to take part?
Kind regards
Kelly
Susan hopefully replies to confirm and this is where you set the date/time for the call and then you can insert a line or two asking what else they are up to, with the intention that perhaps you might find something you can work on together again in the future.
An alternative approach is to first write a case study about the work undertaken, and to reach out the client asking for a quote to insert about how they found working with you and the results achieved. This is even easier for that client than a phone call interview and is perhaps a better approach to take if you know that client is very time-poor.
The benefits of having a call with them is that you will inevitably catch up outside of the main agenda and it can be a nice way to keep in the loop with what’s going on with your client and also update them with what you’ve been up to. It’s all about keeping past clients warm.
An added benefit of doing the client interview over the phone is you feel you can type more while talking as don’t need to make eye contact!
The best format for your client case study
Start with the client’s business background
Now that you have your client lined up for a case study, you need to prepare to write it. The logical place to start is writing about your client’s business background – summarise what they do.
If they have a broad offering, describe the part of the business that you were tasked with supporting or the function of the particular team that you worked with. Give a short overview of the company’s expertise, customer base and position in the market.
You might know everything you need to know about the client’s business background, enabling you to get this part written without their input. If you do have some questions relating to this section, you can ask them during your case study call.
TOP TIP: Fill in the gaps ahead of time by looking your client up on LinkedIn and reading the About page on their website. If you can write about the client in their own words, they will feel comfortable when reading it during the approval process.
Once you have the client’s business background documented, it’s time to move on to the main part of the case study.
This is the structure that I suggest you use for your client case studies:
1. Summarise the client’s problem
What problem were you brought in to solve? Maybe the client didn’t see it as a problem or describe it to you in that way, but you were there to provide a service to help them achieve something so explain here why they couldn’t achieve it without you.
2. Document the solution you came up with for the client
What did you do to help solve the client’s problem or meet their need? Describe the specific skills and experience that you utilised on this project. Perhaps your client thought they had a particular problem they wanted you to solve but you were able to help them see that the problem was in fact different – enabling you to provide a better, more relevant service for them.
3. Detail the positive impact of working with you on this project
This section is key, and most readers will probably jump straight here so make it count! What did you help your client to achieve? You can talk in terms of ROI and meeting KPIs here but also consider wider benefits like time saved or steering them on a better path to success.
4. List key facts relating to the success of the client project
This is where you pull out facts and figures in the form of bullets so that the reader can skim read and clearly see what you achieved for your client. Perhaps these bullets go like this:
20 marketing qualified leads
10,000 landing page visits
80% response rate in just 5 weeks
500 customers surveyed in just 8 weeks
Try to include a number and a timeframe if possible.
While interviewing your client, make a note of a sentence or two which you can quote verbatim in the case study. This short quote could also be used in isolation on other marketing materials or on your website.
When interviewing your client over the phone, I suggest putting your phone on loud speaker and typing (or writing) notes as you go. If you don’t feel like you’d be able to keep up, you can record the conversation but be wary that listening to it again to write the piece effectively doubles the time you spent on an interview!
Template of suggested client case study questions
For service-based businesses, here is my template of suggested questions for each of the sections listed above to ask your client to enable you to write a case study about them:
Background
Please give me a quick overview of your business.
Can you describe your role?
How long has your company been in business?
How many employees do you have?
Who is your target customer?
Problem
What challenges were you and your team experiencing prior to working with us?
How did you go about searching for a solution to your problem?
How did you hear about us?
Please describe a few of the reasons you decided to work with us.
What problem(s) were you hoping we would be able to solve for you?
Solution
Can you describe the process which we took your business through?
What changes did you make as a result of working with us?
What impact have the results from working with us had for your clients?
How have the wider team benefitted from working with us?
Impact
What benefits have you experienced from working with us?
What has been the most significant achievement for your business facilitated by working with us?
What do you hope to achieve in your future working relationship with us?
Would you recommend us?
Extra question to remember:
Can you please provide your company logo and a group photo for use on the case study?
The client case study approval process.
Once you have the case study written and you are happy with it, it’s time to seek approval from your key stakeholders. You may need to first approve the piece within your own organisation before it goes to the client. Once you have the case study signed off by your own internal team, it’s time to send it over to the client.
It’s a good idea to set expectations for your client of when you would like to make the case study live. That way you can give them a deadline for approval. Remember that they are doing you a favour by giving permission for the case study so don’t be too pushy at this stage but just be aware that the case study perhaps isn’t a priority for them and they will need to be given a date to get back to you by if possible.
Conclusion
Planning is key when it comes to writing a strong client case study. Doing the groundwork in preparing questions beforehand and structuring your case study in the format listed above will ensure your client case study is compelling.
If you are new in business and don’t have any long-term clients or completed projects, you can still ask your clients for a short testimonial for your marketing materials and website.
You should ask all clients for feedback as part of your project completion process – don’t be shy! What’s the worst that could happen? They could say “no” or give you areas for improvement.
Make sure you approve the finished case study with all your internal stakeholders and everyone at the client organisation.
I’m sure you will find case study writing as a great form of reflection and it’s always a boost to look at how far your business has come and the success you have had for your clients.
Happy writing!
