We all know that feeling.

You may have already run a case study of your big-name customer or the one with the most impressive results. And now you need to create another case study, and you’re stuck on where to find the right customer for it.

Not to worry, you probably already have several potentials; you just need to take a different approach to find them. Here are a few ideas to help you.

Who has experienced a change worth talking about?

It doesn’t have to be a major change. You’re looking for a customer who might have said to someone at your company, “We used to spend three days every month pulling reports manually, and now we get the information in an hour.”

They’ll be able to explain:

• What life looked like before
• What made them look for a solution
• What was difficult or frustrating
• What changed afterwards
• What they can do now which they couldn’t before

Who felt the pain of the problem?

These customers have a strong emotional connection to the problem you solved. I don’t mean this in a soap-opera type way, more that the issue was causing them a lot of stress and keeping them up at night. We all remember those times vividly.

How can you find them? Ask your teams if they can remember customers:

• Who was struggling with an issue before they bought?
• Who was under a lot of pressure to find a solution?
• Who said: “I can’t tell you how pleased we are not to have to worry about this anymore”?

Who can tell their story in their own voice?

You know these customers. They’re natural storytellers who can explain the ins and outs of their experience in their own words.

They often have great anecdotes and quotes that can lift a case study, especially when it’s on a technical topic. They can also be a good bridge to other people at your customer’s company who find it harder to talk about these things.

People like the person who uses your solution every day or whose job has just become a lot easier. Being interviewed for a case study might feel like a formal process for them, and everything comes out as corporate speak.

By having a chat with your source, they’ll feel more relaxed, and you’ll get the quotes and information you need for your case study.

Whose context the prospect will recognise themselves in

The key here is who will be reading your case study. If it’s prospects with global operations, then a big customer talking about how they: “Transformed our global operations” is more relatable than a smaller one talking about how they’ve “Transformed our staff rota system.”

All this said, sometimes you have a smaller customer who is a perfect fit because the issue they had affects large and small companies alike.

Who’d benefit from the visibility?

An unusual one. You might have a customer who values being seen as an innovator or leader in their field. Maybe you designed a bespoke product for this customer that could also help other companies. Or one of your products was used in a new way to solve a problem.

There are all sorts of possibilities, and these customers can be keen to take part in a case study or success story because it gives them something they can use for their business.

You now have five ways to find potential customers for your case study. With any luck, this has inspired more ideas, making the tricky task of finding the right one a little bit easier.

Stakeholders and others, understandably, prefer to use big-name customers for case studies; however, this means that many other, just-as-good or even better ones get overlooked because they don’t fit that criterion.

And there’s another positive side to this approach. If you’re sending case studies to the media, it can help them stand out. Journalists are used to seeing big-name companies. When they read about a smaller company that solved a problem that they know their readers are facing, they’re more likely to get in touch with your company.

Now you’ve found the perfect customer for your case study, how do you persuade them to take part? That’s the topic of my next post.

I’m Sara Edlington, a B2B technology case study writer.

With twenty years in tech journalism behind me (The Times, The Independent, StrategicRISK Europe), now I help B2B technology companies turn customer success into stories that prospects recognise themselves in. If your customers have a story worth telling, either get in touch or find out how I can help you.

The post How to find the right customer for your case study (beyond the big name) appeared first on B2B Technology Case Study Writer.

Here’s a quick example of what I mean. I interviewed an SME about a new enterprise software platform. One aspect of this that they talked about was an automation feature:

“This feature is designed to automate the process of extracting data from two legacy systems and integrating it into the platform, removing the need for manual data handling while ensuring the information is available within the system.”

There’s a lot of business value in this paragraph:

‘…extracting data from two legacy systems and integrating it into the platform.’ Extends the use and value of older systems as they don’t need to be replaced straight away, and reduces disruption.

‘…removing the need for manual data handling.’ Fewer errors, reduced manual work, so staff time is freed up for other things.

‘…ensuring the information is available within the system.’ Helps teams respond faster and provides better data visibility.

Lost in (technical) translation

The problem is that all this is lost if it stays in technical language or explanations. If you leave it as it is, you could also lose your reader, because they want to see how, in this case, a software platform will help their business.

And this tells them they’ll have higher-quality data and information to work with; their staff will have more time for higher-value tasks; they’ll get the information they need quickly; and they won’t have to worry about their older systems.

We’re all techies in our own way

You might be wondering if this means that SMEs and technical experts don’t understand the business value of the technology they’re so familiar with.

They do, they just word it in the language they use every day. Just as anyone does when they’re talking about a subject they know a lot about.

We know we’re talking about business value; it just doesn’t always come across that way to the reader or listener, who’s looking at this from a different perspective.

How to ‘decode’ technical speak into marketing and sales speak

I’ve been asked a few times to teach technical experts how to ‘talk’ in marketing or sales language, but I think that misses an important point. By asking the right questions of experts and specialists and listening carefully, you’ll ‘decode’ the business value you might otherwise have missed.

Another example, this time a cybersecurity expert talking about their company’s product:

“The platform continuously monitors authentication activity across the environment. It analyses login patterns, device information, user behaviour, and access requests in real time. If it detects something unusual, it can automatically apply additional verification steps or restrict access until the activity is validated.”

The less obvious business benefits:

‘…continuously monitors authentication activity across the environment.’ The value here is that the system is under constant guard, always a good thing.

There’s also another benefit for audits and compliance. The company has evidence of who accessed what, when, and can show how security controls are working.

‘…analyses login patterns, device information, user behaviour…’ Two things here. It helps protect sensitive systems and information by adding an extra layer of security.

A stolen password alone won’t get an attacker in because the system checks the behaviour matches the person.

‘…automatically apply additional verification steps.’ This has a business value for a team; they can spend less time on routine alerts. Another one is that staff and customers can access the system quickly and easily.

A second look can help you find even more value

It’s always worth looking at something a few times, because there’s often a second benefit you might miss if you focus on the first one, understandably. And the more you find, the more choices you have, and that helps you create a strong case study or success story.

We’ve covered a lot in the two examples, and I realise it can look overwhelming, so you might worry you’ll miss something important. I worry about the same thing. Here’s what helps.

I use a three-step formula.

1. The expert gives me the technical information.
2. I listen to that and ask myself: ‘What changed?’
3. Then ask: ‘What is the human/business or both consequence of this?’

Here’s an example to help explain how this works in practice.

The expert says: “It simplifies managing security policies across thousands of users.”

What changes? Team managers don’t need lots of specialist knowledge. They make fewer mistakes, and it’s quicker and easier to change policies as needed.

What’s the consequence for the people involved, the business, or both? It’s easier and less stressful for staff and team managers. And it helps keep the company secure.

I was once asked if you could create an AI that could do this; maybe you could. However, we notice things that only another human would notice.

AI can be a big help, but the things you hear and see are what give your case study its edge. One human to another.

I’m Sara Edlington, a B2B technology case study writer.

With twenty years in tech journalism behind me (The Times, The Independent, StrategicRISK Europe), now I help B2B technology companies turn customer success into stories that prospects recognise themselves in. If your customers have a story worth telling, either get in touch or find out how I can help you.

The post Lost in translation: turning tech-speak into business value for your case studies appeared first on B2B Technology Case Study Writer.

You know that sinking feeling you get when you read through a customer interview transcript and think: “Oh dear.”

Or maybe something a bit stronger.

There can be any number of reasons why you didn’t get what you wanted or needed, so what can you do?

Here are a few tried and tested ideas:

Follow the threads

When you read or listen back to your case study interview, what catches your attention?

Let’s say your case study is about your customer using a security platform. They mention that during implementation, an unexpected new risk emerged.

That’s something your reader will also be interested in, as they won’t have expected it either. Additionally, it’s also a ‘hidden benefit’ of using your platform, which is always a bonus.

Look for patterns as well. Did something keep getting mentioned in different ways? Maybe it was comments about how staff used the previous system.

Repeated themes can be another good source. Let’s say you hear or read comments like these:

“We needed to get buy-in from the relevant department managers.”

“Training people was important.”

“Staff were nervous about the change in platform.”

“We organised regular meetings, updates through our messaging channels and kept everyone up to date with what was happening.”

“We gathered feedback during the process.”

The theme here is trust. If trust was important to your customer, it’s likely to be important to your reader as well.

Search for the story

A story involves people, a change or both.

Often, the two of these come together. Let’s say you have a passwordless authentication product that your customer is using.

Your customer says that staff were constantly changing passwords because they kept forgetting them, creating a security risk.

Further on, they mention that a new security risk appeared as staff didn’t like the new MFA (multi-factor authentication) and kept trying to find workarounds.

These three points provide the structure for a good case study story.

The two failed attempts (passwords and MFA), the increased security risks, the frustrated and fed-up staff, and now another change: passwordless authentication, and how that worked for both the company and its staff.

Your reader will want to know what happened because they may be facing the same issues.

Even if you don’t have much more than a few comments, you can add relevant information, use the comments as quotes, add statistics and metrics, and bring in a comment or two from your own team.

Find supporting materials

If you’ve gone through your transcript and found something/s that will work with a bit of extra information, the good news is you can probably find what you need.

Good places to search include press releases, media kits, reports, white papers, product sheets, analyst reports, the company’s website and social media, discussion forums and so on.

You could also look outside the company. Do background research; use sources such as specialist research databases and sector-specific reports.

If you quote from these, you will need to credit the source and get their permission. It’s worth the extra work, as few case studies do this, and it adds depth to your case study.

Other places to look in the interview

Another way to find what you need is to look at the timestamps of your interview and note down which topics led to shorter or longer timestamps.

You might find the interviewee spent 5 minutes on market trends, 16 minutes on their staff and your product/service, and 21 minutes on regulatory issues.

These might not be in neat blocks of time, or you might be lucky, and they are. Either way, by gathering together specific themes, you can get a good idea of what’s important to the customer.

Listen for emotional wording. By this, I mean phrases like ‘limited time,’ ‘too many requests,’ ‘staff overwhelm,’ ‘problems with something,’ ‘pressure to do more,’ and so on. These emotional clues can also help you piece together a real issue they were facing.

Bringing all this together. Method One.

OK, how do you make sense of what you’ve found? Here are two ways.

One way is to use a journalistic format to find a story.

• Who. Who is affected or involved?
• What. What happened? What was the issue?
• Why. Why did they choose your product/service?
• Or Why. Why did they decide they needed this type of product/service?

Taking the example of passwordless authentication.

Who? The customer’s company, its staff, and security teams

What? The different security methods they’d tried, the increased security risks, and their unhappy staff.

Why? The customer needed to find a way to keep accounts secure while providing a process that staff could easily use.

Bringing it all together. Method Two.

The second is to write a paragraph explaining the case study to yourself. It doesn’t need to be long or detailed.

Using this method can help you find the focus you want. Sometimes, you write this and then realise the real story is something else.

For example, you might write:

“Our customer needed a zero-day security solution. They were concerned about how this could be implemented, given their legacy systems, and several teams were worried about how they would be expected to use the new system. We found an unexpected benefit during implementation and discovered that trust was important to the customer and their team.”

Then, when you read it back, you notice you mentioned trust. Is there a bigger story there? When you go back to your notes, you can see mentions of getting team buy-in, training, nervous staff, and regular meetings to update everyone.

With such a big change, keeping staff on board, listening to their concerns, providing them with the right training, and showing how you helped the company manage it gives you a great story and case study.

The unexpected benefit fits in nicely with this, as it’s part of the process, and it would make a good sidebar.

A final bonus tip

If you can, leave the transcript or recording for a day or so and then come back to it. You’ll often find your mind has made connections you didn’t see before, and they could be just what you need.

The next time you’re stuck with a case study interview, you can still use it, as you’ll have a ‘back pocket’ set of tips and ideas you can use.

I’m Sara Edlington, a B2B technology case study writer.

With twenty years in tech journalism behind me (The Times, The Independent, StrategicRISK Europe), now I help B2B technology companies turn customer success into stories that prospects recognise themselves in. If your customers have a story worth telling, either get in touch or find out how I can help you.

The post What to do when a case study interview falls short appeared first on B2B Technology Case Study Writer.

For vendors, this is a particular problem. Your prospects are already cautious, and ho-hum case studies do nothing to build the trust you need.

As a former B2B tech reporter, I read hundreds of case studies. Most went straight to the recycle bin or a real bin. But occasionally, one would stand out because it:

• Showed what really happened during implementation (including the problems, yes, really).
• Included real customer insights in their voice.
• Told a story about a problem your customer had, what you did to help them solve it and what it meant for the customer.
• Gave behind-the-scenes details that readers want to know, like the unexpected benefit or how you helped keep staff on board with big changes.

These were the case studies I’d use. I’d get in touch and ask if I could interview the customer and company for my article, or keep them for future round-ups.

A quick example of what I mean about including real customer insights in their own words. Let’s say this was the original:

“When we saw our old system working with the new software, we knew it was going to make a difference to our customer service.”

And then someone wanted it changed to something more ‘fitting’:

“We were highly impressed by the interface that connected these applications.”

The first one sounds like you having a chat with the customer; the second sounds like you’re reading a particularly poor prompted AI version of the quote.

The most valuable part of a case study isn’t always the outcome

Your prospects aren’t just evaluating your technology; they’re also evaluating your company. They’re trying to picture what it’s like to work with you.

It’s like when you ask a friend what washing machine they would recommend. You’d listen to their experiences, why they chose the manufacturer and model they did, and how it’s working for them now.

You wouldn’t expect them to start giving you a rundown of its features and how it uses the latest tech because you want to see whether it’s the right machine for you.

Equally, you’re also researching the manufacturer, even if you don’t realise it. And prospects are the same; they’re looking at your company and are trying to picture what it’s like to work with you.

Which is why all of the above matters, because it helps answer that question. A case study that only talks about “seamless implementation” and “impressive results” doesn’t help your prospect. They know implementations aren’t seamless.

Here are a few questions you can ask your customer to gather the information you need.

• Why did they choose this approach?
• What nearly stopped them?
• What did they underestimate?
• What surprised them?
• What would they do differently?

These questions are also the sort of questions your prospects will be asking themselves.

The case studies that work.

The most effective case studies I’ve seen don’t hide the rough edges. They acknowledge challenges, issues and problems and show how they were solved.

That’s what builds trust. Not perfection, just reality and how you dealt with issues and problems.

If your case studies read more like marketing than stories, your prospects can tell, and they’ll click away. Which is a shame, as your product or service could be just what they need.

How can you make your case study more credible? Give your prospects the customer’s real story.

I’m Sara Edlington, a B2B technology case study writer.

With twenty years in tech journalism behind me (The Times, The Independent, StrategicRISK Europe), now I help B2B technology companies turn customer success into stories that prospects recognise themselves in. If your customers have a story worth telling, either get in touch or find out how I can help you.

The post Are your tech case studies missing the point? Here’s how to fix them appeared first on B2B Technology Case Study Writer.

However, there are other, more subtle ways your content can be too technical. Here are my top five to check.

It explains how before it explains why.

You might have seen this: content that dives straight into frameworks, integrations, or architecture diagrams before explaining the problem it solves.

It might look helpful because it gives a wealth of information about aspects of your technology. However, if readers have to wade through half a page before discovering why it matters, the detail isn’t helping; it’s hiding the point.

Start with the business context: what changes, what improves, and what risk is reduced. The “how” makes more sense once readers know the “why.”

It assumes shared knowledge.

Internal teams read content and nod: “Of course, they’ll know what XDR or ELT means.” But does your business audience know what they mean?

This is the ‘Curse of Knowledge’, meaning that you know your topic so well that it’s difficult to explain it to others, who don’t know as much as you do. There’s nothing wrong with this; you’ve built up that knowledge over a long period of time.

One way around this is to add a sentence that turns technical shorthand into a straightforward explanation: “XDR brings together data from across systems, so threats are spotted faster.”

Your prospect now knows what XDR means and how it can solve a problem.

It treats every detail as equally important.

When everything is important, nothing stands out.

Business readers don’t need the whole implementation story; they need to see what matters to them and their company. What are the most important details your prospects need to help them make a decision? Put these first, and then use the rest to explain how it works.

It reads like documentation, even when it’s not.

Documentation language tends to creep into business content more often than you’d think. Phrases like ‘the solution leverages advanced capabilities to…’ sound professional but say nothing.

The fix is to replace abstract words like ‘capabilities’ with what they do. Instead of ‘leverages automation,’ try ‘automates routine tasks so teams can focus on high-value work.’

It forgets the reader’s role.

You can get so caught up in making the case for your technology that you forget your audience. It’s easier to do this than you might think.

You get on a roll with what you’re writing about, and you get so into the topic that the readers get left behind somewhere along the way.

One way to spot if this has happened is to read your content back. If it only describes what the system does, rather than what the reader gains, it’s not about what matters to your reader.

You don’t need to do a complete rewrite; you can change certain wording. If you say that your “platform provides”, try changing it to: “teams gain.” Now you’re talking to the reader again.

Final idea

Technical content isn’t “wrong”, it’s just written for a different audience with different needs. If you’re worried about losing that technical depth, it can still be there. It just needs to be reshaped to work for your reader.

That’s when technical content becomes business clarity, and your content works for the most important person, your reader.

I’m Sara Edlington, a B2B technology case study writer.

With twenty years in tech journalism behind me (The Times, The Independent, StrategicRISK Europe), now I help B2B technology companies turn customer success into stories that prospects recognise themselves in. If your customers have a story worth telling, either get in touch or find out how I can help you.

The post Five signs your content is too technical for business buyers (even if it doesn’t look like it) appeared first on B2B Technology Case Study Writer.