Episode 17: Customer Case Study Journey
Welcome to the next episode of The CMA Newsletter where 497 marketers get better at building Customer Marketing programs and strengthening relationships with their customers in less than 5 minutes.
See past episodes of the CMA Newsletter here. 🙌
Dreamforce was this week and holy moly I’m pooped. I dressed up as a Piñata and hit the streets of SF. Our CEO Kris thought of the most wonderful idea this year. We rented out Jeffery’s Toy Store and purchased 600 toys. We invited everyone to come in and wrap a gift for a child in need this holiday season. So yeah, you bet your ass I dressed up as a piñata!
Anyway, today I’d like to talk about Case Studies. 😒
I heard that! You “uuugh’d”! I know, I know they are so taxing. I have narrowed down why I’m not fond of them —> I am not in control. The approvals, the timelines, the CHANGES! It’s rough for me.
What we can control is how we enable CSMs to pass over customers who are seeing success. (I give away a program doc on a Customer Story Spiff in Episode 13. Go get that!) We can also control the way we “pitch” working with us. This is a BIG ask of a customer and the least I can do is come to the table well prepared and full of goodies!
I once interviewed at Salesforce and the last part of the interview was to pitch a customer to work on a case study or speaking opportunity. I didn’t get the job BUT I learned a little about how important it is to show the customer that:
A) You have your shit together
B) We understand that this is a time commitment
C) We will take care of you through the whole process
Here is an old SFDC pitch deck. Hope it helps inspire you to do a little extra work to come off really professional even if you work at a Series A start up. It’s just good practice for your career.
Fast forward 5 years - I’m at Sendoso and partnered up with a badass Content Marketing Gal - Brittany K. She was assigned to help me pump out case studies. We ended up doing 16 in one quarter which is unheard of and you probably think I’m lying but we did it!
I believe there were 3 ways we accomplished this:
Spiff for all customer facing teams & CONSTANT reminders
ASANA - no shot in hell we could stay organized without it
Customer gifts throughout the Case study journey
Let’s talk about #3. And again I’m not trying to sell you on Sendoso here. You don’t need a sending platform at all for this.
Now we have all been there…spent an obscene amount of time working on a case study only for it to be stalled on SIMPLE edits or legal approval.
So I like to set expectations in that pitch deck that I was talking about. We ended up gifting during the Case Study Journey. Now the problem with Sendoso customers is that they expect us to send them things. I can’t imagine the success you would see with this by gifting people who don’t expect gifts 😮
Here is the slide we implemented that quarter to help us reduce time to publish. Take a look at the italicized part at the ends of the steps!
First, in order to get from CSM intro to them booking an actual call, we offer a coffee eGift just to fill out the Pre-interview survey.
Here is the email:
Hello,
Thank you so much for partnering with us on a case study. To better prepare for the process, I have a few things for you to look into before we get started. I will send you an eGift to help fuel you for this prep process. ☕️
See Success and Growth Metrics here. (insert metrics you would like to see)
Start answering the questions here. (this helps form the story early)
Photo of your send. (Sendoso exclusive- you can do logo and headshot)
Legal or PR approval from your company. If no approval is needed, please state in writing. (GET IT UPFRONT!)
Thanks again so much for prepping with me! This will make this process go so much faster!
I am looking forward to hearing about your success.
Best,
Leslie
Then, once the interview is complete, we give them a larger eGift for dinner. We feel this is a classy move and shows we respect their time.
So you write it and can’t wait to show it to them only to be completely ghosted or have it be starred in their inbox to come back to.
After this started to happen, I tried to spice things up my email:
Hi Erin,
Great news! The first draft of your case study can be found here! Feel free to dive in when you get a chance.
After the first draft is approved or edited, you will receive your second round of gifts and they are DELICIOUS!
Have a great rest of your week! Talk soon!
Best,
Leslie
By creating intrigue and offering a surprise reward, the case studies were getting looked at and approved or edited way faster. If they had to do a second round of approvals then I would offer something specific they told me they liked during the interview (Ask fun questions when you have them on the call)
If I know it’s something they like I will put a picture of it inside the body of the email.
Then by offering a big ticket item at the end of the working together, helps get final approvals and solidify the relationship.
Now say legal is holding up the process, just ask your champion for their email so you can send them an Address Confirmation email (Sendoso exclusive). Our Sales folks are always gifting procurement to speed up the process and trust me those people never receive gifts. 🤣 😳 Talk about Surprise & Delight!
Final Thoughts:
We all need any tips in this area. There is so much out of our control so anything we can do to take a little of it back , I’m all for it. Hope this helps!
Love your CMA Soulmate,
Leslie
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