How to Build a Reliable Case Study Pipeline with Customer Data
WRITTEN BY Tom Crist, FLUVIO Principal
Product marketers are often, and rightly, under pressure to deliver customer stories that move the needle for prospects and upsells.
Only the rare prospect is willing to be the first to take a leap of faith – and potentially put their job on the line – by buying an unproven software solution! The power of relatable, powerful social proof? Undeniable.
Let’s imagine a scenario. One that might sound familiar…
Sales has a goal to increase penetration in a specific ideal customer profile (ICP). For example purposes, let’s say the target is regional quick-service restaurant chains.
Older case studies just don’t speak to the same pain points as this specific ICP, and instead mainly feature multinational fast-food brands.
So, here comes the Slack message to product marketing: “Hey, we need more regional QSR case studies, and fast.” And, of course, team-player PMMs are happy to help.
Finally, product marketing sends a message to customer success with a vague ask for happy customers that fit the bill (and would love to be in a case study). Which, predictably, goes nowhere fast.
Quickly, we’ve arrived at underserved sales reps trying to close deals without proper enablement, CSMs feeling overtaxed by yet another ill-defined ask on top of their day-to-day, and stressed PMMs caught in the middle and losing credibility.
How did we get here? What could product marketing have done differently?
The answer lies in creating a reliable, consistent case study pipeline framework across the PMM function – i.e., not waiting for the ask from Sales. In this post, we’ll break down a data-driven approach to generating a high volume of impactful case studies in a way that flows hand-in-hand with your revenue and customer success partners.
Before you start: Remember the end goal
As with any project, it’s important to consider what you’re solving for: delivering great social proof that helps Sales close more deals. This typically takes the form of written or video case studies that live publicly on your website or are shared 1:1 in sales conversations.
A common trap teams fall into is stopping with this definition. Testimonials take many forms, and the right program perfectly creates asks that drive the types and formats you need. The Social Proof Spectrum visualizes the variety of outputs a full-scale program can produce to support go-to-markets.
As you can see, there’s far more to social proof than our imagined ask from Sales earlier in the article. In the ideal world, your overall approach is generating every type of testimonial, but this is unlikely to be the case out of the gate. So, consider what you’re looking for:
Seeking shorter-form quotes and aggregated ratings? Solutions like UserEvidence can take the burden off PMM and programmatically create a deep database.
Seeking a customer co-presenter at the big industry conference? For now, you might need to rely on a customer executive’s relationship with a senior leader in your organization.
Need a better library of case studies for sales decks and the website? Now we’re right on topic. To do this, it’s time to put your sales rep hat on and start generating a regular, steady influx of customer stories that align to today’s strategic initiatives.
A follow-on benefit of building an effective case study pipeline is that strategic asks become much easier. A deeper library of testimonials makes a second, later request easier to make, and better relationships with customer-facing teams inspires them to help when it’s most needed. For this exercise, let’s concentrate on creating the right set of new case studies.
Understanding today’s landscape: Audit time is here
Know where you’re going, but not where you’ve been? That’s a sure way to end up on the road to nowhere. When building an effective case study program, identifying gaps in segments, verticals, features, and themes gives you a starting point on where to spend your efforts.
So, your first step should be a comprehensive audit of what’s in place. Break out your spreadsheet app of choice and start reading through your current case study library.
Above is our suggested format. There’s no wrong answer to how to format the audit; we find that this version creates easy reporting and charting to identify gaps.
Based on your unique needs, you’ll likely adjust and expand the columns presented. Here are the key fields we recommend you track:
Client Name: It’s all about easy reference. Link to the case study and make sure the company name matches what’s in your CRM.
Type: What’s the format of the case study? Keep the list of options small and easy to report on in dashboard format.
Year: When was the case study done? It’s good to understand if your library is dated, and how many case studies were produced per year in the past as a benchmark.
Segment/Vertical/Geo: Recording and charting these attributes will illuminate where your case study library is strongest and thinnest. You’ll also gain a handy, referenceable resource for Sales to more easily identify relevant case studies for a given prospect.
Most-Valued Capabilities: In most case studies, clients will mention specifics about why they like your product. Gather your top 8-10 capabilities, features, services, or other attributes and record them in this audit. Just as with the firmographic data, this will help you identify where you’ve historically over- and under-indexed on product capabilities in social proof.
Stats and Themes: Is there one or more statistic or improvement metric in your case study? Capture each here and assign them to a limited number of themes. This is an additional area to examine the focus of your testimonials vs. your ideal state.
With this data in place, you can easily create basic charts to visualize your audit and an initial dashboard for your program. Use these to identify proposed areas of future focus and examine velocity of case study production by year.
With your audit in place, you’ll need your product marketers to keep it up to date. As more case studies are added, ensure that they and their content are recorded here. Improvement in case studies produced per year and closed gaps in segments, verticals, geo, capabilities, and themes are ideal metrics to demonstrate program success.
Bonus points: Get a view of the current state of review sites while you’re conducting the audit. This is a great time to also address the themes of current G2 and Capterra reviews and build a well-rounded picture across owned and earned channels. You might even find a quick case study win in a recent, customer-attributed positive review.
Deploy the data at your fingertips
PMM is ultimately responsible for delivering on numerous initiatives beyond social proof. Wasting time and goodwill on vague asks for happy customers ultimately harms both CSMs and PMMs.
Instead, use your case study audit, CRM, and product data to drive targeted asks. By merging fields and data points from these three sources, you can generate a list of clients that are (1) far more likely to accept a tailored ask to participate and (2) CSMs are more likely to approve.
The data parameters you select will be dependent on your business model, product, and the tracked data.
CRM data is typically straightforward to access and can be pulled by PMM or made more programmatic by a helpful RevOps partner. Common CRM data parameters include:
NPS score
Region
Vertical
Number of locations
Segment
Revenue generated / ARR / MRR
Prior solution (by ex-competitor)
Time as customer
Product data varies in accessibility, and may depend on built-in tools or access to product data analysis solutions (e.g., Looker). You may need to make asks of product or reporting teams to gain initial access to the data points you need, so take an inventory of what’s easily available early on. Product data parameters at the client organization level could include:
Outcome performance improvement
Usage of a given capability
Results from a given capability
Number of active users
Pro tip: The appropriate frequency for pulling this list will vary depending on your go-to-market model. High-velocity, crowded inbound funnels may provide more potential case study targets than you need. In contrast, if you’re after high-dollar, high-complexity deals with large or enterprise organizations, you may need to scale back to a monthly or quarterly target list.
Aim for a hyper-targeted list of 10 or fewer clients per ask to customer success, with the data to back up why you’re making the request for each. If you’re returning too many or too few clients in a given month, tweak your parameters until you hit the ideal list. You can, and should, get as granular as possible.
Consider the differences between these three asks to customer success leadership:
By combining a regular cadence of requests with a direct ask about limited, specific clients informed by CRM and product data, you can reasonably expect to generate new, valuable case studies each month.
Build a ready-to-use process that avoids overtaxing PMMs and CSMs
Now, it’s time to get down to brass tacks re: process. What are the steps? Who does what? When does it happen? It’s on product marketing to design a powerful framework – this section should give you a leg up.
You’ll need to design two key processes to being building a case study pipeline:
Generating, actioning, and closing a regularly-provided target list (typically monthly). You now have all the raw materials to build this list; you’ll need a clear, simple process that helps the rest of the company understand.
Managing client handraisers. What happens when a client or CSM organically flags up a case study? These are extremely likely to close when pursued, but are also sometimes poor fits to create a strong story. You’ll want to enable CSMs and create pathways for clients that handle every eventuality. We’ll cover more on helping CSMs do this in the “Inform and enable” section later in this post.
What could all this look like? It can be as simple as this proposed process slide:
Visualizing the process in flowchart form is often highly effective when securing buy-in for the program, and helps teams understand what’s happening at each stage.
You may notice that the above process may end with a client entering the pipeline. From here on out, PMM must secure the final content and Marketing must be engaged to activate the case study.
In many cases, once the client enters the pipeline, the product marketer is responsible for:
Scheduling and conducting interviews
Attempting to secure video, if desired
Writing content and ensuring accuracy
Securing final client approval
Coordinating with internal teams to enable the activation machine
Requesting copywriting review
Submitting creative requests
Enabling revenue teams
Ensuring activation occurs through Marketing
Sharing the success story “win” with the organization
Gain alignment and input
The visuals you’ve created, and insights you’ve gathered, and processes you’ve designed form a powerful way to communicate your program strategy and vision. You’ve created a comprehensive view of what exists, but it’s only backward-looking. There’s one important missing piece: input on needs from your cross-functional partners.
This input comes from two primary sources:
What’s coming or recently delivered by Product Management. If there are new upsell options or major features, you’ll want customer proof points to prove them out. Ideally this is already captured in your GTM process and captured from beta customers, already in progress, or at least identified and known to PMM.
Speaking with new logo and upsell team leaders (and select individual reps!). While many requests likely make it to your product marketing function, others do not. Take the time to speak with your cross-functional partners and find out where their perceived gaps lie.
Armed with your audit findings and cross-functional input, it’s time to share your program goals. Distill these into a few simplified slides and get buy-in from leadership.
Done all your homework leading up to this point? You’re very unlikely to encounter friction.
Inform and enable your Customer Success partners
As mentioned in an earlier section, enabling the customer success team to understand and participate in your new process is a best practice that will pay immediate dividends. Host an dedicated enablement session with CSMs to present the benefits and answer any questions they may have.
CSMs are also the conduit through which customers organically offer to be part of case studies, and they can help identify these potential handraisers. Enablement should include:
The different categories of social proof, and the impact they drive for the organization
Your new process and why it will improve how case studies are generated
How to identify a likely candidate for a testimonial
Best touchpoints to consider making an ask (e.g., at renewal, during QBRs, after positive customer service, after delivering measurable results for their business
Set clear goals and celebrate wins
Your case study pipeline program should have clear goals that demonstrate your impact to the organization. Baseline goals could be structured similarly to:
1 target list provided to CSMs per month
4 case studies in the first quarter of the program
No key ICPs without case studies within 6 months
12 written case studies/year
3 video case studies/year
If relevant, it’s always best practice to align your highest-level metrics with the overall OKRs for the organization and product marketing. Once you’ve set macro goals, add them to your monthly reporting to leadership to demonstrate investment and progress.
And don’t forget to celebrate each and every win! You already need to educate the sales team when a new case study goes live, and how to use the testimonial data within. Use this occasion to continually demonstrate your wins to leadership.
A strong program yields consistent benefits
Going back to the Social Proof Spectrum, a healthy case study pipeline will allow you to more easily generate strategic social proof such as conference co-presenters or analyst interviews as needed. You’re building a more engaged database that can be drawn upon as needed for these major milestones. And you can also chop up case studies into short-form content or use free-d up bandwidth to pursue more programmatic options.
Finally, make sure to think about how you can get the most from your new case study content. Uplevel to an SKO presentation with new video content. At the end of an interview, ask if the client would be comfortable becoming a referral. The possibilities are endless.
With this article, you should have everything you need to start implementing a data-driven case study program and start building a pipeline of customers.
Fluvio has helped leading PMM functions implement similar programs as part of our product marketing consulting engagements. Curious how we could help your team? Get in touch with our experts.