Don’t Make Your Customer Sound Like an Idiot in a Case Study

If a customer agrees to participate in a case study, they are doing you a favor. They are giving you their time, allowing you to use their company name and putting their reputation behind your work.

So please don’t thank them by publishing an article that makes them sound like they had no idea how to run their business until your Microsoft Dynamics consultants showed up and saved them.

I’ve written many customer case studies for Microsoft Dynamics partners, and this is something I think about every time I interview a customer. Of course I want the partner to look good. That’s part of the purpose of the case study.

But I want the customer to look good too.

In fact, one of my goals is to write a story the customer is genuinely proud to share.

The Customer Doesn’t Have to Be the Problem 

It’s easy to fall into a standard case study formula:

The customer had terrible processes. Their old system was a disaster. Nobody could find information. Employees were wasting hours on manual work. Reporting was a nightmare.

Then your company arrived, implemented Microsoft Dynamics, and everything got better.

That may make your partner look impressive, but think about how it makes the customer look.

The executives approving the case study may not want their customers, employees or competitors reading an article about how disorganized their company used to be. Even if every fact in the story is technically accurate, you may be emphasizing details they would rather not advertise.

There is usually a much better way to tell the same story.

Make the Customer Look Smart for Recognizing the Opportunity 

Instead of portraying the customer as a company that needed rescuing, show them as a company that recognized an opportunity to improve.

Perhaps they were growing quickly and realized their current systems weren’t going to support the next stage of the business. Maybe leadership wanted better information for decision-making. Perhaps they wanted to make life easier for employees, improve the customer experience, accommodate an acquisition or prepare for expansion into new markets. 

Those are good business decisions.

A manufacturer doesn’t have to be “struggling with outdated technology.” It could be a successful manufacturer whose growth had created more complexity than its existing systems were designed to handle.

A distributor doesn’t have to be “plagued by inefficient manual processes.” It could be a growing distributor whose leadership recognized that processes that worked perfectly well at $20 million in revenue weren’t going to work at $50 million.

You can still explain the challenge. You don’t have to sanitize the story until there is no problem left to solve. But the customer should come across as smart enough to recognize the issue and forward-looking enough to do something about it.

Then you can show how your Microsoft Dynamics team helped them accomplish what they wanted to achieve.

Remember Who Else Might Read the Case Study 

We tend to think of case studies as something prospective customers will read, but your prospect isn’t necessarily the only audience.

The customer’s employees may read it. Their executives may share it internally. Their competitors could see it. Their customers could find it online.

Keep that in mind when deciding how to describe the “before” picture.

If I am interviewing a company that implemented a new CRM system because its salespeople had trouble keeping track of customer follow-up, I don’t necessarily need to write, “The company’s sales team frequently failed to follow up with leads.”

Perhaps the more accurate and useful story is that the company wanted to create a more consistent sales process as the team grew and give management better visibility into customer interactions.

Both descriptions can lead to exactly the same Microsoft Dynamics project. One of them is much more likely to get approved.

Write a Story They Will Want to Share 

My ideal outcome isn’t simply getting the customer to approve the case study, I want them to like it.

I want the executive I interviewed to send it to the CEO and say, “Look how well this tells our story.” I want the marketing department to share it on LinkedIn. I want employees to be proud of what their company accomplished.

And wouldn’t it be great if the customer shared the story with their own customers?

That gives Microsoft partners another reason to make the story about more than the software implementation. Show how the project helped the customer serve its customers better, prepare for growth, improve its operations or become a more forward-looking company. 

Your partner still gets credit for helping make that happen, but now the customer has a reason to promote the story too.

Be Careful Who You Put in Front of Your Customer 

There is another part of the case study process that I don’t think Microsoft partners should take lightly: who is going to interview your customer?

Your customer relationship is extremely valuable. Depending on the account, it could represent hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in current and future business.

You don’t want just any old person talking to that customer.

Yes, hiring an experienced case study writer costs money. But this isn’t simply a writing assignment. You are putting someone in front of an important customer and asking that person to represent your company.

They need to make the customer comfortable. They need to understand enough about Microsoft Dynamics, ERP or CRM to follow the conversation. They need to know which questions to ask and, more importantly, when to abandon the prepared questions because the customer has just said something interesting.

I’ve conducted many interviews with Microsoft Dynamics customers, and some of the best comments I’ve gotten weren’t answers to the question I originally asked. The customer mentioned something in passing, and because I understood why it mattered, I could dig a little deeper.

That’s often where the real story is.

Learn more about my case study writing services.

Don’t Turn the Interview Into an Interrogation 

You also don’t need an hour-long interview with 25 questions.

I generally schedule 30 minutes for a customer case study interview, and I can often get what I need in about 20. 

I want to understand why the company decided to make a change, why they selected the solution and partner, what was interesting about the project, what improved and what they would say about the experience. 

But I also want it to feel like a conversation. 

A good interviewer should make the customer feel that talking about the project was easy and enjoyable, not like they just completed an oral exam about their ERP implementation. 

Remember, the customer is doing you a favor. Respect their time and make the experience a good one. 

The Best Case Study Makes Both Companies Look Good 

A case study shouldn’t be a story about how brilliant your Microsoft Dynamics partner is and how fortunate the customer was that you came along. 

It’s a story about two good companies accomplishing something together. 

Your customer recognized an opportunity, made an investment and worked with your team to improve the business. Your partner brought the experience, technology and expertise to help make that happen. 

Tell that story well and your prospects see evidence of what you can do. 

But just as importantly, your customer reads it and thinks, “Yes. That’s a story we’re proud to have our name on.” 

That’s the kind of case study you want. 

Do you need help writing a case study to highlight your clients? I can help. 

By Anya Ciecierski, Co-Founder, ERP/CRM Software Blogs