A case study is a valuable marketing tool that serves as a proof point for your products and services. It can be used for several purposes depending on your business profile, your goals, and where your potential customers are in the sales cycle.
Forward Vision Marketing often develops client case studies for lead generation, email marketing, and product launches. We offer a link to our B2B Case Study Template in Word format at the end of this blog to give you a starting point for your case studies.
What Is a B2B Case Study?
A Business-to-Business (B2B) case study succinctly chronicles the success one of your clients has had with your products or services. It walks your potential customers through the process another client experienced and highlights the qualitative and quantitative benefits the client experienced.
A clear-cut story of a problem and how your product or service solved it, is a powerful message for potential clients. It enables them to visualize how your product or service could help them overcome their challenges. This makes a case study extremely valuable as one of your marketing assets.
The B2B space is different from the Business-to-Consumer (B2C) space. In a B2B environment, the buying committee or prospective customer typically goes through detailed research before purchasing a product or service. This is especially true post-pandemic, where B2B prospects have become accustomed to conducting extensive online research before reaching out to a company. A case study is an essential tool for incentivizing the potential customer to take the next step and contact you.
How Is a Case Study Different from a White Paper?
A white paper is also a valuable marketing asset. It is typically a lengthy document that details an issue, a technology, or a solution. It is usually 2,000 words or six pages, and it’s a more in-depth exploration than a case study, offering technical specs, charts, and diagrams.
In contrast, a case study is a real-world example of how a customer used your product to solve a problem. It is a detailed testimonial of your products or services in action. The length varies, but a typical case study is less than 800 words.
Where Do Case Studies Fit into the B2B Sales Cycle?
If we define the B2B sales cycle in three stages: awareness, consideration, and decision, a case study is often most valuable in the two first stages of the process. In the awareness stage, the customer either becomes aware of an issue or searches for a solution to a problem. Gathering information is a big part of the sales cycle’s awareness stage.
In the consideration stage, your potential customer may be aware of a problem and is gathering more information to consider the solution. Learning how other customers successfully leveraged your solutions lends tremendous credibility to your product or service.
Case Study Examples
There are different kinds of case studies. For example, Forward Vision offers three case studies of our products and services on our website with images of the marketing assets we created for the project. Website content is best when it’s succinct, so these case studies are short, but all the case study elements are there.
Here is a different case study example we created for one of our clients. It is more in-depth than the previous examples but contains all the essential elements.
How to Write a B2B Case Study
- Craft a title that encapsulates the case study’s message
- Include a quote from the customer if possible
- Write an executive summary with a focus on the customer
- Introduce the customer
- Outline the challenge
- Talk about the solution
- Highlight the results
- Insert a section about your business with a call to action
- Add a professional touch with images and design
Download Our Free Case Study Word Template
Marketing assets like a case study or white paper are essential tools to use in the context of a comprehensive marketing plan. Knowing your potential customers, their pain points, and how your product or service solves them is paramount to getting the most out of your marketing budget and assets.
To get you started, Forward Vision is offering a free download of the Word template we use when writing a case study. Contact us. We’d love to work with you to create and implement an effective marketing strategy and all the assets that follow.