When it comes to case studies, everyone wants to showcase not only their work but their agency, team and what separates them from the rest. But how much is too much? What do clients actually want to read? How do you write the ultimate case study for both RAR and your website?

First off, I don’t want to teach you to suck eggs. But on a daily basis case studies are uploaded to recommendedagencies.com, these are one of the main ways you can showcase your agency’s true capability to potential clients.

A well written case study is the evidence of your success for your existing clients and can have a powerful influence in the selection (or not) of your agency. All too often however case studies are viewed as an afterthought, pulled together only when requested or repurposed from other content like press releases. The fact is this is one of the strongest weapons in your agency arsenal. The more metrics and information you provide, the more you can match your future clients needs to your experience. To demonstrate, put yourself in a client’s position for a moment. Let’s say they have selected your searched for and selected your agency on recommendedagencies.com, they like your approach and the overview of your agency, they’d like to view your case studies; now here are the top 5 common mistakes.

1. There are no case studies. Believe it or not only 56% of agencies on our platform have added case studies.
2. There is a case study but it's a lonely soul and gives no sense of the scope or the scale of your agency’s offer.
3. You have more than one case study but they are neither recent or relevant. These are the two measures that matter. If you last completed work you are proud of in 2011, that is not recent enough to still be valid. If your case study seems disconnected from your offering then it’s not relevant.  
4. You have loads of case studies. They are recent, relevant, they are even for your best clients, but they are poorly presented. Either cut and paste from another application or just a few generic lines is not representing your agency in the best light.
5. There’s no images or video to bring your story to life. 

So what does a great case study actually need?

A Story

A good case study needs three basic elements: a business challenge faced; the solution found; and, most important, the benefits gained. Too many times we seem to forget that a great case study is all about the story, engage your readers and tell a story with a strong angle.

People enjoy a story:

1. Who is the sample customer and what do they do?
2. What were their goals?
3. What were their needs?
4. How did you satisfy those needs and help the customer meet their goals?

A picture tells…

Don’t have an A4 document of text! Make it short and sharp and use clear headings and titles so clients can skim-read. Also use the best quality imagery, audio and video available to bring your story to life. Before reading any text, 60% of site visitors will watch a video if available* (Diode Digital) and 50% of marketers consider customer testimonials, explainer tutorial videos, and demonstration videos the most effective types of video content used. 

If you have the necessary resources to do it by video, do it. But keep it under 2 minutes!

TLDR

Put yourself in client shoes and get to the point. Don’t oversell your agency, you have loads of other collateral to do that for you. Avoid jargon. No one cares about your business agility or creatively synergised approach, that’s all unnecessary BS. As a client I want to find out what you did for someone like me and how that can relate to my business.

Prove it

Have you ever read a case study that says “we increased awareness” or “we doubled traffic” So from one visitor to two, yeah? Don’t be ambiguous. If your objectives were SMART then your results should be too. Show real numbers and even (if possible) add real proof such as analytical screenshots or reports.   

Testimonials Work.

A testimonial is a great way to summarise your case study. It ties everything up and is the best proof that the client is happy. All that is needed is a sentence summarising the relationship, but it does wonders. It’s a case study straight from the horse’s mouth. Check your agency ratings report and you might even have some new testimonials waiting for you there.