[Part 2] 3 case study myths that are costing you time and money

Introduction

Does writing case studies actually produce benefits or are people just peddling myths?

In part one of this series, I answered this question:

Case studies produce benefits every company and organization, including nonprofits, should be taking advantage of.

A quick recap

I dispelled the common idea that case studies are more effective than reviews alone using some common case study myth talking points, including:

• Case studies can’t be used again
• They can be altered or fluffed to make the company look better than the client vs. reviews
• Reviews have more credibility than case studies
• Case studies are mostly flattering and successful vs. reviews

Hopefully, my post helped you to better understand the power of case studies as well as the benefits of investing in them. Also, I hope that you understand that last part, that writing case studies are an investment.

In part two my case study myths series, I’m dispelling the idea that anyone can write a case study. I’ll be touching on common ideas, including:

• Volunteers can write your communications
• Writing is not a skill
• Writing is the same across disciplines
• You can teach any employee to write on the job
• There’s a formula you can follow to write a case study

Now, when I say “anyone”, I mean people who have yet to gain the skills, experience and time (this is important) to actually write one. That could very well describe someone on your team who is already writing case studies or someone you have yet to hire. Either way, I mention “anyone” to bring attention to how much more help we all need in the marketing and communication department.

NOTE: This is part two of the case study myths I’m debunking. Part three is coming next week!

I know what this sounds like

I know, I know: It sounds mean and pretentious. Also, it sounds like it’s impossible for anyone to learn how to write a case study, and that they can just learn on the job.

I’m definitely not saying that.

What I am saying is this: If you’re going to make an investment in case studies, also make an investment in the person or people who are going to write it.

First, what makes a great writer?

Before I answer that, let me make mention of something:

There aren’t a lot of writers that specialize in case studies. If you search “B2B case study writer” using Google, you’ll find only a few results of people and agencies from around the world, in addition to some guides to writing case studies.

This is to say that, in addition to case studies being a marketing secret, there aren’t many specialists to begin with.

That’s why the question of what makes a great writer matters. It just may not be feasible or realistic for some companies and organizations to find someone who specializes in writing case studies. But it is feasible and reasonable to look for a great writer.

So, on with the question: What makes a great writer?

If you ask anyone this question, you’ll get very different answers. Most of them include something about habits, obsessions with writing (i.e., writing every single day), post-secondary achievements and then some.

(I went back to school for this very reason)

I get that, and I believe that writing as a skill on its own requires qualities that are unique to professional writing.

CopyBlogger has a list of six unique traits that make a good writer. Here’s a sample of them:

I like this list because each point emphasizes how a writer thinks and approaches storytelling. It’s the thinking and the skill that makes the writer great, in my opinion.

Therefore, you should be looking for a writer with the capacity to think through projects, challenges, ideas and general information.

So, why do companies and organizations look for everything but that?

Let’s explore the case study myth in depth.

Case study myths #2: Anyone can write a case study

Take a look at Uplift Content’s survey of over 100 SaaS companies about case studies, particularly at who writes the case studies and who conducts the client interviews:

It’s clear that most SaaS companies expect their in-house team member to write the case studies (and sometimes conduct client interviews). For larger companies, it’s the writer. For smaller companies, it’s the marketer.

Nonetheless, I’m sure it’s safe to say that both kinds of in-house team members have the professionalism and expertise to produce case studies.

After all, your team would know how you want to present the case studies.

Now, take a look at why some SaaS companies outsource their case studies to freelance writers or agencies:

Survey respondents cite time, professionalism and expertise as the main reasons for outsourcing. Those are almost the same reasons why the in-house marketer and in-house writer are the go-to people for case studies, except for one reason:

Time.

Perhaps this means that freelance writers and agencies are more available and have more capacity.

But I think there’s more to this. Let’s take a closer look.

Marketers, writers and communications professionals are fine, just fine…

This is a myth.

Rather, marketers, writers and communications professionals are taking on loads of work that they may not be able to handle. This includes freelancers.

Look no further than the recent survey results about B2B content marketing that Content Marketing Institute released:

Everyone should know that content is not cheap to make, produce, market or outsource. So, of course some companies and organizations are going to try to make the most out of a little bit, especially if outsourcing is not an option.

However, there’s a high price to pay for that.

Take a look at these recent survey results by Blind, an anonymous professional network. According their 2020 study, about 75% of the 7,000 marketing and communications professionals surveyed had experienced burnout, and it only got worse during the COVID-19 pandemic.

If this tells you anything, it should tell you that there’s a huge gap between who’s writing case studies and who should be writing case studies.

In other words, if the people who are currently writing case studies are burnt out, tired and out of time, then it’s time to reevaluate who should be taking on the responsibility and how that responsibility is being shared (or not).

This is precisely why it is a myth to assume anyone can write case studies. They are simply not easy to write and take a lot of time that many people (read “anyone) just don’t have.

What about hiring volunteers to write case studies?

This is a complicated matter when it comes to for-profit companies, so let’s look at nonprofit organizations.

Some organizations, specifically those that are nonprofit, opt to use volunteers to do their communications work. While this seems like a good idea in theory, it’s actually counter to solving the problem of “anyone” writing case studies.

Let’s take a look at this article by Imagine Canada about the use of volunteers in the nonprofit sector:

If you decide to use volunteers, you still have to onboard them before you even assign any tasks or responsibilities. That doesn’t save you time; it takes time away.

This is especially true when we talk about writing case studies.

Think about it.

You’d have to teach the volunteer about:

• Target audience
• How the case studies fit into larger organizational goals
• How the case studies will be used
• The client and their background
• Any other organizational information they aren’t privy to (due to their status as a volunteer)

This doesn’t take one day.

But let’s say you have documents with this information that the volunteer can read.

The volunteer would still have to be able to interpret and organize the information into a story. Perhaps, they’d also have to interview the client themselves. Nonetheless, if they aren’t able to synthesize the information in a way that aligns with your goals (as hopefully outlined in your case study brief), then you end up taking more time revising copy that you thought you wouldn’t need to revise so much.

Take a look again at this survey result from Uplift Content:

If that’s how long it’s taking a marketing team to work on one case study, how long do you think it might take a volunteer?

Job postings for communications professionals are reflective of the work they’re expected to do

Even though I’ve just mentioned burnout on the job among communications professionals and the like, I also want to mention the thing that comes before the job:

The job posting.

Unfortunately, job postings for communications professionals have become increasingly onerous. In other words, they still describe “anyone” for jobs that require specialization. They are that unspecific.

That’s what makes this idea connected to the myth that anyone can write a case study.

What companies and organizations ask for is sometimes just not realistic and conducive to creating great content.

I won’t put any on blast.

Instead, I’ll explain to you a few examples of things I’ve seen in job postings:

Writing is not listed as a skill for copywriting/marketing jobs

I saw one job that had front-end development as a required skill for a marketing job, but not writing. The word “writing” wasn’t in the job description nor was “communications” or even “editing”. Guess what word was also not in the job description?

“Marketing”.

The job title was “Marketing Specialist”.

But you know what was in the job description?

The requirement of a degree or diploma in…

wait for it…

Computer. Science.

I know. I know!

The title and description don’t match

I’ve read through job descriptions that were for copywriting positions or communication specialist positions, and all of the job responsibilities were related to social media.

The problem with mismatches like this is that they undermine the possible career path a communications professional might take. In other words, it might stifle their professional growth.

On the company side, mismatched job descriptions and titles may simply turn away top talent.

This tweet is about social media managers, but it applies here:

Too many expectations of knowledge in close but very different professional disciplines

Many of these job descriptions include multiple disciplines related to communications that would take decades to get degrees for. For example, I’ve read some where they ask one person to have experience in journalism, marketing, communications, social media, graphic design, UX and fundraising. As varied as communications positions are, there are very few people with all of this experience.

Public relations is different from social media, which is different from UX, which is different from communications etc.

If one person could gain all of that experience at once, there would be a single degree for it. But there isn’t because these disciplines are not the same. So, asking for experience across these disciplines is basically asking the candidate to be okay with being extremely busy beyond reason.

We already know how much one person or one group takes on when it comes to content production and marketing.

So, when companies and organizations overload job descriptions, they are communicating two things:

1. They do not value the time it takes to create content
2. They believe that the communications professional role is not worthy of specificity

I’m sure not every company and organization believes this. However, this is the messaging that gets across and it’s pushing the best candidates away.

Nonetheless, even if you do get some great candidates, some of the same issues bleed into the job interview.

Suddenly, you’re answering questions about event planning and other skills that don’t have anything to do with the job.

(Ask me how I know)

The right interview questions matter

In my opinion, the key to finding the best candidate is the questions that you ask in the interview. Asking questions that tell you about how someone works and approaches tasks and responsibilities will bring you closer to find the right person for the job. Scenario questions are good but contextualized questions are better.

Why?

Because they tell you how someone thinks. I keep mentioning this, but this is the most important quality in a candidate that you want to have a clear sense of. The answer to those questions will tell you if the candidate understands and can do the job well despite challenges and setbacks.

Also, they’ll tell you if they’re a good fit for your team. For example, if you learn about the processes, techniques and approaches the candidate takes to do work, you’ll have a better sense of the value they bring to your team. Also, you’ll have a better sense of how this candidate is different from the rest. “Anyone” can’t show you that.

Uplift Content has a great resource that outlines interview questions SaaS companies should use to find the best copywriter to join the team:

Can’t you just teach someone how to write a case study on the job?

You might be wondering: “Well, if I hire someone and maybe their experience and credentials aren’t all there (but they’re a great fit), can’t I just teach them how to write case studies on the job?

Yes, this is possible.

But who will do it?

Everyone needs help!

Furthermore, I mentioned how important it is to hire someone who can think through work. This is very difficult to teach because it comes with practice, time and learning from mistakes along the way.

So perhaps the answer is that it’s possible, but it requires a big investment.

Are you willing to do that?

Let’s say your new hire is going to conduct a client interview for a case study. However, they include questions in the interview that don’t lead to a story, including:

• Yes/no questions
• Leading questions
• Questions that don’t require follow up
• Company-first questions vs. client-first questions

As a result of these kinds of questions, you may end up with:

• One-word answers
• Zero details
• Nothing about the situation before your product or service was used
• No context
• Successes unrelated to your story

More importantly, you end up without a story to tell.

What do you think will happen to your case study, as a result of this?

Probably something not great.

The message is this: “Anyone” can write questions for a client to answer. However, “anyone” can’t exactly tailor them to the client’s story and expand them during the interview.

Case study interview questions

Here’s a resource from HubSpot about case study interview questions that I linked to in part one:

These questions are divided by topic for a very good reason. You are trying to cover as much ground as possible and capture changes across time related to the client’s experience with your product or service. So, whoever is writing case studies should reflect that in their questions.

So, your questions should reflect that. Your writer should know which ones are best to ask.

What about templates if you can’t hire someone?

Let me be clear: There’s nothing inherently wrong with templates. Rather, it’s that they are short-term solutions for a simple reason: They can take away from the actual story.

Allow me to explain.

Say you use the popular problem/challenge/solution template:

You fill in all the blanks, dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s.

What usually happens when you use formulas and templates on a regular basis?

The stories can suffer

It’s possible that you start to skip steps and cut corners telling the story for the sake of finishing it, especially when you’re pressed for time.

(Don’t worry: We’ve all done it before!)

So, you might inadvertently leave out some information from the story because it doesn’t neatly fit into the template. That might cost you a story you can use AND repurpose.

Your goals for the case studies you write should inform what you write and how. Otherwise, you risk big losses.

So, how does this myth about how anyone can write case studies cost you money and time?

You lose more than just a case study

As we’ve already established, case studies are not cheap or quick to produce.

So, if you hire “anyone” to write them, you’re taking quite a big risk.

Why?

Case studies increase sales for companies and organizations exponentially.

To remind you, here’s what I wrote in part one of this series:

“Uplift Content, a content writing company for SaaS companies, surveyed 121 SaaS marketers in February 2022 to better understand their experiences with case studies. The results showed an unsurprising detail: Case studies are number one at increasing sales.”

Furthermore, people are more likely to read case studies in full. That might not guarantee a sale, but it does guarantee that potential clients are much closer to becoming your clients. Remember:

“…DocSend, a company that offers secure document sharing, did an analysis of 34 million sales content interactions.

34. MILLION.

They found that case studies have a completion rate of 83%, higher than any other content type. In other words, out of everyone who ever read a case study on DocSend, 83% of them read the entire thing.”

If there’s anything this should tell you, it’s that the loss is more than the sales asset itself. You could also lose:

• Opportunities to repurpose the case study (and the time you could’ve saved doing so)
• The opportunity to refresh the case study and increase its value to potential clients
• Possibly, the strength of the client relationship

And if we already know that people are seriously burnt out?

This is not a risk you can afford to take.

Unlike other sales assets, the case study writing process has less room for error

Case studies are not linear. In other words, they follow a process that is quite risky to mess up.

Usually, making a case study goes something like this:

You might be thinking: “Isn’t this like any sales asset?”

Not exactly.

With something like a blog post or a social media post, you can more easily make revisions or just start over because it won’t take as much time. Even if you interviewed someone for either post and they were suddenly unavailable, you could still use the information you do have to still get what you want.

You can even take brochures, webinars and slide presentations and apply the same logic. You can more easily make revisions or just start over from a previous point.

What I’m trying to get at is that revisions and editing are not dependent on anyone except the writer, by default, because the information that you do have is still salvageable.

However, with case studies, the writing process could go haywire somewhere and make your case study no longer a possibility.

Note that some of these situations are just unavoidable. However, they are just more likely with the “wrong person “anyone” leading the charge writing case studies.

Examples on LinkedIn

Recently, I read the comments on this LinkedIn post by Case Study Buddy founder Joel Klettke. They’re all in response to common mishaps Klettke has experienced while writing case studies:

Here’s the original post:

Here are some of the comments:

All of this is possible and likely to happen at some point in the case study writing process.

Let’s dig even deeper.

Planning

If you can’t convince your team that writing case studies is good for business, you’ve lost before you even began.

But let’s say you get past that stage and are planning the case study strategy.

What if you don’t know who the case study is targeting? Furthermore, what if someone on your team asks you, “how should the case study be used?” and you don’t know?

You have two options:

Option 1: You figure it out with the right people

Option 2: You skip this step and get right to client

Of course, option one looks like the more sensible option. But when you’re strapped for time, option two seems like a good idea, until you finish the case study. Suddenly, you don’t know where it should live on your website. Furthermore, you’re unclear about how to or if you should repurpose the case study at some point.

To clean up this situation could take a while because it will fundamentally change the format that you used to write the original case study. That means that the story could be longer or shorter. Also, the story could require more information, which means reaching back out to the client interview subject who may or may not be available.

This is all time wasted and money lost because you can’t put the case study to good use.

Interviewing

Let’s say you’ve secured an interview with a client for a case study.

You’re conducting your interview, and you notice the client is giving you yes/no answers to your questions. Uh oh!

So, you ask more open-ended questions. But you don’t get enough information or concrete numbers.

So, what can you do?

You can either:

Option 1: Ask for more information and numbers

Option 2: Leave it alone and figure it out later.

Of course, option one looks like the more sensible option. But when you’re strapped for time, option two seems like a good idea, until you start writing the case study. Suddenly, you don’t know how to take the interview and turn it into a story. Furthermore, you’re unclear about if you can embellish (i.e., fill in the blanks) and by how much.

Perhaps you thought about reaching out to the client at this point, after the interview. But the client tells you that they don’t have any more time, two weeks after you asked.

To clean up this situation would likely be a waste of time. Without the right information, you may write a case study that is either inaccurate or doesn’t read like a story.

That means that the story may not be there. And if you try to make one up, the client’s legal department might give you a call.

This is all time wasted and money lost because there may not be a case study to put to good use.

Remember: TWO MONTHS FOR ONE CASE STUDY.

Writing

For example, imagine you want a case study. You find the right person to interview, set a date and time for the interview and prepare. You interview that client and it goes really well.

Now, imagine that the day after your interview, the client interview subject leaves the company.

You have enough information, so you go ahead and write the story.

But when you send it to the legal department, they tell you that the client hasn’t consented to the publishing of the story. The client simply hasn’t responded to any emails.

You don’t have options here because you don’t have time. However, you might be able to repurpose what you wrote and structure it in a way the client may like. You may even do that in multiple formats (Note that this is a sign of how someone is thinking and problem solving along the way!).

But who has the time or the resources?

Remember: Everyone needs help!

Writing case studies: Conclusion

This was the second lost post I’ve ever written, and I’m happy that I did it.

I really think it’s important that we are honest about who can do what.

In this blog post, I showed why the idea that anyone can write case studies is simply incorrect. Hopefully, it didn’t come across as pretentious.

My goal was to demonstrate how important it is for companies and organizations to hire people who will actually contribute to their goals, no matter how big or small they are, not just “anyone”.

The reality is that we don’t all have what we need. Also, we all need help. But we don’t all get it.

So, in my opinion, doing a few things very well is exponentially better than doing many things not so well.

Takeaways

1. People who have demonstrated how they think as writers are the best people to write your case studies.
2. Do what you can with what you have. Overloading job postings with multiple disciplines and a wide variety of responsibilities may have the opposite effect that you’re looking for – burnout.
3. Templates and formulas are fine as long as they don’t take away from the story.
4. Asking better questions is key to both client interviews and prospective writer interviews.

And there you have it!

Don’t be afraid to ask for help and direction

It’s important to know what your company and organization is doing NOW so that you can better understand what you need LATER. (And let someone help you with that.)

If that means looking over your job descriptions, changing your interview questions or looking (or glancing) at your budget, do it. You’ll be in a better position than you were before.

But if you are going to wait, only take one week.

One week from now, I’ll be debunking the third of three case study myths about what the actual return on investment (ROI) is for case studies.

Stay tuned!