How To Create A Winning Video Case Study Strategy

Take a second, and think about the last time you made a decision about buying something for your business. Did you just dive in and buy, or did you scour the internet for information, reviews and other people talking about their experiences with the company? More likely it’s the latter, since that’s what most of us do in our day to day lives. And one of the most compelling things you can present for that searching audience is a video case study. These showcase a customer’s very real opinion and experience about your product and service, and establish a trust that makes them much more likely to buy from you. But to make a successful video case study, you need a good strategy.

The Key Elements Of Your Video Case Study Strategy

If you’ve decided that you want to make a video case study, then you need to know what’s going to be included in the video, and what you’re going to do with it afterwards. Otherwise, you will not see the success or conversion you’re looking for, and you could end up wasting your money! To be successful, a video case study needs to include:

·     Real customers who are representative of your target audience

·     A specific problem that your product/solution can solve

·     Facts and evidence backing up your claims

·     The key benefits of your solution need to be demonstrated

·     It needs to have a clear call to action

Don’t worry if that all seems a bit overwhelming! We’re going to be going over each of these points in the rest of the article.

Find Your Best Story Tellers

Case studies are all about telling prospects a story. The story of how you helped a particular client with a particular problem, and the benefits they saw from it. And when you’re doing that in a video, you need someone who is a natural storyteller to get in front of the camera. Choosing a good storyteller to narrate your video case study helps make it more personal, and gives the watcher something to connect with. Bear in mind that whoever you choose to be your storyteller should play an active part in the events being shown on camera, so that they can speak with authority and credibility.

Make your Product The Hero

As well as having a fantastic storyteller to talk to your viewers, they need a good story to tell. For that, you need a story arc. This basically means your video case study should be following the same sort of structure as a story. It needs a beginning that sets the scene, some ‘stakes-raising’ with a problem, and a satisfying resolution. This means your audience is more compelled to watch to the end, and will be more engaged in your video. And when it comes to the resolution, you need to make your product or service the thing that rides to the rescue and solves the problem. For example, in this case study video (which we filmed for Chris Spratling of Chalkhill Blue), Mark tells a story about where his business was 12 months ago and the problems he was facing. Then, we see Chris ‘riding in on a white horse’ to save the day, and the case study ends with Mark telling us just how much Chris has helped transform his business increasing his turnover from 400k to 1.1 million! This is the perfect storytelling arc, and makes Chris’s service out to be the hero of the video.

Bring On The Facts

As with everything in life, there are some people who are going to be sceptical of your case study. After all, it’s a piece of marketing material, so of course you’re going to talk about the positives and not the negatives! But there is a way to convince even the sceptics to trust your video case studies – and that’s to dazzle them with facts! Look over your solution and provide some hard facts to support your claims. Numbers are always a good go to, but you could also use growth statistics and the improvement of quality too. So before you start shooting your video case study, do some research and see if you can find some interesting data to talk about.

Focus On Benefits

A really common mistake people make in marketing in general, but video case studies in particular, is to focus on the features of the solution. But in reality, a list of features isn’t a very compelling reason for prospects to buy. What they want to know is, how will your product or solution help them? And for that, you need benefits. Ask your subject to talk about how working with your business has benefitted them, and what value you have added. Pull in quotes to your video in post-production to reinforce what your customers are saying, and if you’re really ambitious you can even animate them! This helps highlight that they are important benefits, without interrupting the point the storyteller is making.

Don’t Forget The Call to Action!

This is the part a lot of people forget, and that’s a call to action! Once you’ve wowed your prospects with your video case study, dazzled them with amazing storytelling and won them over with data, you need to tell them what to do next. This is the part that could make or break the success of your video case study. You can do this at any point in your case study, but the end is always a good point to include one. Your call to action can be in the form of text, images or even a clickable HTML link (although studies show that text CTA’s tend to convert best). You can direct people to a contact page, have them fill in a booking form, or give them a number to call.

At Ginger Video, we work with business owners who want to produce high-quality, compelling video case studies for their own products and services. We can help you develop a winning video case study strategy, from storyboard to creation, and help you with the marketing of it too! For more information on our video case studies, just get in touch with us today.