There are two types of customer story that are valuable in the sales process: hypothetical tales featuring people making ideal use of whatever you’re offering, and real-world case studies detailing exactly how your satisfied customers have ended up so pleased with your business.
The former obviously allows you a great deal of creativity, but so does the latter. Think about it. Either way, you’re going to be detailing a similar narrative: broadly positive about you, but not unrealistically effusive, and featuring plausible characters and events. The creativity comes in how you present the story — how you plot and frame it.
So regardless of whether you’re drawing from reality or your own imagination, you need to know how to set out a customer story that flatters your company and makes a compelling case for buying from you. Let’s run through 5 simple tips for doing just that:
Choose an empathetic protagonist
The reason that a story serves as an effective sales tool is that the person reading or hearing it empathizes with the protagonist. This allows them to imagine themselves in the story — imagine what it would be like to experience those circumstances and reach the same conclusions. This means that using an unlikeable and unempathetic protagonist is a non-starter (which is why the cinematic industry works so hard to find tricks for inspiring empathy).
For instance, imagine that you had a customer very happy with your business but also notorious for engaging in questionable (arguably unethical) business practices. Even if they offered to feature in a case study, would you want to make such a thing? Your target audience wouldn’t want to empathize with that customer, and would end up disliking you by proxy.
Structure the distinct phases
There isn’t too much room for creativity when you’re composing a narrative for an everyday audience. We all know the classic story layout, even if we’re not consciously aware of it (it’s burned into our minds), and it applies to narratives across cultures and media types. For evidence, check the story structure identified by Jericho Writers: you’ll find that just about every satisfying book or show you’ve ever seen fits with that arrangement.
Start by setting out the typical parts of this story framework. Where does the story begin? What challenge does the protagonist face? What motivates them? How do things go wrong? What major role does your company play in taking them to the point of success? What matters is hitting those story beats and having the connective tissue in place. Everything else you add to the story is essentially decorative.
Stick to relatable events
We’ve already been through the importance of the protagonist being empathetic, but that’s not all that matters — the events of the story also need to be relatable. The people being told the story must be able to envision the trials and triumphs. Imagine a small business owner reading a customer story about a customer signing a huge international enterprise deal, and ultimately feeling heavily disconnected as a result.
Consequently, try to keep the events quite broad, and don’t go into detail that won’t add anything useful. Instead of concentrating on the exact nature of a challenge (e.g. needing to fulfil a multi-million dollar contract), cut it back to the basics, making it far more about what the challenge means to the protagonist than what it technically involves. For instance, achieving positive cashflow is stressful for almost every business.
Focus on emotional impact
Emotion drives sales far more effectively than cold logic ever can, and it’s emotion that gives a narrative its weight and impact. You want to root for the protagonist, being saddened by their difficulties, inspired by their resilience, and relieved by their success. A customer story bereft of emotion is barely worth writing — so how can you make it a priority?
Firstly, run through every identified stage and keep asking two questions: how does the protagonist feel at this point, and how do you want the person experiencing the story to feel? You can encourage a sale with positive emotions (you’ll feel amazing if you use our new shampoo) or negative emotions (suffering with split ends and dry hair is extremely unpleasant”), so pick your preference. Secondly, pepper the story with accoutrements such as direct customer quotes or relevant visual elements. Upping the creativity will make the story feel warmer.
Add hooks to retain attention
Whether you’re ending a chapter, an episode, or even an entire book, including a hook is a great way to keep people interested. Sometimes it’s a hint of what’s to come (a chapter sample, perhaps), but often it’s a cliffhanger — a situation left hanging in the balance, requiring you to wait for the next part of the story to discover how it plays out.
Because a customer story can be fairly lengthy (particularly when it’s an in-depth case study), it’s a good idea to plan some hooks to maintain the narrative flow. For example, if you do a case study as a multi-part series (introducing the customer in the first part, explaining their original problem in the second part, etc.), you should end the first part on an intriguing note.
A good way to do this is to pose some questions that you’ll soon answer. “So now you’ve met [customer’s name], and you know why they’re in business — but they’ve had their fair share of problems over the years, and it’s taken a lot of work to overcome them. Want to know their story, and how we helped them achieve their current success? Stick around for part 2!”
An exceptional customer story will feature a likeable protagonist with a relatable story. Conforming to the classic story structure for ease and impact, it’ll run through powerful emotional beats in a compelling fashion, and push the audience to feel a certain way. Follow these 5 tips, and you’ll take your sales storytelling to the next level.
