#announcements
Important info for Customer Marketers & Community members
Thread
Hi friends, this holiday season I'm hoping for the gift of a slide, or slides I can repurpose. I need something to help communicate: 1. when in the customer journey it's appropriate to ask a customer for a case study / success story. Like 1. Contract signed. 2. Product Implemented. 3. Success. 4. Then consider case study. 2. Communicate that *a case study is not the only medium* for customer content. There are name/logo approvals, quotes, new wins mentioned in earnings, speaking engagements (webinars, thought leadership, owned and 3rd party events), leaving reviews, interviews with analysts or media, etc. Anyone willing to share?
InEvidence created a great visual a few years ago. Here you go.
thoughts @Joel Klettke and @Emily Amos (also, no need to jump in if you are already out for the year) 😄
Hi, Megan! 👋
The first thing I did was identify the crucial touch points with our customers. I like to "strike while the iron's hot" in these moments. You mentioned some of them already. We are introducing the program along the way and letting them know that they can receive rewards for advocating for Nectar. Then, once they're interested, I like to follow a process that I like to call the "escalation of commitment". Essentially, start with small asks like writing a quick review. Then, if they actually complete this smaller act of advocacy we then invite them to continue advocating for us by inviting them to sign up to be a customer reference. Once they've signed up and show that they're willing to hop on a call or an email thread, then we might invite them to complete a Case Study or join the official Champions program. Hopefully you get the idea of what I mean by escalation of commitment.
I, for example, have an automated process where when our customers complete our NPS survey and score a 9-10 (promoter) we send out an email that invites them to write a review or sign up to be a reference.
We do the same thing when a customer renews. We give the CSM the ability to send some of their customers a gift for renewing and invite them to sign up to be a reference.
These are just a couple examples of things we do to capitalize on those moments when our customers are already doing some "act of advocacy" and continue to invite them to advocate for us in the future.
Hope this helps! 🙏
Thanks @Tyler Johnson. Sounds like a great program! I should provide some more context on my ask.
My team, and sometimes PMMs by proxy, frequently get ask (more like demands) by our internal sales and product owners to do case studies with customers who just closed. There’s a lot of internal excitement about the deal or new logo…and then they expect my team to turn around a case study immediately.
We do a lot of explaining that a case study is traditionally challenge/solution/results…and a new customer has no results to speak to. They haven’t even deployed. Let’s check back in X months, and (depending on the deal or logo) look at other opportunities like an earnings mention, quote on why they bought, or thought leadership speaking opp.
My boss wants me create a slide or something that my team can point to and enables the PMMs to get ahead of or combat the same question over and over. This group is amazing and I am awful at creating slides…so I thought I’d see if someone had one I could repurpose or use as a starting point!
@Florian Engel really interesting diagram! Honestly, at first glance I was overwhelmed by the lines and subway view. I don't know folks outside of advocacy would be able to deliver the voiceover for this one...but I definitely could. thanks for sharing