Videos come in a thousand shapes and flavours, from noirish documentaries to 16-second dance TikTok crazes. Imagination really is the limit. So it’s unsurprising that this supremely flexible tool can be used in different ways at every stage of your marketing strategy, from awareness through to after-sales.
Customer testimonial videos – and their more detailed, numbers-led cousins, customer case study videos – are particularly effective at the conversion stage, helping interested browsers take the decision to become paying customers.
It’s the equivalent of going to a shop to look at a particular product, to feel it in your hands, and to ask other customers what they think of it. Video marketing is particularly well-suited to this task, which involves bringing customer stories to life and creating a human connection with people you’re unlikely to meet in real life.
How to make a great video case study or customer testimonial video
As with any other piece of content, you need to make sure your case study or customer testimonial video is aligned to the objectives of your marketing strategy, targeting the right people with the right message, in a way that is consistent with your brand.
Every second should be planned carefully in the scripting and storyboarding stages of video production, for maximum impact.
Show the value proposition clearly and quickly
We live in an age of rapid-fire content and bored thumbs. The average millennial attention span is reportedly 12 seconds – 4 seconds longer than for Gen Z, so it’s dropping – and the content on the major video channels reflects that.
And although business viewers last a little longer – 58% will watch a business video to the end if it’s less than a minute long, according to Vidyard – it still pays to get the key message out quickly.
In a case study or testimonial video, that key message should be your value proposition – how your product or service helps. Look at this video from Caterpillar, about how its 365 Excavator helped construction firm Steven Rock.
Aside from being very on-brand (nothing says ‘we get construction’ like electric guitar riffs and dynamic dig shots), it’s also very relatable, reeling off the ways the product was useful in the customer’s own words, from operations managers through to operators.
Caterpillar’s video isn’t afraid to use numbers to back up its claims – it is ‘10% more productive’ than old models, and has ‘9% increased visibility to the left’.
Tell a story
The most effective case studies – and the most effective videos in general – tell a story. They let you into someone’s reality, they paint with emotions, they capture your interest and take you through a change towards a satisfying resolution.
The result: you get a more engaging, enjoyable video, which one study found can boost purchase intent by 97%.
That might conjure images of something deep, a tearjerker, but businesses have stories too. Tease from your featured customer what challenges are exercising them, what it’s like to be in their shoes. Get them to explain how they came across your product, how it fits into their working lives and how it solves those challenges.
This customer testimonial video by Zoom is a good example. It brings you into sound system company Sonos, the work they do and the way they work, and then it reveals how Zoom enables them to do their best. It doesn’t feel like an advert.
Find brand enthusiasts for your product or service
Given how important the featured customer is to your testimonial or case study video – adding credibility, relatability and a narrative arc – take the time to find a good one.
There are various ways to do this – if you’re a B2C brand, this could be by looking for customers who have posted enthusiastic videos about your product themselves; if you’re in B2B, it’s more likely to emerge from conversations with loyal customers.
In any case, make it worth their while. Be generous. Let the video be about them, showing the world what they are like and what they do. If it boosts their brand at the same time as promoting your product, they are far more likely to participate, and also to promote your products and services afterwards.
In your video testimonial, whoever you go for, make sure their challenges speak to your audience. In this video from IT services provider Cloudian, the customer not only talks in some detail about the problem he faced and how Cloudian helped, but he also does so in glowing terms.
Note how the video gives a lot of airtime to the customer – the University of Leicester – generosity in action.
Conclusion: the keys to testimonial videos
A strong case study or customer testimonial can be critical for converting awareness of your product into hard sales. Video is uniquely suited to that, because it adds credibility and increases engagement, but you need to think carefully about who you feature, and how you communicate their story and the value you’ve brought them.
Wooshii is an innovative video production company with the capacity to create video anywhere in the world, in any format, using a talent network of over 16,000 plus experts. Wooshii works with world-leading organisations across multiple industry sectors to enable consistent and reliable video production at scale, supporting a wide variety of internal and external marketing and communication functions.
Need help devising your video strategy or perhaps want to discuss your productions needs, give Wooshii a call today.
