#134 How to Create Powerful Case Studies Without Client Photos (Plus AI, UI Design & Lead Magnets)

Jonny Ross

-: 00:28

Hi, welcome. This is the Ninth Day Website Mastery podcast. It's our 53rd episode. Welcome, Pascal Fintoni, my co-host.

Jonny Ross

-: 00:29

How are you today?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 00:37

I'm very well. I feel like we've had a long break, but I was counting. It's not that many weeks, really. So, you know, really pleased to be back.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 00:41

And thank you to our viewers and listeners, whether you're joining us live or on replay.

Jonny Ross

-: 00:57

And this is the companion to our recently published book, Web Proud. In fact, Web Proud is coming on the road in person in Leeds. We're going to be doing a workshop at the end of March. We've got a new favorite tool, haven't we?

Jonny Ross

-: 01:00

It's a bit of a best kept secret, I think.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 01:24

Well, if we've done our job properly, though, people should know that Notebook LM by Google is one of our top favorites. And you're right. What started all those years ago as a webinar, then became a podcast, then became a book, and tons of e-books and resources, we thought, you know, it's time to go and meet some lovely people who have been our great supporters. So yes, 25th of March in Leeds for a Notebook LM for Website Special Masterclass.

Jonny Ross

-: 01:35

Yeah, looking forward to that. As always, in every episode, we have four segments. We have the you ask, we answer where someone submits the question and we explore it for you. We've got website stories this week.

Jonny Ross

-: 02:01

On this episode, we're going to be telling you about a conference that we were at recently. We've got the website engine room where we share a couple of apps or pieces of kit that's going to help you as a website manager, make you feel more proud of your website, make your website work harder for you. And of course, we always finish with a website call to action. One simple thing that you could be doing right now to start making your website work so much harder.

Jonny Ross

-: 02:08

Shall we get started, Pascal? Shall we? Let's go with the first segment. You ask, we answer.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 02:29

Now, this is an interesting one. So this is literally straight from a webinar that I delivered a few days ago. And so I'm going through a series of sessions, if you will, Johnny, very much like you would. And we were working on our credibility.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 02:38

And case studies was one of the things we discussed. FAQs was another one as well. And so they came back, and they were doing a show and tell, the participants. And I've got some of this.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 02:54

So listen, I've written the case studies, a combination of mind, thoughts, and using a bit of AI support. as you recommended, but I'm stuck on the visuals and the photography. You know, it feels like I can't really use photos of people or my clients. I can't use their premises.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 03:00

I can't use their logo. So I'm stuck. What should I do? What say you, Johnny Ross?

Jonny Ross

-: 03:32

Yeah, well, it's interesting because I had a very similar question yesterday. I mean, talk about stars aligning. And as well as layering onto that, as well as not being able to use the images and the brands, the logos, it's about perhaps not even being able to use the name of the person or the name of the business. And potentially, I actually think this puts you in a stronger point because when we're using the logo, I think a lot of the time we're sort of relying on that to tell the story and that to build the trust and that doesn't make us work as hard as

Jonny Ross

-: 04:02

we would if we can't use the logo. So I think this is about really being sort of quite out there in terms of being generous in what you share, in terms of the impact, in terms of the difference, in terms of the process, in terms of how you've come to where you got to for this particular product or solution or whatever that was sold. And so it's a way of really digging deeper into what it was.

Jonny Ross

-: 04:12

And then in terms of imagery and pictures, I mean, the first thing is don't just jump to stock imagery. Would you agree with that, Pascal? You know, it's not, it's not our favorite, is it?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 04:31

It's not though. I would say they are some incredible website that gives you professionally, you know, kind of, um, professional shots. So yeah, move away from stock photography and find platform that we mentioned in, in other episodes that gives you access to professional photographers, gifting, you know, their, their work to small business owners.

Jonny Ross

-: 04:58

Yeah, but where we can go is more illustrative and perhaps even charts, perhaps even making things that show and demonstrate, perhaps laying out the process. Or you might have an image that talks about the impacts of some kind of graph. We've gone from here to here. You might not be able to talk about revenue changes, but you might be able to talk about how it's gone up in the percentage terms.

Jonny Ross

-: 05:18

You might be able to talk about how you've reduced staff retention by 20% and how you can then create some kind of graph to show that. And if anything, that shows that you are data led, you're thinking about data. And so it's trying to trying to always come up with those numbers. Because in terms of a structure of a case study, we typically think of, you know, if we really simplify it down, what was the problem?

Jonny Ross

-: 05:26

What was the solution? And what was the impact? And when it comes to the impact, it's constantly saying the so what? Okay, so we did this.

Jonny Ross

-: 06:12

Yeah, but so what? what we did this yet but so what until you get to those numbers so you can then take those numbers put them into some kind of illustration and use those type that type of imagery and then in the solution part of that talking about the process the thinking we perhaps had a we were thinking of going three different ways with this particular project and visually you could show add the road map in terms of you know what we're thinking in this way but that would have been a disaster and would cause more problems and we ended up with this route and this is the impact that it gave so it's i think what i'm saying is you you end up giving more explaining more on that if anything builds trust i've got some thoughts on the the name as well but just pascal in terms

Jonny Ross

-: 06:18

of imagery specific you're asking What would you add to my thoughts?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 06:36

So what I've done then, um, in the moment, I'm inventing a new term called case story, because I think what people need to understand is that, you know, what is the lesson and what do you want people to remember? So you're going to read the case to me. They may watch it actually. They may listen to it if there's an audio overview.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 06:51

But what are the key messages you want them to retain? And in a way, the images, the visuals, need to be an echo of what that is. Do you want them to remember the process you used that is unique to you? Do you want them to remember the impact, as you heard a moment ago, Joni mentioned?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 07:23

So what do you want them to remember from that case story? Because there's two things. Either you are retelling something that happened in the recent past, or you are showing an example what could happen as well if you are for example a start-up business or it's when you're offering in the marketplace. So for me If we talk about case story, I would argue that to your point where you described our visuals that normally would be in a blog section, and are we actually inviting ourselves to think of case studies just a bit more creatively, where it's more engaging, and

Pascal Fintoni

-: 08:08

then in a way, you free yourself of the shackles of having to exactly match the case story visual to the building of your customers, or the logo of your customers, or the location. i think as well about so many of our customers and listeners of yours are professional service providers that there isn't a venue to show for you know there isn't and they may take no shots on the mobile phones but you know that they can use them necessarily without without permission so for me if you use a term case story cuz words are powerful then your job is to find that illustration and it can be something you can access online, something you can create yourself or using some support from AI. It's there to kind of be an echo, a whisper about the key lesson you'll take away from reading this story.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 08:10

Nice.

Jonny Ross

-: 08:36

I love the idea of case story. And whilst you were talking, I was thinking, so other imagery that you could use is in terms of context around the industry, around the sector. So you might not be able to use one of the pictures, you know, using a stock image of, you know, perhaps it's a manufacturing plant and you're thinking of using a stock image of manufacturing, but it's, again, it's not real. So what you might be best doing is using some kind of illustration that gets it across.

Jonny Ross

-: 09:19

So for example, if it was logistics, having, if you imagine like a London tube map, that sort of gets across logistics. For finance, it might be more like grids and structural precision or numbers. Manufacturing, it might be more like systems or geometry or, you know, thinking about how you can create something illustrative and as Pascal said there with a bit of AI you've got you know so many tools to be able to create something like that very quickly or even just using where I was saying about stock images is what you don't want is sort of two guys shaking hands or the computer you know the laptop on the desk with a cup of coffee so that's what I was meaning about that That sort of real stock image.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 09:40

Yeah, can I just say, you know, those photos of computers with the desk are far too neat. I mean, people can't see because of, you know, of movie magic, but my desk is a horror. And that's, that would never matches, you know, those photos online. I mean, I use them in fairness, you know, I use them because I use them for title slides, you know, on for training, because actually there's a lot of space to put text and that's what they're designed to do.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 10:03

But for me, you know, there's exactly that, which is, so I used to, when I used to teach content marketing, particularly the photography I used to call visual marketing, I used to say, you know, there's two ways you can go. You can go literal. So the case study is about this organization and literally the photography or the visual matches that. Or you can go lateral, which is where you heard a moment ago from Johnny.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 10:17

So, But what was exciting, so the customer then went ahead and rethought their approach, but also as a result to which they came up with a better title for the case study, because it was more story led. And I thought that was brilliant. Yeah, nice.

Jonny Ross

-: 11:09

Finally, if I may, in terms of client details. So actually, I think that that is a strength as well, not putting the name on the company, because it's an opportunity to show how you are a very the words completely vanished but a very safe space a very safe place to work with someone that's trusted so it might be something using using something along the lines of client details with held due to commercial sensitivity and i think that actually put you in quite a powerful place to be able to say look you know We know the client but we can't tell you cuz this commercial sensitivity here and by the way other people can trust us and what you would immediately need to anchor that with is the credibility around actually giving a bit of detail so detail that's not gonna give the client away but for example you know this is a an eighty

Jonny Ross

-: 11:31

million. pound business, um, uh, in a particular sector that are covering three, um, uh, world markets, you know, whatever it might be. Um, but giving a bit of detail in terms of industry or size or market or complexity. Uh, and I think, and I think if anything, that increases the trust, uh, on, on many in many layers.

Jonny Ross

-: 11:35

So yeah, I, I don't think this is a problem. I think actually there's a massive opportunity.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 11:40

I like that last option there. Thank you. And I mentioned that to my clients as well, Johnny.

Jonny Ross

-: 11:46

Shall we move to our next segment, which is website stories?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 12:18

Now, about a week ago, you know, at the time of recording this, you and I were invited to, um, you know, launch the digital exchange program in Yorkshire. We went to Leeds stadium and you were hosting. And I was delivering the opening keynote and two presentations, one of which we're going to focus on. And you also presented and did the closing keynote.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 12:38

I mean, the organizers, foolishly enough, trusted us to, you know, take care of proceedings. And we had an amazing, amazing day, the participation from people, but also the question, you can see the level of maturity when it comes to digital marketing and AI, which was a theme of the conference. Just very quickly, your, your memory and, and what you've taken away from that day.

Jonny Ross

-: 13:28

Yeah they did trust us it was a great day we covered lots of different topics around marketing around growth around businesses really thinking about what they could be doing to grow but more so how they could incorporate AI how they could be using AI. I think what I walked away from was the feeling that I have with most businesses right now is that there's pockets of success where people are embracing AI and are powering some of the things that they're doing, some of the strategies, some of the thinking, some of the brainstorming, some of the structure of things. And then there's other businesses that sort of, you know, just haven't even started or they're just playing with it.

Jonny Ross

-: 13:49

And then you've got another few businesses that are dead against it. And, you know, AI is not going to help and an AI is not going to take over. And this is a fad. And I was left with sort of I'm, I'm not sure you're seeing the future here.

Jonny Ross

-: 14:08

Um, and I'm not sure you're, you're, you're engaging with the, the opportunity that there is right now. So yeah, that, that was just overall. Um, if I was to sort of think about the, uh, some of the thoughts around use of AI, that's, you know, that, that was just where I was thinking, uh, how I left from the day.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 14:34

For sure, and listen, when I was doing the opening of Me, Myself and AI, you know, I did say to people, let's embrace our feelings fully, you know, all views and opinions are valid, particularly where we're only three years and three months from the launch of Championship ET. But for me, you know, all we're seeing is the echo of the past. I mean, this is some reaction when social media was first introduced, you know, as a concept in the early 2000s. Prior to that was SEO, prior to that was website.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 15:16

I mean, you and I, you know, know and remember When we as marketing employees, and I was a young marketing officer, went to my boss and suggested websites. And people look at me, you know, saying, well, why, you know, and it's a cost and how much we're going to get back in return and so on. And my argument was, well, Let's be an early adopter will learn so much more that once it gets good and once you have you know a sizable volume of internet users would be ahead of the game compared to trying to do it when it's working for everybody else so i think that was kind of interesting i have one of the presentation i gave was how to undertake your 2026 website health check.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 15:53

And we borrowed from web prime the book, we borrowed a little from our notebook LM for website masterclass taking place on the 20th of March, everybody, as a quick reminder. And what was fascinating is that it did resonate because everybody has a feeling that the website could do a bit better. Everybody has a feeling or has some thoughts. about what could be changing but sometimes i don't know where to start so quickly i did a demonstration and i was because i didn't do live by the way i did some screenshots with connectivity so i did a screenshot of taking a real business you know i wouldn't

Pascal Fintoni

-: 16:32

dressmaker in northumberland and going through the the prompting and the stages of reflection using the book LM for a comprehensive website health check using first impressions trust elements and calls to action which is really what we recommend in the book. Then i went elsewhere and i went into content marketing in the age of AI overviews. and I was showing some workflows. And my aim really, Johnny, at the time, was to get people to not put all their eggs in one Chachapiti basket, but actually to think more of a team and a workflow from Chachapiti to Cloud, to Perplexity, to Nobukele, and kind of showing that.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 16:41

I must say that people look at me with stunned look, thinking, really? I said, well, why not? It's all there. It's all free of charge.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 17:03

But also, you need to, as a skilled operator of digital tools, you have to know the strength of the blind spots and so on. And then we did do a session on video very, very quickly. And then we had a massive q&a. So it was the first time that you and I actually put webpround as a as a movement front and center during a presentation, you know, I think sometimes we do stuff with modesty.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 17:04

It was good.

Jonny Ross

-: 17:38

Yeah, it gave us a great thread, really. And the keynote that I was doing, sorry, one of the workshops that I started with was visibility and how you can use AI to think about, well, not even using AI. I mean, you know, this was AI to power it. But in terms of, you know, there's some really easy ways to start getting better visibility quite quickly so we were exploring PR, we were exploring direct marketing, guest marketing and we were exploring intro requests as well, referrals and just you know getting businesses to think about perhaps just

Jonny Ross

-: 18:09

picking a couple i'm coming up with something very simple to be able to do over the next ninety days to to raise the visibility and i think business is really engaged with that i also had a keynote on a in seo how to be how are you gonna be seen in this new changing landscape of those ten blue links disappearing from google but how you gonna be seen in Perplexity and Gemini and chat GPT so that was a good session. What I really did like was businesses were really engaged. They clearly wanted to grow.

Jonny Ross

-: 18:34

There was a really great engagement all day. There was a lot of passion in the room and it was brilliant to see so many startups, people that have got ideas that perhaps have had a change of circumstances in their lives and really want to develop and grow their own business and create something around them that they're passionate about and that. that came across strongly and I think we were just helping them unlock how they could start achieving it.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 18:58

No, absolutely. So it was a full day, you know, and I will say thank you for everybody that lasted the full day, because sometimes with, you know, life commitments and so on, it can be very, very tricky. And, and yeah, I suppose, you know, thank you to the team behind the scenes at Digital Knowledge Exchange, because you and I turn up, have an amazing day, but there's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes when you do event management, for sure.

Jonny Ross

-: 19:04

That certainly is. Let's move to our next segment, which is the website engine room.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 19:22

Now, in this part of the show, Jonny and I recommend one app each, you know, a bit of software that can make life easier as a website manager or content creator. So Jonny Ross, what is your selection for today?

Jonny Ross

-: 19:46

Yeah, so this one's a bit more for the technical people out there, or alternatively, website managers that are trying to get across what they want in terms of a design or a look. And this gives a great signpost. So it's one of the largest libraries, an open source library of UI. And by that I'm talking about user interface elements.

Jonny Ross

-: 20:14

So buttons, icons, forms, menus, all the things that allow users to navigate and interact with digital products ultimately. And it's a great, it's just a brilliant library of all of that. whether it be shapes, whether it be colors, whether it be styles, formats. And what that can really help you do is create better call to actions, better understanding of how to move customers around your website.

Jonny Ross

-: 20:30

and be able to talk to designers and developers and say, actually, I've seen this style of form, or I've seen this style of button, or this style of call to action, or this style of menu. This is what I'd like on my website. So I've just realized I've not even mentioned the product, have I? Uiverse.

Jonny Ross

-: 20:43

Uiverse.io is the one that I'm highlighting. It's the largest library of open source UI, community built library of user interface elements. And that is what I would recommend.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 21:06

There's nothing like having a conversation where there's a discussion based on something you can look at and react to as opposed to a blank screen and waving your hands around. I can just say I love the name, Uiverse.io. I bet people out there are thinking, damn, I wish I'd thought of that myself. So I wanted to build on the conversation we've had so far.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 21:27

You and I, one of the highlights of the episode we've done now, this is being 53, is when we did a special on AI overviews, GEO, and the future of SEO. And there is a resource that we want in on that. I would recommend you download that in a moment. I would ask you to remind us of the URL.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 21:53

I suppose the takeaway from the conference, but also from that special webinar, was the return of long-form content. Long-form content supplemented by TLDRs at the beginning of the summaries section. And long-form content is not easy at all. So I wanted to remind people that there is a platform that is dedicated to be your ultimate creative partner for long-form content, and it's called cloud.ai.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 22:20

I keep saying people, I'm not liking it because I can pronounce it properly. It's because generally it was designed for that. There's another side to it, which is about coding, but in the context of SEO, the new SEO, GEO, and building a brand, building trust. you've got to show you know your body you've got to be seen and her being helpful within you know beyond two hundred fifty words you not have a bite size post so what you can do with the clothes is a number of things you can think of the

Pascal Fintoni

-: 22:42

structure first. I don't go and write it you can write maybe a medium length version and get clothes to get and give me some ideas but how you can expand but ultimately you know. What you want to do is make sure that when you use cloud.ai and any other platform, Johnny, that you educate it by your voice and your style. Therefore, you have to show and share examples of your work.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 23:00

And we've got to be careful because there are businesses out there, Johnny, who have not written anything whatsoever themselves. They've used AI all the way. And therefore, they are in no position to educate their assistant by their tone of voice and style. So make sure that, you know, I would say write the draft, you know, get the beginning going.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 23:31

and then go for the long form and don't be scared people when i say long form by the way i want to be clear i'm talking two thousand words you know kind of the two thousand word authoritative piece that you can do once or twice once or twice a month i would give ai overviews plenty to get the teeth into if they have any teeth but more importantly People said to me, you know, no one's going to read that. I said, you don't know that, you know, you'd be very surprised. And in any case, even if you've done 2000 word, um, article, meaningful article, there's a summary of the top anyway, for people who like to scan read.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 23:46

Um, but the fact that you have done the 2000 word article is impressive. The reading bit is almost enough for me, a bonus, but more importantly, we are now operating, um, with an AI overviews first internet.

Jonny Ross

-: 23:51

We are. We are. And that is a great tip. Love it.

Jonny Ross

-: 24:00

Very, very fitting for the website engine room. So yeah, I like it. Thank you very much. Let's move to our final segment.

Jonny Ross

-: 24:09

And every piece of content, including our podcast and including everything you do, should always have a call to action. So ours is the website call to action.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 24:22

This is about the one change with one adjustment you should be making right now on your website. Johnny, what is your call to action?

Jonny Ross

-: 24:35

Well, we need to grow our email list because people aren't always ready to buy, so we've got to nurture them. We've got to grab their data and we've got to start nurturing them. People are not necessarily ready to buy, so how are we going to grab their data? We need to create a lead market.

Jonny Ross

-: 25:19

I can't believe that we've hit episode 53 and not mentioned lead magnets, creating something in-depth, something really helpful, a how-to guide, some kind of insight report. It could even be something fun, depending on what your business is and depending on what your products or services are, something that fits the audience, something that's really helpful, something that would make them want to give their email address in return for whatever this thing is. So whether that be something to listen to, something to watch, something to read, something that's going to be really valuable and helpful so what can you create that's going to add value where they want to spend time and the point being is give me your email address we'll send this over to you and make your life easier and here's some answers.

Jonny Ross

-: 25:38

So building your email list is something that you could you know perhaps by the way you've probably already got some lead magnets You might need to just dress them up a tiny bit. But the call to action really is putting something on there that says, put your email address in here, and you can then have a copy of this call to action for this episode.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 25:57

And then use your UI verse maybe to challenge the status quo in terms of the way the page looks and so on, which is great. So mine is kind of three calls to actions into one. I've cheated a bit, but I had to make sure that I had the full journey described. I've done a lot of work recently on PR push to increase someone's visibility.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 26:19

You did a full presentation of the conference we mentioned a moment ago. So I'd like people to actually go back, research, and refresh their list of local and national media contacts. And I mean by this, Johnny, real people, not just the name of the publication or the name of the radio station, but who are the people that you can then get in touch. And when you get in touch, don't get in touch to say, please run my story.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 26:46

Get in touch to ask for their editorial calendar for the next quarters. They should be organized. And in terms of special supplements or just the running of the magazine, they have already mapped out, you know, minimum the next quarter, if not, you know, the rest of the year. And knowing what the themes of those kind of different months and quarters going to be is everything to you, because then you can match your follow up email to their content calendar.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 26:58

This is really what you want to do. But also listen, those media organizations have done their research. If it is in their content calendar, it means that it's a hot topic. So also could be an inspiration.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 27:16

for your own kind of blogging. But for me, I need you, all of you listening live on replay to be featured even more so than ever before on someone else's platforms as part of the SEO, GEO of today. And who are they? What are their plans for the future?

Pascal Fintoni

-: 27:21

And then get in touch and match your suggestions, I guess, contributor to their content calendar.

Jonny Ross

-: 27:34

Oh, I love that. And publications absolutely do have these content calendars, and it's totally worth asking for them. And what a great way to start the conversation as well. You're not pitching to them.

Jonny Ross

-: 27:56

You're not saying, write my story. You've got a really easy in there. I absolutely love that. You were mentioning the GEO, SEO, we've got a 20 urgent actions that you could take, that you should be taking right now to ensure that you're optimized for generative engine, engines that are out there.

Jonny Ross

-: 28:22

And if you simply go to 90 day website, marketing.com you'll be able to get the download in the resources tab of that website. All the links for everything we've talked about will of course be in the show notes anyway. So all you have to do is whatever device you're on scroll down a bit and you'll be able to get all the links Uh, and by the way, whether you are live or whether you're listening on the replay, we love you being here. So thank you very much indeed.

Jonny Ross

-: 28:25

But, um, we've covered, we've covered a lot.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 28:32

We've covered a lot today, Pascal. I'm always surprised only half an hour, but we do fit in a lot of information. So, you know, it's great.

Jonny Ross

-: 28:48

We've helped you think about how you can make your case studies even more powerful by not mentioning names or logos. And we've really helped you think about, uh, some of the imagery that you could be using to tell the story. I love it. Case stories, case stories, everyone likes a story.

Jonny Ross

-: 29:00

Uh, and, uh, we've talked about how, uh, AI can be used to integrate into your marketing, lots of tips and apps that you could be using right now. Uh, and as I said, everything will be in the show notes.

Pascal Fintoni

-: 29:03

Thank you for joining us. It's been good.

Jonny Ross

-: 29:14

Thank you. Thank you so much. If this has been helpful, please do tell your friends and colleagues. We would love for them to join us and start listening as well.

Jonny Ross

-: 29:31

It's a wrap for episode 53 of the nine state website mastery podcast, your audio companion to the nine state website mastery program. Don't forget we are on the road. We're doing the notebook LM workshop on the 20th of March in Leeds. Uh, in the, in the show notes, you'll have a, see a link to the event, right?

Jonny Ross

-: 29:42

You're very welcome. to join us. In fact, we'd love you to be there. For more information, visit 90daymarketingmastery.com where you can book a discovery call with either myself or Pascal.

Jonny Ross

-: 29:50

It's goodbye for now. We'll leave you with a fun video and audio montage to enjoy whilst you review your notes and actions. We'll see you on the next episode. Look after yourselves.

Jonny Ross

-: 29:50

Take care.