Working for Articulate Marketing’s clients, I write a lot of case studies. I try to tell a story that shows how my client’s product or service helped a business. Stories being hard-wired into the human brain, this is a better way of getting the point across than a facts-only product description.

However, in thinking about the last couple of days’ posts - which have been about what motivates people - I’ve been thinking about other ways of approaching the case study format. One possibility is the ‘anti-case study’. If I can tell a story of TWO companies, one with the product and one without, I could show the benefits more distinctly and (the main point) I could create a sense of opportunity, fear of making a bad decision and show cost savings or profit gains. Ambition, fear and greed. Powerful stuff.

One example of an anti-case study came to mind. (I am a private pilot and write about flying in my other blog: ModernPilot.com). The contrast between traveling by airline and traveling on a private jet is very clear: it’s more luxurious and more efficient. Here are a couple of private jet companies who have really good ‘anti-case studies’. I’m going to see if I can find a way to do this for one or my clients in the next couple of months and I’ll report back on the results.

• Gold Air has a great minute by minute breakdown of a business day by private jet vs. commercial flights with pictures. Full disclosure: a couple of years ago they took me on a trip in one of the LearJets to the South of France. Very swish.
• Bombardier has a neat series of price comparisons with commercial flights which try to show that private aviation can actually save money.