Just imagine that your site is one of the most successful in the on-line classifieds industry, but no one knows about this fact. The both sides - you and your prospect clients - suffer. You are not properly rewarded for your efforts because nobody knows about your excellence and your clients don't know what good services are available for them to use and how they can be benefitted.

You should do something to make the public to get to know about your accomplishments. How?

We've got the answer! Write a success story! Success story, case study, customer testimonial - whatever you call them they are a valuable sales and marketing tool, as their main goal is to impact public and make them visit your site and use your products or services. Almost everybody loves to read about success stories. They are always about a challenge, new experience and looking for solutions.

What Is a Success Story?

In general, success story is an example of a successful practice when a company has achieved documented successful results. Success stories can be as short as 3-4 paragraphs or as long as 20 pages. It can be distributed in print, as PDFs, in the company newsletter, it also can be posted on the Web site, distributed at conferences, packaged and tailored to particular audiences for customer meetings, and sent in direct mail packages.

Why to write success stories?

• To give your readers an example of real successful project. Examples will help to understand difficult concepts and complex business issues. And solutions that can solve the issues.

• To generate empathy to enable readers to empathize with the challenge that you faced in the success story, in case your readers face a similar problem. The goal is make readers to closely identify with the author of the relevant success story.

• To add credibility. People believe success stories because such case studies usually relate a factual situations, besides they are full of real facts. A good success story full with facts and figures can also demonstrate ROI (if the documentation of a return on investment is possible).

• To share your ideas and to learn what works and what doesn't work.

• To let the public know that you do good work that positively impacts the lives of people

Anyway writing a success story about your business can not only provide the competitive advantage that your business need, but give you additional reason to be proud of yourself which is also important for a successful businessman like you.

How to write a good success story: CARP - Model

We live in the world where people are mostly skeptical and need a good reason to listen to you, or choose your product or use your services. Previously we discussed the reasons for writing success stories and today we will learn how to write a success story that makes people believe.

There are a lot of ways to write an interesting and persuasive story and you can easily google them. Today we offer you the CARP-model for wring success stories, the model which is easy to understand and follow and flexible enough to be changed giving you much space for self-expression. Finally it's quite effective.

The structure consists of four parts:

1.     Challenge

2.     Action

3.     Result

4.     Perspective

We call this structure CARP-model. it's easy to remember even if you are not a fishing lover, isn't it?

So the CARP-model provides you with the structure for your success story. Let's dive deeper into the details.

Challenge

The main purpose is to make readers identify with the challenge.

Who had the challenge? Who cares?

What problem, issue or concern needed addressing?

Why was it important?

What was the cost of addressing or not addressing it

Action

The main purpose is to demonstrate how you responded to the challenge and how product and services can impact the business challenge.

What did you do to address your challenge?

How big was the project? Include inputs (staff, funding, volunteers, research, expertise) and outputs - activities (teaching, facilitation, product development and people (number of people and demographics).

Which product or services did you use?

How did our products and services help?

Why do you choose this product?

Result

The main purpose is to show that the benefits are real, quantifiable and compelling

What resulted? Use quantitative and qualitative data to describe important outcomes (changes and benefits) achieved as a result of the actions described earlier.

Who benefited and how? Help the reader understand the meaning behind the change.

Describe the benefits you achieved (including benefits like increased customer satisfaction or reduced stuff turnover) in most-important-to-least-important order.

Perspective

The main purpose is to show that achieved excellent results are the part of continuous growth and you are full of plans and perspectives.

What is the perspective for the future?

Is there a next stage that you now plan to implement?

How do you plan to change your business in future?

What are your goals and intentions?

You just need to follow the CARP-model and it will keep you from becoming confused while writing your success story. Answer all questions and you will get well-structured and clear success story. And some more tips:

• Don't forget about the appealing lead to the story
• Use attractive pictures
• Proofread the text
• Use active vs. passive voice
• Read it aloud before submitting somewhere
• If the story seems too long, delete one or more of the least important facts from the story .
• Try to follow the classic structure for writing a success story: Problem and Solution, Before and After, Then and Now.
• Focus on the reader's interest (usually in terms of how clients benefit).

Good fishing!

About the author

WorksForWeb is a software development company specialized in Web-based applications with focus on PHP  classifieds scripts. WorksForWeb offers three multi-language SEO-optimized platforms: iRealty real estate classifieds script, iLister multi-purpose classifieds software and iAuto vehicle classifieds script.