The Ultimate Case Study Page for Commercial Construction Companies

This article is for commercial construction companies that build awe-inspiring experiential works of art and multi-million to multi-billion dollar structures.

In the past, you might have seen your website as something purely to attract talent, condition the market or drive brand awareness, but that might not always be the case - the world is changing. Winter is coming. 

We have to be thinking about staying ahead of our peers and continuing to remind our team and clients/partners why they choose to work with us, and that means mastering every aspect of our industry and often related ones. 

Don't believe me? Well, we have brought in hundreds of millions in potential leads for our collective clients since 2010 and have also brought in dozens of multi-million dollar leads for commercial construction leaders. 

Our goal with this article is to help you look out at your content from your audiences perspective and see if there is:

• A need for clarity in your content?
• Any areas where you might be missing something?
• Easy changes you could make to create a better and more compelling case study that does justice to the scale and caliber of work your group does?

Here is a guide with all the elements that make a great case study for commercial construction companies.

Elements of the Ultimate Commercial Construction Case Study

1. Unique URL
2. Clean Layout
3. Inspiring Project Image or Video
4. Compelling and Keyword Focused Name
5. Visual Credibility
6. Concise Overview with Short Paragraphs 
7. Strong Section Titles w/High-Quality Images
8. Social Proof
9. Project Stats
10. Highlight your People
11. Compelling Call to Action

Unique URL

This might seem like a none-item, but having a custom, search-friendly URL is significant. Many commercial construction case studies opt for a pop-up image gallery of their projects. And while this might reduce your content work, it also reduces your opportunity for results.

If you don't have a unique page for each case study, it is doubtful you will rank if anyone ever searches for:

• Who built (insert the name of any project you completed) 
• Construction projects of a similar industry or type

In case you decide to use a single-page website or gallery, just know that it is essentially the equivalent of a tree falling in the woods. Or building a high-rise or hospital without an address. It is unlikely you will be found except by people who know exactly where you are. 

When could a single-page portfolio work?

The only exceptions might be if you have the following:

•  A very creative and talented web partner because they can do some additional dev work to help you rank.
• A talented PR team working round the clock. In this scenario, you might come up in search results, but it would only be on a news website.  

URLs also matter because they relate to user experience, which is a relatively new factor in Google's Page Rank algorithm, so they're essential for a few additional reasons:

1. Provide a better user experience
2. Play a factor in determining rank
3. Make link sharing clear on social media

Still, don't believe me; compare these URLs below and think about which one you would feel comfortable clicking on.

Clean Layout

Make sure that the layout of your case study uses a visual design that guides visitors down the page and that the overall case study content type answers questions and features data and social proof evidence that supports your marketing claims.

As the number of case studies in a portfolio increases, the avg time on each case study goes down. For example, on a site with:

• Under 20-30 case studies, the avg time ranged from 1-2 minutes.
• Over 300-400 case studies, the avg time was around 30-50 seconds.

Think about your page from the visitor's perspective. How much information can someone read or scan on a project they are seeing for the first time? 

Inspiring Project Image or Video

When the page loads, this will be the first thing your audience will see. Make sure you compress your images and that they load smoothly, but also make sure the image is stunning and that it reminds them of the awe-inspiring work you do and why they want to work for you or with you.

Please avoid small or pixelated photos, and never anything shot by an iPhone unless it is used in a secondary image gallery, and definitely give it some context.

What Video Styles Are Being Used?

If you're going to level up and opt for a featured video over a static photo, these are three practical video formats your peers are using:

1. Documentary style Interview
2. Punchy visuals, with text and transition effects
3. Building walkthroughs without dialogue set to inspiring or uplifting audio

For hosting the video, Vimeo and Wistia allow for nice customizations (i.e., modifying the typical video wrapper) and can even allow brand color modifications to the payer.

Compelling and Keyword Focused Project Names

Your case study should really have two names or titles:

1. One to engage humans
2. Another optimized to engage Google

1. One Title Designed to Engage Humans

The few words at the top of the page should grab the reader's attention.

Too often, commercial construction project titles use the client name only - which is not nothing - sometimes that name holds a lot of cache. 

But we're here for more than just notches in our bedposts. It's about the work, and your work is transformative. However, we also need to be succinct. 

Does it pass the "elevator test"

If your project title doesn't pass the "elevator test," you need to rethink it.

Meaning if you read the project title on your case study page to someone you met in an elevator, would that person have any idea what you did by the time they had to get off? 

You're not always writing for other construction peers - sometimes, they are, in fact, subcontractors or peers, but sometimes the visitor is a client or prospective client, and clients are not always on the same level as your knowledge, and jargon can exclude others. 

2. One Title Designed to Engage Google

The 2nd title, equally important for different reasons, is powered by your audience's vocabulary or keyword research.

This title is hidden in the meta title field of your Content Management System. The goal of this title is to attract the attention of Google's famous math ph Ds behind their algorithm. 

If you want to learn how to do this on your own, like many of our other clients, you can attend one of our SEO workshops.

A formula for Search-Friendly case study titles

The key to identifying good keywords is ones that have high search volume and low competition. This title should never be creative or clever. A good formula to use is:

Type of Construction + Location

Once you identify the phrase, you can also use it in other places on the page, like section headers or body text, but the Meta Title field is the most important.

Some tools for keyword research include Google's Keyword Planner, and SEMRush's SEO Assistant.

When we talk about a title to engage Google the screenshot below is what we're talking about. This one about Aegis is missing some keywords. Specifically, "Construction".

And that matters because Google might not know that this is about a "Science Lab Construction" project. So if the content on the page does not clarify, Google might display this site if someone is searching for the Aegis Science Lab. Which is not really they type of person they would want to attract. 

Visual Credibility

Plain text project facts are boring! They're just words on a page, and they don't do much to build trust or credibility. But when you turn those facts into images or icons, they become visual seals of trust that instantly grab attention and build confidence.

Accolades and collaborations build the story, and commercial construction is full of those each of those items.

Easy items to turn into icons and build trust

Here are some specific examples of how you can use images and icons to build trust on your website:

• Awards won: Use a high-quality image of your award or ask your designer to make a custom badge to re-use on any award-winning project.
• Certifications received: Did this project require any special certification or result in one? No one may know if you just write words on a page.
• Partners involved: Use images or logos of your partners.

When you use images and icons to showcase your project facts, you're not just providing information. You're building trust and creating a sense of credibility. And that's what will ultimately help you attract new customers and grow your business.

Concise Overview with Short Paragraphs 

Short paragraphs are key throughout any well-planned website, and that applies to the case study as well. 

Here are some other styling tips:

• Keep paragraphs to 3-4 lines 
• Use bulleted or numbered lists
• Be sure to use high-quality and well-planned images
• Add internal links to related content

Users don't read websites they scan them

According to eye tracking studies conducted by Nielsen Norman Group, users don’t read websites; they scan them, typically reading as little as 20-28% of a webpage. The amount of time a user spends with the content depends on the following:

• Level of motivation
• Type of task
• Level of focus
• Personal characteristics

The same goes for your project overview. And be sure to break paragraphs up with strong section titles. This makes the content scannable. 

Use this image below as a perfect example. All of the text is generated via Bacon Ipsum, and the only difference is the formatting. Formatted text is far easier to read and scan and it's far less intimidating than a wall of text.

You Have Limited Time to Make a Compelling Case

In general, people's attention and appetite for reading walls of unstyled and unengaging text are decreasing.

It's also worth noting that as the number of case studies in a portfolio increases, the avg time on each case study goes down. For example, 

• On a site with over 400 case studies, the avg time was around 40-50 seconds. 
• On sites with under 30 case studies, the avg time ranged from 1-2 minutes.

So think about your page from the visitor's perspective and how much information someone can read or scan on a given project they are seeing for the first time. 

Strong Section Titles w/High-Quality Images

So many sites do these two things that are a mistake:

• Include them in a gallery or carousel of low and mixed-quality images. 
• Include photos at various stages of project completion with zero context.
• Brief

I understand that the file size of photos used to be enormous and create load time issues, but compression has come a long way.

As for taking pictures at various stages, only do it under a couple of circumstances. 

1. If the photo addresses a common client need/issue or reinforces you as an expert. Otherwise, save those photos in the articles or get more involved behind-the-scenes blog storytelling.
2. If the answer above is yes, also make sure that you provide context - what are we looking at, why is this photo relevant or important.

Doing this can also bring dynamism and visual interest to your layout if each picture is celebrated more and differently than just another one in a slide show.

Social Proof

This can work for career recruitment as well as potential clients. Either way, this is one of the most powerful types of content that exist. Because this content is the voice of your audience and they can speak to the things you can't - specifically the value that they got from working with you.

Are you familiar with the concept of conformity bias or peer pressure. It's the tendency to change one's beliefs or behavior to fit in with others. Like if you're out to dinner with two other friends whether or not you go in on dessert may directly impact your decision.

This same force is at work with testimonials. It takes something that is unknown, abstract and scary, and it turns it into something that other similar folks like you are getting real value from.

5 Things to include with your testimonial:

1. Headline
2. Testimonial Quote
3. Photo of the Person
4. Person Name + Title
5. Client Name or Logo

Getting testimonials from Senesitve Clients

This can be a challenge no doubt. We hear and experience this a lot. Sometimes the work is sensitive and the project or results just cannot be shared. In situations like this, you can anonymize the quote by using initials, first name only and industry.

If you're not sure how to get testimonials from sensitive clients - here is how Varonis, a US security company got an anonymous testimonial from a Casino client of theirs who had been hacked.

But you definitely can't get them if you don't ask. 

Project Stats

This is one of my favorite topics because it is an easy win for bringing something different to your commercial construction case study. But maybe go beyond the standard stats like:

• Number of awards won
• Years of experience in the industry
• Total Sq Feet
• Tons of concrete

Stats like that remind me of the economist Theodore Levvit’s quote: 

 “People don't want to buy a quarter-inch drill. They want a quarter-inch hole.” 

The same could be said for construction. People don’t want 2,000 tons of concrete; they want a parking facility that accommodates their client's or patient's needs. They don't want to hire a construction firm. They want the thing that hiring a construction firm gets them - A century's worth of experience to build quicker, leaner, and more efficiently, and get groundbreaking creative problem-solving.

What's in it for them?

What if you thought about it from their point of view? What do your visitors hope to achieve - you can speak to the things that they might have a risk aversion to or that they didn't even think were possible:

• Number of dollars saved through your recommendations
• Timeline reduced by x number of months because of your recommendations/solutions
• Percent of the building that is off the grid or some other LEED-related stats
• Maybe this is the 1st Building in this city built with green concrete 
• Number of tradespeople from the community that worked on this

Or maybe include some other qualitative stats that can’t easily be measured. 

And with minimal design, you can take a stat from simply existing to really standing out.

Which number is bigger? Technically they're exactly the same.

Highlight your People

Feature your team members in case studies to show off your company's talent and expertise.

Commercial construction companies often say they have the best people, but they rarely put their team members in the spotlight on case study pages. This is a missed opportunity to showcase your company's talent and expertise to potential new team members or clients.

Highlighting your team members in case studies can help you:

• Build trust and credibility with potential clients.
• Demonstrate your company's commitment to quality.
• Show off your team's skills and experience.
• Attract top talent to your company.

Of course, there is some risk involved in featuring your team members in case studies. For example, other construction companies might try and poach them on Linkedin. However, it's safe to assume that every company is already doing this.

Here is a list of questions to kickstart employee thought leadership in your commercial construction case studies. 

Here are some additional benefits of featuring your team members in case studies:

• It can help you improve your employee morale. When team members see their work featured in case studies, it can make them feel valued and appreciated.
• It can help you attract new talent. When potential employees see that your company values its team members, they will be more likely to want to work for you.
• It can help you build your brand. When you feature your team members in case studies, you are essentially putting a human face on your company. This can help you build a stronger connection with potential clients and future team members.

So, if you're looking for a way to showcase your company's talent and expertise, consider featuring your team members in case studies. It's a great way to build trust and credibility and really stand out.

Call to Action

Sales pages often stop right before they let visitors know what to do next. This would be like not including the way finding signage after you finish the final build outs of a building.

This is a missed opportunity to convert a lead into a potential candidate or new client.

Especially in commercial construction, organizations tend to look at their website as a brand or marketing tool only.  With very little work, it can become an equal parts sales tool with very little work.

A great CTA can make all the difference in whether or not a visitor takes the next step and contacts you. Here are a few tips for writing a compelling CTA for your commercial construction website case study pages:

• Make it relevant to the page. The CTA should be relevant to the content of the case study page. For example, if the case study is about a recent project you completed, the CTA could be something like "Let's Build Together" or "Ready to Work Together?" 
• Be personal and inviting. The tone of your CTA should be personal and inviting. You want to make it easy for visitors to reach out to you.
• Make it a gentle nudge. You don't want to be too pushy with your CTA. You want to give visitors the opportunity to contact you on their own terms.

So, if you're looking for a way to increase your improve your lead generation, consider writing a compelling CTA for your website case study pages. To be clear and let visitors know what to do next.

The Ultimate Construction Case Study is Within Reach

The biggest challenge is knowing what to produce. Once you have the list, you can focus on planning out the essential case study content you can create and start planning what it will take to produce that next-level content that will make your case studies stand apart.

Your website and digital case studies will never replace your sales reps or your best recruitment team members, but it can match and mirror them and, best of all, be working 24/7. 

The most effective ones will:

• Use compelling or engaging titles 
• Provide exciting mouth-watering visuals
• Use clear and concise paragraphs
• Answer common questions 
• Offer examples and share stories from everyone involved
• Provide options for moving forward

A couple of things you could include or leave out

These last items are common elements on commercial construction case study pages. And they often don't take much work to add because your website developer can create a content section in the case study template page that pulls in any similarly tagged projects, but we have seen these on a lot of websites over the years in different ways and have not seen enough data that shows them as a distraction or tool for engagement.

1. Related Articles & Case Studies
   It is fantastic if you have gone deeper into the project's storytelling via in-depth articles or news stories. Or if you have a lot of other projects of that type, why not find a way to weave that into the website case study so visitors can get a glimpse of it on the page.
    
2. Social Sharing Icons
   It's doubtful that someone will share a case study on social media. Yet this is something that you see and is definitely a mistake. If you have social media icons on that page, try running that page's URL through SharedCount, or Buzzsumo to see if that page has ever been shared. Chances are high that the social sharing icons are just digital clutter.

Building commercial-grade structures and everything that goes into them can be such an abstract concept, so the more you can share, the better you can help demonstrate your expertise, but remember more is not always better.