← The Marketing Station ~ dish 07 of 10 · the marketing station

Customer Story Drafting

A customer story is not a feature list wrapped in narrative. It's the change that happened because your work happened. The station can draft from recordings. The Chef decides if the story is true.

The job

You recorded a customer call. Forty minutes. They told you what changed. How they used the thing. What they tried first. Why it mattered. All the material is there. You just need to shape it into a story. The moment before. The change. The moment after. The reason someone else would read it.

The station can do the shaping. Listen to the recording. Pull the narrative. Reconstruct the arc. But the Chef has to review it. Did the station get the emotional truth right. Did it change any facts. Did it miss the actual insight the customer was trying to make. The Chef decides. Then the station revises. By the second draft, it’s usually right.

This is where Feedback Loop lives. The Chef tastes. The station updates. Over three or four customer stories, the pattern sharpens. By story five, the Chef is mostly approving because the station learned what emotional truth looks like at this company.

The recipe

All seven ingredients still apply. The leverage on this dish is Feedback Loop (Ingredient #7). Every story teaches the station what matters.

Training matters. House style. How narrative. How specific. How much personality. Examples matter. Show the station a customer story you wrote that landed with an audience. The one that got forwarded. The one that made someone reach out and say “that’s us.” The station will learn the shape.

Guardrails matter. Things you never do. You never exaggerate the result. You never gloss over the struggle. You never make the customer sound smarter or dumber than they are. Context matters. The customer recording. Notes on what changed. The business context of the change.

How to build it

  1. Conduct the customer interview. Record it. Let them tell the story. Forty-five minutes. Let them ramble. The good stuff is often in the tangent.
  2. Transcribe the relevant sections. Twenty minutes of transcript. The before. The problem. The thing you did or they did. The after. The learning.
  3. Pull a customer story you wrote that you’re proud of. One that got positive feedback. Note the structure. The voice. The pacing. How much personality. How specific on data.
  4. Define guardrails. “Never exaggerate results.” “Never gloss the struggle.” “Never make them sound different than they are.” 4-5 rules.
  5. Note the change in the business context. What was the number before. What is it now. This grounds the story.
  6. Feed the transcript, example story, guardrails, and business context to the station. Ask for a draft.
  7. Review the draft. Read it aloud. Does it sound like the customer. Did the station get the emotional truth. Did it miss any key points. Make notes.
  8. Mark the changes. Lines the Chef would rewrite. Points the station missed. Send the marked draft back to the station.
  9. The station revises. By draft two, it usually nails it because the feedback showed it what mattered.
  10. By story five, the Chef is mostly approving because the station learned the pattern.

What breaks it

  • No feedback loop. The Chef approves the first story without notes. The station has no data on what worked or what to improve. Story two is softer because there was no correction.
  • Example story is the wrong one. You pull a customer story that won awards, not one that customers actually forwarded or shared. The station learns the wrong thing. The drafts sound impressive and irrelevant.
  • Transcript is incomplete. The station gets thirty seconds of context and two minutes of the actual story. It’s missing the before. The emotional shift. The Why. The draft is flat because it didn’t have the material.
  • Chef reviews but doesn’t mark. You read the draft, you see it’s not quite right, you approve it anyway because it’s close enough. The station never learns what wasn’t right.

When it’s working

By story three, the Chef is spending 15 minutes on review, not 45. By story six, the first draft is usually right. By story ten, the station knows what emotional truth looks like at this company. The feedback loop has sharpened the recipe.

The signal that the recipe is sharp: a customer reads the story about them and says “you got it. That’s exactly what happened.” Not impressed. Recognized.

Monday Move

Find a customer who will record a call. Let them tell the story. What changed. Why it mattered. Record it. Transcribe the key sections. Then pull a customer story you wrote that landed well. Feed the transcript and example to the station. Ask for a draft. Review it. Mark the changes. Where the station got it wrong. Where it nailed it. Send the marked draft back. The station revises. By revision two, you have a story ready for publish. By story three, the process is tight.

Dish 7 of 10 on the Marketing Station. Build-note leverage: Feedback Loop (Ingredient #7). Chef stays in DIALING stance.