The research report redesign that turned a family office survey into a lead engine

A merchant bank and a private equity firm had the data and the insight. They needed a report family offices would open, read and reply to.

At a glance

Family offices surveyed

75+

Content as written, design rebuilt from the first page to the last.

ContentKept as written
DesignRebuilt
DistributionThe firms’ opening move
LeadsFlowing

Objective

Qualified family office leads

The report as the firms’ opening move

Two firms

One publication

Reads as a single authored piece

Client

US merchant bank and European private equity firm, co-publishing a research report on family offices and private markets

Family offices
Private markets

Scope

Design only
Visual system
Layout
Data visualisation

The challenge: strong research that looked like a survey export

The content

A survey of 75+ family offices on allocations, direct deals, syndicates and governance, with insights from two firms that have worked with over 300 of them.

The problem

It looked like a survey export: dense pages, charts straight from the survey tool, two logos on the cover and no reason to keep scrolling.

The brief

Make a family office principal stop, read and want the conversation, with the content kept exactly as written.

What we learned: why research reports fail to generate leads

Most reports get skimmed for thirty seconds and filed. The numbers explain why.

50%+ of decision-makers get no valuable insight from the thought leadership they read
45% lose respect for a firm that puts out subpar content
55% abandon content that fails to engage within the first minute
71% prefer short-form, so a report has to work as a two-minute skim

Sources: Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact studies, 2017 (50%+, 45%, 71%) and 2021 (55%).

And most reports are designed for the author: every finding at the same weight, charts that need a legend, pages that read like a Word file.

What makes a report convert, and how this one does it

73% of decision-makers trust thought leadership more than marketing, and 45% say it led them to award business. Design is what makes it land.

Sources: Edelman-LinkedIn B2B Thought Leadership Impact studies, 2024 (73%) and 2017 (45%).

Visible authorship and rigour.
One publication from two firms, with a cover that looks like it came from a house family offices trust.
Insight in the reader’s language.
Findings for family offices, in their numbers and their language, with the headline figure large on every page.
One point per page.
Front-line insights like the co-investment deal funnel, laid out so each spread reads in a single pass.

What we did: design only, from the cover to the contact page

The content stayed as written. The design was rebuilt from the first page to the last.

Visual system
A restrained palette, editorial typography and full-bleed photography, with both firms’ identities in one system.
Data design
Every finding got one visual: the headline percentage large, the chart built to carry the point without a legend.
Hierarchy and pacing
A skim path: summary, findings as spreads, insights with imagery, quotes as breathing room, and a contact page.
Readability
Dense paragraphs broken into findings, key numbers pulled out, and margins that let each page read in one pass.
Built to be forwarded
A partner can send it to a family office contact, and the first spread does the selling.

Results

Lead flow from distribution onward: the report became the firms’ opening move with family offices
2 firms, one publication that reads as a single authored piece
Content untouched, design rebuilt from the first page to the last