Case Study: American Express doubles engagement and builds a storytelling engine for small business owners with Contently

How Amex Turned Small Business Saturday Into a Storytelling Machine

American Express launched the OPEN Forum to grow its small‑business owner audience by educating rather than selling, turning Small Business Saturday into a content initiative. The challenge was scaling a full editorial operation while finding enough high‑quality creatives to produce substantive, relevant stories.

Amex staffed its editorial team with experienced Contently writers and expanded to multimedia creators and longform feature writers to tell more sophisticated stories. The effort produced ~2,000‑word pieces that doubled engagement time per article, effectively turning the program into a high‑impact storytelling engine.

American Express

Carrie Parker

Director