So how do you get closer to your customers? How do you understand what their needs and wants are? How do you make sure that your targeting the right customer that will help grow your business? Enter the Buyer Persona!
Buyer personas are fictional, generalised representations of your ideal customers. They help you understand your customers (and prospective customers) better, and make it easier for you to tailor content to the specific needs, behaviours, and concerns of different groups.
The strongest buyer personas are based on market research as well as on insights you gather from your actual customer base (through surveys, interviews, etc.). Depending on your business, you could have as few as one or two personas, or as many as 10 or 20. (Note: If you’re new to personas, start small! You can always develop more personas later if needed.)
Buyer personas are created through research, surveys, and interviews of your target audience. That includes a mix of customers, prospects, and those outside of your contact database who might align with your target audience.
The first step is to gather your persona data and as businesses, we are very lucky to have plenty of resources to utilise. Here are some practical methods for gathering the information you need to develop personas:
So you've got the methods, now it's time to create your persona.
When forming your ideal persona it’s recommended to look at the following areas to build a picture of your customer:
So that's the areas, it's now time to delve into your customer persona, asking plenty of questions, leaving no stone unturned!
So where do you start? What questions do you ask? Don't worry, we have plenty of questions to help you below. In addition, you can download a 4-slide template to organise your persona data (using these questions) below this blog.
1) What is your job role? Your title?
2) How is your job measured?
3) What does a typical day look like?
4) What skills are required to do your job?
5) What knowledge and tools do you use in your job?
6) Who do you report to? Who reports to you?
7) In which industry or industries does your company work?
8) What is the size of your company (revenue, employees)?
9) What are you responsible for?
10) What does it mean to be successful in your role?
11) What are your biggest challenges?
12) How do you learn about new information for your job?
13) What publications or blogs do you read?
14) What associations and social networks do you participate in?
15) Describe your personal demographics (if appropriate, ask their age, whether they're married or if they have children).
16) Describe your educational background. What level of education did you complete, which schools did you attend, and what did you study?
17) Describe your career path. How did you end up where you are today?
18) How do you prefer to interact with vendors (e.g. email, phone, in-person)?
19) Do you use the internet to research vendors or products? If yes, how do you search for information?
20) Describe a recent purchase. Why did you consider a purchase, what was the evaluation process, and how did you decide to purchase that product or service?
Finally, pick a name for your persona i.e. HR Manager Helen, Architect Alan, etc. and a stock facial image to add context and reality to your persona. HubSpot have a number of royalty-free images that you can use and download.
So you now know that buyer personas are important for your business, but how do you start researching and creating these personas from scratch?
Our free, customisable buyer persona ebook will let you easily organise your research to create your very own buyer personas.
With this ebook you can learn best practices for persona research and create thorough, detailed buyer personas that you can share with your entire company.
Contact Atlanticus Digital today to see how we can get you started on your quest to gain more qualified leads.