Buyer Persona
is the first step for company’s #inbound #Marketing strategy. Get the buyer
persona right and the strategy falls into place automatically. Get the persona
wrong and the marketing strategy will lose the foundation to deliver results.
Strategy will not withstand through the thunders and storms of market.
So, in my
previous blog I explained why Buyer Persona is essential for any and every type
of organization. In this blog, we will see how to develop a buyer persona.
Buyer
Persona is nothing but the resume/profile of an ideal customer. It has to be
built from extensive research.
Here are
the 5 rules marketing must follow to develop persona. It is also called as User
persona, customer persona or buyer persona.
- Begin with your existing customer: Your existing customer’s database can lead you to know how your ideal customers would generally be. It will give you the idea about:
- What is the profession of buyer
- What is the age group
- What need drove them to buy the product
- What keeps them up at night
- How they are judged socially
- Their emotional drivers
Best way to begin is not by analysing data but interviewing the customer himself. The insights from at least 5 – 10 customers will give clear understanding of why and how.
- Analyse Social Sites: Analyse groups, discussion forums, Linkedin profiles and any other places where target audience frequently visits. The interactions/observations will lead you to understand which channels are viable to reach out to them. It will also give you the perspective around ‘WHY’. If your target audience is not digital savvy then look for community groups, gatherings, social engagements to analyse them.
- Research Research and Research: It’s the only Mantra when you are developing buyer persona. Talk to Prospects, talk to those who denied being your customers. Even furious customers would give insights on which expectations were not met by your product. This will tell you what should be avoided in the messaging or what should specifically be targeted.
- Competition: It’s fine to look at competitors. What’s working for them and what is not. This will help you to decide which way to go. Analysing how the persona messaging is or from where the traffic to website is coming will lead you to create a better persona. Or if your audience is not computer savvy then simply observing why there are lot of walk-ins to the competitor’s stores would also give you insights!! More the observation, better the insights to build persona.
- Revisit persona every quarter: Revisit and confirm whether the persona that you have developed is relevant to current market situation. Check whether the messaging you have developed considering the persona is yielding profits. And make edits wherever needed.
Here is a quick example of buyer persona
developed for a health application company whose target customer is a frequent
flyer.
 |
| Buyer Persona Example |
If you are looking to develop a Buyer Persona
for your company, try Hubspot
for free templates or simply start adding information by answering 20 questions
on
