Heart Internet’s Tips in Ten

Marketing Personas

You’re just ten slides away from learning how

(and why) to develop marketing personas.

What are marketing personas?

Marketing personas (aka buyer personas) are fictional representations of your ideal customers.

In theory they are based on real data about customer demographics, online behavior, their buying goals, personal histories, motivations, and concerns.

In practice, for small businesses they also include personal experience and anecdotal evidence.

How do marketing personas help?

Persona

Where to advertise

The product to create

Pricing

Design

Tone of voice

Level of support

Creating a persona you can visualise makes developing a marketing strategy much easier.

Creating a persona

Segment the market

Target audience

Create persona

Creating a persona – segment the market

Bloggers < HomeHobbyists

Mid-sized ecommerce < Business

Large Ecommerce

Large design agency

(11+ staff)

< Creatives

Small design

agency (1-10 staff)

WYSIWYG users

First time website builders

Brochure website

Small Ecommerce

SOHO web

designers

Part-time

freelance

Creating a persona - target

Home based Hobbyist

Active bloggers Small businesses

SOHO designers IT services Start-ups

Power-users (e.g. developers)

SOHO designers Small design agencies

Sources of data to build persona

• Customer surveys (quantitative)

• Customer interviews (qualitative)

• Google consumer surveys

• Keywords used to find your website e.g. [{City} + {Product}]

• Sales and support team knowledge (They are at the coal face)

• Personal experience

• Google Analytics (device, time of day, interest categories etc.)

• Buyer persona research specialist companies

Paint a picture of the market and who your ideal customer is, what they value, and how your solution fits into their daily lives.

Creating a persona

<<Give the persona a name>>

BACKGROUND:

• What is the persona’s job?

• Key information about the persona’s company

• Relevant background info, like education or hobbies

DEMOGRAPHICS:

• Gender bias

• Age Range

• Income/ budget

• Geographic location (where applicable)

IDENTIFIERS:

• What specific mannerisms sets them apart?

Including a real photo from Creative Commons or iStockphoto helps everyone envision the same person.

Creating a personaGOALS:

• What is the persona’s primary goal?

• What is the persona’s secondary goal?

CHALLENGES:

• Primary challenge to persona’s success

• Secondary challenge to persona’s success

HOW WE HELP:

• How you solve your persona’s challenges

• How you help your persona achieve goals

REAL QUOTES:

• Include a few real quotes – from survey or interview–that represent your persona well. This will make it easier to relate to and understand your persona.

COMMON OBJECTIONS:

• Identify the most common objections your persona will raise during the sales process. Identifying common objections help to understand potential road-blocks and allows you to tailor marketing messages that address these.

MARKETING MESSAGING:

• How should you describe your solution to your persona?

ELEVATOR PITCH:

• Make describing your solution simple and consistent across everyone in your company.

SOHO designer DanBACKGROUND:• Experienced freelance web designer• Works alone• Small office, home office (SOHO) • Targets small businesses with small budget expectations

DEMOGRAPHICS:• Skews male• Aged early 20s to mid 30s

IDENTIFIERS:• Knowledgeable about the web• Quality and support are most important considerations• Online primarily during office hours• Small budget

Identify Dan’s goals, challenges, and what you can provide to help

him in a short series of bullet points.

Then create a marketing message and elevator pitch to showcase

your offerings in line with his needs and expectations.

Expand this further with your bigger marketing efforts. Marketing

personas allow you to create campaigns that attract, educate and

resonate with those potential buyers.

SOHO designer Dan