You know your own business, and you’re an expert on the products or services that you offer…but how much do you actually know about your customers? Do you have a detailed understanding of the types of people who buy from you, and why they do? Are you using those details to inform the messaging on your website and marketing materials to speak to specific types of prospects? If not, it’s time to create some buyer personas.
What Are Buyer Personas?
Buyer personas are in-depth example profiles of your ideal customer that outline their personal and professional demographics, daily life, challenges, and goals. Once developed, these profiles will help you build more successful marketing strategies around specific types of buyers and their needs. Accurate and effective buyer personas are not created through guesswork, but through knowledge of past customer experiences and both internal and external research.
Depending on your business and what products or services you offer, you may find that you have several different types of prospects, all requiring different buyer persona profiles. This is common, so don’t shy away from really diving in and detailing every type of persona…it’s worth the time it takes.
Why Should You Use Buyer Personas?
One major problem that can be solved with a well crafted set of buyer personas is the business that focuses their website content and marketing materials on themself and their products/services, rather than directly addressing specific customer interests. You may offer the best product or service in your industry, but if your prospect doesn’t immediately see how it can benefit them, why would they bother to keep moving through the purchasing process? This is a content delivery issue that is most common with businesses who know their own offerings much better than they know how to speak to their potential customers (tip: these prospects may not even know the details of what they’re looking for, and could need some education up front- and you need to know how to educate them before you lose them).
Another issue we come across often is the business that speaks to the wrong types of prospect in their content. Maybe a piece of content you’ve sent out in an email campaign highlights information that isn’t particularly relevant to one sector of your audience, but could help a different group of your prospects.. but you sent it to all of them anyway. Even though this information can be helpful to some, those who don’t find it useful might be inclined to ignore your future outreach. However, defining your buyer personas and using them to segment your contact lists allows you to send the right content to the right people, and can keep separate groups engaged.
Creating and learning your buyer personas will help you strengthen your customer targeting approach and center your efforts on the prospects who are most likely to purchase. With a better understanding of who your best customers are and what motivates them, you will be able to speak to their pain points and tailor your marketing content and communications specifically towards their objectives. All of which will lead to higher conversion rates and overall sales.
Need help creating your buyer personas or putting them to use? Contact us today to learn how we can help.
