Buyer Persona Guide - Cook County Small Business Source

BuyerPersonaGuide Templates

Table of ContentsWhat are Buyer Personas?.03How to use Personas in Marketing,Sales, and Customer Service.04How to Make Buyer Personas.09Conclusion.15

What are Buyer Personas?Buyer Personas are fictional, generalizedrepresentations of your ideal customers.They help you understand your customers(and prospective customers) better, andmake it easier for you to tailor content tothe specific needs, behaviors, and concernsof different groups.The strongest buyer personas are based onmarket research as well as on insights you gatherfrom your actual customer base (through surveys,interviews, customer data, etc.). Depending onyour business, you could have a few personas ora lot of specialized personas — you can alwaysdevelop more later if needed.3

How to Use Personasin Marketing, Sales,and Customer ServiceThe first step is to craft your persona by asking specific questionsabout your ideal customer to find out as much as you can aboutwho they are and how they interact with your organization,in order to pinpoint how to make them a customer.At the most basic level, personas allow you topersonalize or target your marketing for differentsegments of your audience. For example, instead ofsending the same lead nurturing emails to everyonein your database, you can segment by buyer personaand tailor your messaging according to what youknow about those different personas. When utilizedcorrectly, buyer personas can allow you to producehighly targeted content that leads to a higher influxof new and repeat customers who are pre-qualifiedby data.Questions such as:Research from Single Grain showed thatcompanies who used buyer personas saw:What are their goals?What is their profession?What does a typical day in their life look like?Where do they go for information?How do they prefer to obtain goods and services?What is important to them when choosing a vendor?What do they value most? Websites were 2-5x more effective. Personalized emails had a 14% higherclick-through rate (CTR). Conversion rates were 10% higher.Creating a buyer persona offers you insightsinto the customer that you otherwisewouldn’t be privy to. Once you have yourpersona, share it with the marketing, sales,and customer service team to ensure thatyour entire organization has the same viewof your ideal customer.4

Buyer Personas for MarketingAlso known as “marketing personas,” it comes as no surprise that the focus of buyer personas isoften your marketing team due in large part to the wide range of insights you can achieve whencorrectly using a persona for marketing.Uses for buyer personasfor your marketing team include: Building effective content marketing strategiesby focusing keyword research efforts. Identify and prioritize the most relevantpromotional activities. Segment your email list by sending targetedoffers to buyers based on their preferences. Time your marketing campaigns for peakengagement rates. Publishing content and advertisements on thechannels (email, social media) most frequentedby your buyer persona. Align messaging to promote brand unity andincrease brand awareness.Source: SmartBug MediaThe following buyer persona is an example fromSmartBug Media of a buyer persona who is an advocate forsocial change, used by a mobile app company. By incorporatingboth tangible facts and emotional aspects of “Andy” themarketing team is able to gain a more complete view of whoAndy is and how he will act as a consumer. Personalize your marketing automation efforts. Refining your copywriting to reflect improvedSEO strategies.5

Buyer Personas for SalesKnowing your buyer is never more important than when you are selling to them. From the start ofevery potential customer interaction to the end of each successful one, the way in which you sell toa buyer is dependent on what you know about them from their buyer persona.To operate from a person-driven salesstrategy, use your buyer personas to: Craft emails, phone calls, and face-to-faceinteractions with potential buyers based ontheir persona. Help build rapport with potential customers Understand your prospective buyer on a deeperlevel that allows you to be better prepared toaddress their concerns. Guide the messaging sales representatives usewith customers. Educate your sales team on each differentpersona to prepare them to work with anytype of buyer. Teach sales representatives to better recognizethe unique pain points of each persona so theycan address them effectively. Increase win rates for your sales team.Source: MunroCheck out this buyer persona used by Munro. This buyerpersona goes the extra mile by including a fictionalized quotefrom the persona herself as well as actual quotes from pastMunro customers. The more details you include in yourpersonas, the better you are setting your teams up forsuccess in the long run.6

Buyer Personas for Customer ServiceJust because you’ve closed a sale doesn’t mean you have finished your relationship with your buyer.Oftentimes, what transitions a one-time buyer into a repeat customer is their interactions with yourorganization after they have made a purchase. To set your customer service team up for success,involve them in the buyer persona development process so they can tailor their customer servicemodel to each persona.To use this persona-driven strategy toimprove your customer service experience: Involve your customer service representativesin the buyer persona creation process to gaintheir invaluable insights. Gain a deeper understanding of the day to daylife of each persona. Reflect on how marketers and sales teams useeach persona to create a holistic approach toeach new customer. Train on the specific problems your customersare trying to solve to be better prepared tosolve them. Use empathy and compassion to best supportyour customers based on their persona.7

NEGATIVE PERSONASNegative personas are people who you don’t wantto use your product or service. They may be tooadvanced or too junior to be a good fit for yourcurrent goals or future growth strategy. In theexample on the right, a negative persona may besomeone who is an introvert who is not tech-savvy,since they wouldn’t benefit from their product orservice, and thus have a bad experience.Source: Fake CrowCheck out the above persona example from Fake Crow of a storemanager. By incorporating scales and bar graphics, they visuallyshow this buyer’s needs and personality in comparison to otherpotential buyers. This is a great way to add in negative personasfor your team to use.8

How to Make Buyer PersonasNow that you know the why behind creating buyer personas, it’s time for the how. In reality, a buyer persona isthe person you think about when you create content, respond to a support ticket, or try to speak a new prospect’slanguage. In practice, you can create customized slide decks outlining the motivations and challenges of yourideal buyer personas then easily share with all teams in your company.GOOGLE SLIDES TEMPLATESPOWERPOINT TEMPLATESInstructionsTo customize the templates in Google Slides, click the linkto open the Slides file. Then, click File Make a Copy tocreate your own, editable version of the slides, and replacethe prompts with your own buyer persona information.InstructionsTo customize the PowerPoint slides, click File Save As andrename the file to save a new version of the slides. Edit to yourcompany’s needs and delete any templates you don’t need tocreate a deck of your customized buyer personas.Download Google Slides TemplatesDownload PowerPoint TemplatesOnce you’ve created your own version ofthe templates on either Google Slides orPowerPoint, it’s time to start customizingto your company and needs.9

TEMPLATE 1General Buyer Persona 1Download Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template10

TEMPLATE 2General Buyer Persona 2Download Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template11

TEMPLATE 3B2B Marketing Buyer PersonaDownload Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template12

TEMPLATE 4B2C Advertising/Media Buyer PersonaDownload Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template13

TEMPLATE 5Sales Buyer PersonaDownload Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template14

TEMPLATE 6Technology/Product Buyer PersonaDownload Powerpoint TemplateDownload Google Slide Template15

HubSpot Users: You can add yourpersonas right in HubSpot and trackpersonas within the tool. Here’s how.ConclusionBuyer personas are a living document thatshould be continuously reviewed in order toallow it to grow and evolve alongside yourcompany. Creating effective buyer personastakes time and attention. By incorporating yourmarketing, sales, and customer service teams inthe persona development process you will gaina more complete view of each type of buyeryou will meet down the road.Ready to Scale YourMarketing Efforts?HubSpot has the tools you need to learn moreabout your target audience and existing customers,giving you actionable insights to grow better.HubSpot Marketing Hub features include:BlogSEOAd tracking managementSocial media managementCustomized reporting dashboardsMarketing analyticsGet started16

by your buyer persona. Align messaging to promote brand unity and increase brand awareness. Personalize your marketing automation efforts. Refining your copywriting to reflect improved SEO strategies. The following buyer persona is an example from SmartBug Media of a buyer persona who is an advocate for