Image via Garrison Everest
When Actors land a role to play, they need to memorize their lines but for their delivery to be believable, they need to become the character. Actors become the character they play by doing research. This research is conducted by: reading books/watching videos about the life of the character, conducting interviews with the real life person if they are alive and/or meeting with people who knew them.
From this research, actors can identify the strengths, weaknesses, challenges and pain points in this persons life; all of which can help them successfully become this person.
How this Research is applied to Customer Marketing
Successful Marketers have to conduct similar research to identify their target customer. For Marketing to be successful, businesses must understand their target market; analyzing their ideal customer similar to what Actor need to do.
To analyze this ideal customer, businesses need to do research to understand the life of their ideal customer. The result of this research is known as a Buyer Persona. According to research conducted by MarkteingSherpa: Marketers generated 171 % more revenue as result of using buyer personas.
According to research by the Buyer Persona Institute in 2016:
1.27% of businesses have no buyer persona
2. 44% of businesses have a buyer persona
3. interest in having buyer personas is growing as 29% of businesses surveyed said will have them in the next year.
Creating a Buyer Persona
A buyer persona is a guide to understanding the needs, challenges and pain points of customers.
Questions to ask
What are these customer’s habits?
What concerns, needs and challenges do they have?
What actions are customers taking to address their needs and challenges?
Why do customers need to take these actions?
This question may be applied to multiple action steps described in Hooked by Nir Eyal as the 5 Whys.
What makes them want to buy?
Where do they look for information?
What type of content and medium do they use access the information?
What days and times are they most likely to look for information and consume content?
It is important to note that businesses with multiple products and more than one target market will need to create buyer personas for each ideal customer.
image via Content Marketing Institute /Bigstock
Where to obtain information on the Ideal Customer
1. Interview current customers and prospects.
2. Send out targeted surveys via email, direct mail and on Social Networks. Offer incentives such as gift cards and discounts to encourage people to provide the information needed.
3. Read biography and history books about your ideal customer.
4. Study the news.
5. Study existing research conducted by Market Research firms.
Building buyer personas will result in:
1. Creating and implementing better and more targeted product messaging and communication
2. Getting the product in front of customers who truly will benefit from its use
This is how to create a Buyer Persona.
How are you using your buyer personas? Comment below.
Article sources & images
MarketingSherpa.com/intecnic.com
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About the Author
Dan is passionate about using Marketing to help businesses drive sales. Hubspot Certified in Inbound Marketing, Dan has worked on various marketing assignments including a Start Up, Political Campaign & a Digital Marketing Conference.
Prior to teaching, Dan served customers as an Outside Sales & Marketing Rep in NYC. In this role, he taught & trained Dentists on the company’s products & services using a consultative selling approach combined with direct marketing. He also supported the company’s marketing efforts at industry trade shows.
He writes & publishes a business blog on the topics of Sales, Marketing & Social Media entitled Sales, Marketing & Social Media Today; which has grown to over 13,000 followers on LinkedIn & over 8,000 on WordPress.
Dan is seeking a full time marketing role in Direct, Inbound, Digital, Content & Social Media Marketing. If your company is hiring for roles in these areas, contact him directly via a free LinkedIn Message or email him at Dan@DanGalante.com to set up interviews.
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