Target group was yesterday, buyer persona today

Every salesperson in a store knows it and, in their heart of hearts, the online communicator already knows it too: the definition of a “target GROUP” falls short. A product is always chosen by a HUMAN who has questions, sees advantages and disadvantages, is undecided, has to take general conditions into account – and so on. None of this can be applied to a group when presenting a product. We communicate and interact with individuals or at least with types, explain special features, answer different questions and encourage decisions from completely different points of view.

Modern online and content marketers act according to this principle: product-centered one-way communication becomes a customer-centered sales and service interaction.

Buyer persona: It all starts with crucial questions

The beginning of a content marketing campaign is therefore not the flowery and beautiful description of the product or offer, but the consideration from a completely different perspective:

• Who is your customer?
• What motivates him?
• What questions and ideas does he have?
• What are his biggest challenges?
• How does he inform himself?
• Where do they get their inspiration from, who influences their purchasing decisions?

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You create a “persona”, which from now on will partly determine your communication measures. Based on the questions, wishes and requirements of this person, the content of your online campaign is produced, offers written, search terms defined, guides and checklists written. In this way, the user repeatedly comes across your brand, your products and your images – and the path to a click & buy or to a trusted retailer becomes shorter and shorter. Let’s take a furniture brand, for example: who buys a kitchen, which different personae should suppliers in this area focus on? Only then is it decided what the brand has to offer these potential buyers and how it could fulfill their wishes and needs.

You choose the personae yourself, because you know best who your products are suitable for and which customers you want to reach.

You can find a small guide with questions to help you develop the personae here: http://www.makemypersona.com/. We will look at the typical phases of the online or buyer’s journey, websites and SEO as well as some tips in the next parts of our series.

• Customer Journey
• SEO, SEA and the right offers on your website
• Influencer Relations

If you would like to have these questions answered – adapted to the specific issues of an individual market area – click here for the e-book.