What are the top mistakes to avoid when creating customer personas?

You know that feeling when you're trying to put a puzzle together, but some pieces are missing? Our minds can't stand the empty spaces, so we jam in pieces that seem to fit, just to complete the picture. That's how our brains are wired when data is lacking. We fill the gaps with assumptions, stereotypes, "common sense" - anything to create a full story. This is a fundamental human tendency, but it must be fought when crafting personas. Otherwise your imagination, not real insight, shapes them and you may end up with fictional archetypes, richly detailed but factually hollow. Resist the urge to make presumptions and let the data, even if incomplete, guide you.

Useful tip - use an assumption bucket! If you are working with stakeholders literally draw a bucket and each assumption goes on a post-it and into the bucket. Then you can start to map them when they triangulate with other evidence and you feel more confident. Assumptions don't need to be negative they just need to be recognised for what they are. You will then see if your work is being driven by assumption or evidence. You will have clear hypothesis to test. Your personas will benefit hugely because this difficult questions are tackled early. Often they are brushed under the carpet and blurs who the target audience actually is.

Creating customer personas is essential for precise targeting and effective marketing. However, steer clear of these common mistakes: Assumptions: Base personas on data, not assumptions. Overgeneralization: Keep personas specific. Neglecting Research: Data-driven research is crucial. Ignoring Negative Personas: Don't overlook non-ideal customers. Stagnant Personas: Update personas as your audience evolves. Overloading Details: Find a balance between depth and simplicity. Homogeneity: Acknowledge differences within personas. Inadequate Feedback: Seek input from your team. No Validation: Validate personas with real customers. Accurate customer personas are the bedrock of effective marketing.

I think I would rephrase this to "Not Challenging Assumptions" because if you think of assumptions as similar to hypotheses, assumptions are unavoidable, and are actually important to grounding you. It's not realistic, especially for a small-mid sized business to avoid any assumptions when they are starting the business, or beginning a research project. But it is realistic to create a culture of challenging assumptions. In the early days, you might not know who your customers are, but you'll need to make some assumptions and guesses, and the challenge them through customer research. And you can continue to challenge those assumptions over the lifecycle of the business, product or service.

Building personas based only on assumptions rather than on real data can lead to inaccurate representations. Use actual customer data and research to inform your personas.

This happens when you are trying to please too many people. There is no clear strategy and really everyone is holding on to 'everyone' as their target audience. This is the big difference between engagement and demographic information representing the population and target audiences. There can be resistance and fear about excluding people which leads to an excessive number. One way to overcome is to work in phases. Get proof that 3-5 work and focus in on them. Hold requests for more in phase 2. Which is only looked at once phase 1 is delivered. By this point the magic of personas will be proven. And if you genuinely need to reach some missed audiences you have the systems.

Finding the right number of personas is like getting the ingredient mix just right when baking. Too many cooks and you overcomplicate the recipe. Too few and the final product falls flat. Start with a wide base of raw data and refine this down by combining similar segments and separating where more nuance is needed. Keep iterating until you land on the few archetypes that form your core customer base. Resist temptation to over-segment in a quest for precision while also avoiding broad strokes that miss important flavors. Find the balance that accurately reflects your real audience.

Having too many personas can be overwhelming and impractical. Focus on a manageable number of primary personas that truly represent your core audience.

To make your marketing strategy more insightful, focus personas on understanding what truly drives behaviours. Demographics may help categorize customers, but observing their behaviors and how they process information reveals more. Forget generalities based on age or income - instead, closely study how customers evaluate options and make decisions. Note how they seek, consume, and share information to understand what truly drives them. By digging into cognitive patterns over demographics, your personas will become multidimensional and your strategy sharper.

Look, as far as I'm concerned the mistake is making personas in first place. But if you're going to make that mistake, don't rely on demographics OR psychographics. The instances within which a person's hobbies and gender will give you real insight into what will motivate actual behavior change from them are very rare. If you have to pick a metric to segment people with, use motivation and a precise set of motivational drivers (e.g. enviornmental factors or context)

This just highlights the importance of collecting qualitative data, and not just quantitative. We have to find out what people think and feel, rather then reducing individuals to demographic tick boxes.

In my opinion, we should always put ourselves in the customer's shoes and act like them, and then act on the customer journey. This is the first step in figuring out what the customer wants from us, and we can create categories for characters and improve them.

Mistake 6: Not involving stakeholders Collaborate with different teams across your organization, such as marketing, sales, and customer support, to gather different perspectives and ensure that the personas align with the overall business strategy. Mistake 7. Treating personas as static Remember that personas should be dynamic tools that evolve alongside your business. Continuously gather feedback and update personas as needed to keep them accurate and impactful.