A Hole-In-One ...
Would you ever play golf without aiming for a hole? Probably not. So why is your organization marketing without aiming for an ideal buyer?
Reaching the Right People As the owner of a small- to medium-sized company, your goals undoubtedly revolve around growth. In order to grow, you know you need to secure a presence in front of more people—and, to be specific, more of the right people. But we encourage you to ask yourself this question: Do you really know who the right people are? If you answered “yes,” it is important to understand that the people in your target market or a specific demographic do not necessarily qualify as the right people for receiving and recognizing your company’s message. Is your answer still “yes”? Perhaps the people you think you need to reach are not attending networking events like they have in years past. Maybe, like many business owners, you previously relied on referrals and introductions to secure leads, but lately these are few and far between. Nothing that you’re trying seems to be working, so you find yourself doubtful when it comes to new methods and strategies for marketing. So how can you start reaching the right people?
A Hole-In-One for Marketing We have some news for you: your problem has less to do with finding the right method to use or the proper distribution channel to try, and more to do with knowing your buyer. If you don’t already know your buyers, where they are, when they are, and what they care about, you’ll have a difficult time choosing the right distribution channels and, more importantly, distributing the right message. The solution to your company’s problem and the prevention of further problems in the future lies with the development of a buyer persona. Here, we will tell you what a buyer persona is and is not and how a buyer persona can benefit your business. You will also learn how to tell whether a buyer persona approach is right for you, and what steps you can take toward the development of this invaluable resource.
The Buyer Persona: The Tool You Didn’t Know You Needed A buyer persona can be the tool that you didn’t know you needed—the missing piece in every business owner’s toolbox. So what is it? Let’s begin by explaining all of the things a buyer persona is NOT, in order to better understand later what a buyer persona IS.
A Target, But Not Your Target Market As we said before, a buyer persona is very different from a target market, and this is important to recognize. Your target market is the specific division of the total population on which you focus your energy to achieve your profit goals. Target markets are made up of descriptive traits such as demographics, psychographics, and behaviors; this information is gathered using historical data, trend-spotting, and customer research. Buyer personas, on the other hand, are created on a more individual and personal scale; their data points include story lines such as priorities, successes, obstacles, and hopes. A buyer persona is also different from a demographic. In fact, a successful, thorough buyer persona includes demographic information but actually goes much deeper. Think about it; if you were to write something personal such as an autobiography, you would certainly include your own demographic information—your age, sex, relationship status, education, career, where you live, etc.—to provide background for the events of your life. But this information is pretty superficial, and barely even begins to tell your whole story. Buyer personas dive way below the surface information.
The Whole Story A buyer persona is essentially a fictional character in your company’s marketing story, with all of the same goals, needs, and pain points as your real life, ideal buyer. It is an in-depth understanding of how buyers come to make a purchase: what motivates them to think about buying, what they see as barriers to purchasing, and what they consider to be a successful purchase.
These are some of the insights that a thorough, successful buyer persona could provide you with:
? You will have an understanding of your buyers’ priorities, the problems in their lives to which they dedicate their time and energy.
? You’ll know what kind of rewards and benefits your buyer attributes with success.
? You’ll discover why your ideal buyer might choose a competitor’s solution over yours.
? You will uncover the precise steps and the exact process that your buyers go through when they are exploring their options and selecting a product or service.
? You can dive into the specific ways in which your buyers choose to make their final purchasing decisions, whether this involves online searches, past experiences, conversations with friends and family, or social media messaging.
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Buyer personas help you understand the impetus behind the decision-making process of your buyers, providing you with valuable information about how, why, when, and where your buyers choose to invest their money. This information will help you determine which distribution channels might be most effective for reaching your buyers and converting visitors into leads. Buyer personas also allow you to tailor your content to address your buyers’ needs, in order to create a unique message that will draw in and keep your buyers’ attention.
The Negatives are Positive The development of a buyer persona often involves interviewing a sample of people who represent your ideal buyer. This includes having conversations with people who don’t love you—sales that you’ve lost. Sometimes what these people have to say can be difficult to hear, but these negative comments are very helpful in determining the needs of your buyer and expanding your exposure. Sometimes, the development of a negative buyer persona can also be beneficial. A negative buyer persona characterizes the people who are NOT your ideal buyers, so that you can better understand the ones who ARE your ideal buyers (just as we explained what buyer personas are not, in order to better grasp what they actually are). Many times, with buyer persona work, the negatives can produce positive effects.
Overwhelmed? We said it once and we’ll say it again: buyer persona development is a very complex process. We’re not trying to scare you—well, maybe a little. If you feel that your company doesn’t have the resources or expertise to successfully and thoroughly develop the buyer persona that will turn your marketing strategy around, consider contracting with a third party. In fact, we highly discourage you from trying to develop your company’s first buyer persona on your own. Many outside agencies offer help with buyer personas, and some will even create a persona for you. These experienced, knowledgeable agencies can give you the effective, objective, insightful information that you are looking for from a buyer persona—the information that can transform your company and redirect your marketing strategy.
Any opinions expressed are those of the authors.
Published by?#NHGBe?2022-08-09 -Be-Time 11:30 AM?
Copyright free excerpt from source: Buyer Personas: How the Best Kept Secret in Marketing Will Totally Disrupt Your Strategy by Hello Marketing
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Hope you're doing well,
Paul Van den Brande
Founding Father
Noble House Group - Be! Featuring #NHGBe
We Never Forget You Have A Choice!
Bachelor of Commerce - BCom from Nizam College at Hyderabad Public School
2 年????
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2 年Thanks, Paul Van den Brande, for explaining this very important point. I totally agree, as you can see in the one-minute video I posted (coincidentally) at 3:00 yesterday ("great minds think alike"): https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/buddyhodges_connections-targetmarketing-rightpeople-activity-6963210992470081536-r2U1?utm_source=linkedin_share&utm_medium=member_desktop_web P.S., I hardly ever post one of my links in a comment on another's post, but the relevance struck me.
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2 年From my own experience Paul I know how often this is overlooked by business owners and agencies and how important it is. ?? Whilst I had many years as a successful business developer digital marketing was becoming an increasing disruptor to the traditional customer and sales journey. This disruption was brought into stark reality when working on a business development project for a startup idea last decade. Digital marketing, despite the hype and marketing agency promises, was not delivering the results anticipated. Researching I discovered keyword research, competitor research and buyer personas etc. All part of marketing fundamentals as I called it, or marketing strategy as it's known. This discovery was an epiphany and has become an important and essential element in my business development skill set. Of course, as a salesperson, I have always known how to prospect but to effectively prospect and to utilise the full power of marketing it's essential to create buyer personas to understand who, what, where, when, why and how to reach them. One tip I'd recommend. For B2B opportunities there is likely to be more than one person in the buying decision so make sure you create personas for all those people??