Finding the right customer is often a matter of experience and money, but what if it’s not? At Upward Consulting, finding the perfect customer is only a simple strategy away. This one strategy that we are referring to is the use of user personas.
User personas are the perfect tool for any business to succeed in finding leads and conversions. This is because user personas are a summary of the ideal customer, and an effective representation of who would buy something from you. In this blog we will look into the method of user personas, how to make them and why you should make them.
What are User Personas?
User personas are clever iterations of an imaginary customer that reflects what a real customer would look like. An accurate user persona will iterate who the customer is, their needs and wants. It will also identify how they came about your business as well as other minor bits of information. Brands use this information to adjust their strategies and optimise conversion rates.
User personas are especially useful in the realm of SMM (social media marketing). This is due to the high volume of internet traffic that is constantly consuming media. The more media consumed the harder it is to be recognised among competitors. This is why it is vital to construct realistic and useful user personas that can help you reach the right customers. The ultimate benefit of user personas in SMM is found in paid advertising. This is because it has always been important to know who you are paying to reach with your content.
Why User Personas Matter
Understanding the needs of your audience
Creating tailored content
With a deepened understanding of your audience, you are now able to properly curate content tailored to your clients. Content that is made specially for your target audience shows a sense of professionalism and care for the audience. Further more, the content itself will be more meaningful and effective in fulfilling its purpose.
Maximising ROI
Now that you have both a understanding of your audience and content to boot, you will now have to maximise your ROI. Your ROI also known as return on investment is the summation of your success with the given strategy. A good user persona will greatly increase your ROI if done right. This is due to your products and services now being curated for the perfect customers that should be willing to make a purchase. Furthermore ROI will increase due to a decrease in ineffective marketing, now that you know how to strategise.
All three of these areas are vital finding success through the use of user personas. Having a understanding of what matters to your ideal customer, curating to those needs and wants and making use of the improved ROI is the general formula for success in marketing.
How to Create User Personas
Creating a user persona doesn’t have to be such a daunting thought. There are a variety of tools online that simplify the process of making a persona that is meaningful. These tools are often free and have a variety of different benefits to using one over the other.
- Hubspot – Make My Persona Tool
Hubspot is a go to for many small business and large businesses alike with their plethora of well thought tools. The Make My Persona Tool is a great tool that has a great method of collecting information through questions that create informed summaries of who your ideal audience is. This is done through questions about personalised information like, demographics, goals, challenges and more.
- User Forge
Though User Forge is one of the many sites that source user personas, it is done from a unique angle. User Forge makes use of AI to draw data that is as relevant and effective as possible to create user personas with minimal effort on your part. The AI still however needs to be prompted with some information that you believe to construct a deal breaker within a customers mind.
- Xtensio – Persona Creator
Xtensio is a large repository of useful templates that allow you to create highly customizable user personas. There are a variety of templates to choose from, each varying in complexity and relevance. There are large amounts of templates available but it should be kept in mind that some templates are paywalled behind a subscription.
These are the main mediums for creating user personas at a short notice. However it should always be kept in mind that demographic research should always be conducted in order to gather information.
Demographic research should seek out key data like, age, sex, and behaviours. These key data points should include identifying characteristics that set apart what works and what doesn’t. SEMRush is an incredibly useful tool that can help businesses track their social media success and improve on their current strategies.
Tips for Creating Effective User Personas
Effective data collection
One of the biggest mistakes and missed opportunities is not making use of data when creating user personas. The whole premise of a user persona is knowing who your ideal customer is and how they typically behave. That’s why you should make every effort to accurately identify your already existing customers and filter the traits that make an ideal customer.
Don’t Make Assumptions
When creating a realistic user persona, its vital to never make assumptions. The reason being that people are complex individuals that don’t act the same way all of the time. For this reason you should always create informed descriptions of your ideal customer using actual evidence rather than what you think.
Revisit your Personas Regularly
An effective strategy is constantly reviewed and altered in order to keep up with the changes within its marketing sphere. This is due to the constantly changing needs and wants of audiences that lose interest in certain topics and services relatively quickly. You can make the process of staying up to date much simpler by creating a schedule planner for quarterly updates on user personas.
Conclusion
User personas are vital to just about any marketing strategy that you can think of if you really want it to be successful. This is because it does so much more than just create a deeper understanding of your target audience. User personas also help make your content creation process much more efficient and effective. Ultimately, all of these improvements and benefits manifest in increased ROI. So make sure you use the tools mentioned and implement our key tips for creating and maintaining effective user personas.
Still can’t wrap your head around user personas? Why not have a team of professionals do it for you, give Upward Consulting a call and watch as your business grows.
