Buyer Personas are used extensively by marketers and product managers to test and focus their product designs and customer communications. A persona is essentially an archetypal character who could become your fan or customer. More than just a demographic profile of your target audience, a persona is detailed and personalized, usually based on interviews with real customers.
Product managers use personas to prioritize their features and design their user interfaces. Marketers tailor communications and web pages to specific, segmented personas. Personas can help you understand who your audience is, what their needs are, and how, when and where to reach them. Copywriter Karen Goldfarb compares personas to mannequins for your product. Read more of her excellent tips on creating personas here.
Sounds kind of silly. Why should I bother?
This may seem contrived, particularly for musicians. Either people like your music or they don’t, right? Well, there are several benefits to this practice:
- You will learn a lot about your followers from the interview process. Creating personas will inspire you to dig deeper and get to know your customers and fans.
- Personas get you thinking about the real value of your product and the needs it meets.
- Even for a niche business there will be distinct types of people you are serving, who speak and live differently, hang out in different places, and get their information from different sources. Each group may use your products differently, in ways you may not even be aware of.
- You may ‘discover’ new product ideas as you get to know your customers and their needs.
- Artists have a potentially vast, international audience. Helping potential fans find you is an enormous challenge. Personas give you an idea where to look, and help you target your communications.
- For a small service business or product developer, personas can deepen your relationship with existing customers, strengthen your customer care programs, and humanize your sales strategies.
Have you used personas in your business? What’s working for you?
Photo courtesy of Brandon Fick
Thanks for the mention. Interesting use of personas for musicians. I’ll pass your advice on to my husband, who is a musician!
I think it can be helpful, particularly for musicians who have a niche appeal. We have a tendency to just throw our stuff out to the world and hope someone finds it! Thanks for your informative article. ~ej