When you have insights into what your buyers think about doing business with you, including verbatim quotes from people who have recently made the decision to solve a similar problem, you have the knowledge you need to align your marketing decisions — from positioning and messaging through content marketing and sales enablement – with your buyer’s expectations.
It is vitally important to understand not only market trends, (i.e., your customer in big groups or as a demographic) but also to know your customers on an individual level. Your customers experience your product, service, and brand as an individual, and so this is the level at which you must reach them. You need to use every opportunity available to understand your existing or potential customers.
Take a moment right now to ask yourself a question: What does your ideal customer look like? If a clear image doesn’t spring to mind immediately, you have some work to do. Or, if you say, “Everyone who has a dog is my customer,” you have some mindset change and work to do. As Seth Godin says, “not everyone can be your customer”.
What gives every business its competitive advantage is that it meets specific customer needs. It’s impossible to be all things to all people. Your customer needs to feel like your business is in league with them.
You may want to cast your net wide, and there’s not necessarily anything wrong with that. But not knowing who your customer is to each exact detail is like shooting in the dark. You will spend a great deal of money, time, and other resources without getting clear results.
If, on the other hand, you know your customer intimately, you can use your resources more effectively in order to craft the right message that resonates and perfectly meets your customers’ needs. Buyer Personas help you understand your customers better. This makes it easier for you to tailor your messages, content, products and services to their specific needs, behaviors, and concerns.
Buyer Personas are essentially a representative of the type of buyer you have identified as having a specific interest in your organization or product
Buyer personas are not just about demographics. A well-designed persona reveals insight into how buyers buy and how you can reach this type of buyer with relevant, timely information. No longer can you rely on your or your employees opinions of what needs to be communicated to buyers without first knowing if it would resonate with your buyers.
Buyer Personas allow you to better understand the needs and wants of your customers. This allows to do a more efficient job of appealing to those specific desires. As you know, lead generation requires the tailoring of your marketing efforts toward the right people; Buyer Personas are a crucial tool in this.
You can use Buyer Personas to revitalize existing products, as well as coming up with problems and challenges in the marketplace that are not being adequately addressed.
By focusing your message to your target market, you’ll attract the right type of buyer, and not waste time with leads that you can’t nurture. By carrying out this research continuously, you’ll be able to keep meeting the needs of your market even as their needs change.
In other words, by understanding your customers at an intimate level, you can sell more and earn more profit with less effort. Your marketing will create a perfect match between you and your customers.
If launching your business, you’ll know where to start (with the customer and their needs). If expanding your business, you’ll know how to grow and stay relevant.
Copyright 2021 Terry H. Hill
Terry H. Hill is the Managing Partner of The Seaplace Group, LLC. is a veteran chief executive, his three-plus decades of work with business owners, executives, and employees of privately held companies have been instrumental in helping them deal with the challenges they face in each stage of their business life cycle. Terry is the author of the book, How to Jumpstart Your Business, a practical guide for down-to-earth answers to questions and challenges that every business owner and executive faces.
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