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Create Helpful B2B Personas in 5 Steps

A persona is a tool of the customer journey and helps to get to know your target group better. A sound target group analysis is the basis for customer centric marketing.

What's a Persona?

Personas, or buyer personas, are fictitious characters that represent a target group. The goal of personas is to get a detailed insight into the everyday life of the target group and to be able to estimate the reactions to different marketing and sales measures.

A persona should be as close to reality as possible, but not describe a specific person you know. A persona embodies a whole group and its characteristics.

Once a persona has been created, any content and processes can be tested on the persona.

Examples

  • Does persona A need support with topic X?

  • Does product feature Z help persona A achieve her goal?

Create B2B Persona

Creating one or more personas creates a common understanding of the target audience across different departments and helps create a consistent communication and customer journey. We show you how to create a meaningful persona in five steps.

Step 1: Persona Information

The first step is to provide the persona with name and personal information (name, role, company, age, private situation). This information helps to better imagine the persona and to clarify specific questions regarding the target group in the future.

Furthermore, the environment of the persona is analysed. By whom is the persona influenced and whom does it influence itself? Especially with regard to B2B companies, the entire buying center plays a central role.

It is therefore worthwhile to analyze exactly what dynamics prevail within the buying center of your target companies and which decision-makers influence each other and how.

This information helps to assess the status of the persona in their professional and private environment.

Optimally, a persona is created for each target group category. This way, each group can be specifically addressed with the right messages via the appropriate channels.

Tip: Realistic names create proximity. So rather use names like Nicolas Baumgartner than Markus Marketing.

Step 2: Goals and Tasks

In the second step, the goals and tasks of the persona are recorded. A distinction is made between two levels: professional and personal.

The professional level includes all topics that are directly related to the professional role of the persona. For example, the company and team goals.

The personal goals describe the persona's intentions with indirect impact on the professional role. These include, for example, status within (and outside) the company or new skills for personal development.

Examples

  • Professional: Increase in sales and more converted leads

  • Personal: status as an initiator of change

Step 3: Support for Goal Achievement

Step 3 is about finding out what makes it easier for the persona to achieve the goals. The focus here is on the persona's own perspective.

Support should identify what shortcuts and reinforcers the persona would like to see on the path to goal achievement.

This way, the persona's expectations can be matched with the functionalities of the product or service.

Examples

  • How can the persona save time or costs?

  • Where can synergies be used?

  • What does the persona enjoy about the implementation?

Step 4: Challenges and Hurdles

Step 4 puts the focus on the hurdles and stumbling blocks that stand in the way of the persona achieving their goals. Again, this is about the persona's perspective.

What aspects are causing the persona headaches and challenging the persona? To what extent do hurdles within the buying center also show up at this point?

As with step 3, these points can then be compared with the product portfolio.

Examples

  • Where do costs & effort arise?

  • What skills and resources does the persona lack?

  • What causes the persona frustration during implementation?

Step 5: Daily Routine

The daily routine helps to understand the activities and the context of the persona during a working day.

Such an analysis helps to better assess and target the touchpoints used throughout the day.

For this purpose, a short, keyword-like description of the activity and the channels used should be noted for the different time periods.

Tip: Describe a typical working day of the persona and not an extraordinary event. Focus on the most important activities and channels.

B2B Persona Insights

You should now have the following insights about the persona:

  • Persona details: you have a consistent understanding of who the persona is.

  • Goals & Objectives: You know where the persona wants to go professionally and personally.

  • Support: You know the aspects that make it easier for the persona to achieve their goals.

  • Challenges: You know the hurdles the persona faces.

  • Routine: You know the persona's routine and can assess the context at different times of the day.

Conclusion

The definition of one or more personas helps your company to create a uniform understanding of the target group and its needs. In addition, a persona helps to check concrete measures and approaches in advance and to subject them to a plausibility check.

In this way, efficient marketing measures can be created and qualified leads that correspond to the target group can be generated.

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