Customizing your communications to clients, potential customers and donors is vital in today’s marketing and public relations. People are overloaded with emails, website advertisements and commercials, and if you don’t give them information they want, they are going to tune you out. One method of developing targeted communications that meet the needs of your audiences is to create personas: fictional bios of your prospects, leads and customers based on real data. These personas help you simplify the process of targeting and personalizing your messaging, helping your potential customers tune into what you have to say. Point Taken, a marketing and public relations firm specializing in small business and nonprofit communications, explains how to use personas in marketing and public relations.

Create Your Personas

Personas are fictitious representations of your prospects, leads, customers and donors. Let’s say you own a high-end jewelry store. To create personas of your current and potential customers, use data from your existing customers. Break the personas into categories based on their buying habits, give them catchy names and stock photos so you can better identify each persona.

Here’s an example of a persona for your high-end jewelry store:

Persona Name: Fred, the Frequent but Frugal Buyer

Persona Stock Photo: 

Persona Description: Fred loves to buy jewelry for his wife. He is a frequent shopper at our high-end jewelry store, but he tends to buy pieces that are less expensive. He is more careful about how he spends his money and tends to buy a lot of jewelry at lower price points.

Here’s another buyer persona example for that same high-end jewelry store:

Persona Name: Wanda, the Wealthy Woman

Persona Stock Photo Sample: 

Persona Description: Wanda is a self confident woman who can afford to buy high-end jewelry for herself. She can make impulse decisions of high value and doesn’t worry about how much money she spends. Her favorite pieces are from higher-end jewelry lines.

Write to Your Personas

As you can see, Fred and Wanda are very different buyers, and you need to speak to them differently. Fred doesn’t want to hear about your recently acquired one-of-a-kind luxury piece of jewelry that is out of his price range. Wanda doesn’t want to hear about the bracelet every woman on the street of your city is wearing because it is affordable to the masses. Write blog posts, social media copy and email content with Fred or Wanda in mind and makes sure to segment your email lists so only Fred sees the emails targeted for him and only Wanda receives the e-blasts meant for her.

Segment Your Lists

While it may take time, you are much more likely to get opens, clicks, responses and sales or donations from targeted emails. Segment your lists by personas, buyer types, age groups or other categories, and you can then send emails written specifically for that segmented list.

Use Dynamic Website Content

Marketing automation systems allow you to display content designed for Fred, Wanda or any of your other buyer personas if that person is in your marketing automation system. When Fred, Wanda or another contact visits your website, they will see content you have created specifically for their persona, so Fred isn’t seeing that $10,000 ring and Wanda isn’t seeing that $50 bracelet.

Utilize Dynamic Email Content

Much like dynamic website content, you can use dynamic email content to create parts of your emails specifically designed to speak to one of your personas. Let’s say you have a monthly special section of your email newsletter about your high-end jewelry shop. For Fred, you can show that perfect affordable sterling silver bracelet while Wanda will see a gold and diamond statement necklace that just hit the market. Marketing automation systems also allow you to use personas to create dynamic email content.

Need help creating personas, segmenting email lists, creating website content or designing emails? Contact Point Taken today for assistance with all your marketing and public relations needs.