Improve Revenue by Knowing your Customers A business is nothing without customers. Listening to the customer is the driving force behind success! So, my biggest question is.. why are you NOT listening to them? Knowing your target audience is the most important factor in marketing and most of the information can be available at your fingertips. Once you know exactly who you are selling to you, can further understand their buying habits and motivations. This information is valuable in creating marketing strategies, allowing you to put your product or service in front of your ideal customer at the most likely time for a sale. Who is your ideal client and how can you create a customer persona to market to them? A customer persona is a model representation of your target customer. It’s a way to understand your audience by digging deeper into their mindset. Understanding the customer's wants and needs can help you be more effective in acquisition and retention phases of your sale. The founder of buyer personas Tony Zambito said, “Buyer personas are research-based representations of who buyers are, what they are trying to accomplish, what goals drive their behavior, how they think, how they buy, and why they make buying decisions.” Before we explain more, let's first highlight the differences in demographics and personas. Demographic Targeting vs Persona Targeting Are they not the same thing? Demographic targeting focuses on the external information of the key audience in your market. These characteristics can be based on age, race, gender, relationship status, income, education and job title. Often this information is public or can be easily gathered through researching sales data. Personas focus on the wants and needs of your customers related to behaviors, life cycles, and the emotions associated with your product or service. To better understand your customer you have to prepare before meeting them and anticipate their needs. Identifying personas helps you create a strategy to present your product or service at the peak time when a prospective customer is ready to transact or purchase. How to become a customer mind reader: To target your clients, you'll want to understand their personal backgrounds and behavioral identifiers like motives, attitude, and goals. This information will help you anticipate their needs and wants. Humans are creatures of habit. They typically follow patterns and routines. Customers generally react similarly throughout life stages and are more likely to be loyal to brands they have already chosen. To further understand their wants and needs you need to understand the challenges they may face before they contact you. How can you help them reach a goal, acquire a product or service, or make a better decision? By focusing on the values of your customers, you can better determine how your company can help answer those customer needs. With this information we can predict future scenarios such as: * When a product or service should enter or exit the market. * Anticipate the needs of your customers and forecast trends that you can take your company to the next level or prepare you for changes. * Highlight your firm's advantages in order of customer preference. * Showcase advantages to them immediately in your marketing efforts and organize your site to appeal to your ideal customer. * Offer solutions to problems online * Manage expectations and help your customers make an informed decision. Combat doubt at the first point of contact to increase trust in your brand. * Advertise in the right locations * Place your advertising efforts where your buyer personas will be spending time by predicting their shopping habits, both online and offline. Create different marketing efforts for each persona to fill those individual wants and needs. Having 4 - 10 will give you a great variety of different marketing strategies. Before & After Knowing your customer personas before you create a product or service can help you to develop a more tailored approach to your customer and ensure an effective procurement process. Knowing your customer personas after you have an established company can help you to create more effective copy, better advertising and optimize your website for the best customer experience. Constructing personas will help you ask and answer the right questions for the customers you are selling to. You will ultimately save money with optimized ads and receive better leads! Still feeling stuck? Ask your audience! Social media is a great way to interact with your currently interested clients. Ask a question in your caption that encourages your audience to share their experiences or expectations with you. Once you know the expectations of your customers, you can meet and exceed them. Understanding your customer will save money and help create a focused marketing strategy. Creating buyer personas gives you all of the information you'll need to better serve your ideal clients. All of My Internet Scout websites can incorporate analytic tools which offer clear information for an effective marketing plan and track advertising successes. Start listening to your clients today and contact us about a website audit and persona report. ======================= Outline I. Captive intro about the importance of understanding customers and their habits beyond your product/service sphere describing their attitudes, motivations, goals, pain points, etc. II. What is are Client/customer personas? And why businesses should have them... https://www.interaction- design.org/literature/article/ personas-why-and-how-you- should-use-them https://www.vieodesign.com/ blog/8-reasons-use-buyer- personas-guide-marketing/ III. How to build a set of personas for your organization https://blog.hubspot.com/ marketing/buyer-persona- research https://blog.bufferapp.com/ marketing-personas-beginners- guide IV. How to use personas for marketing products/services https://www.intechnic.com/ blog/what-are-buyer-personas- and-why-they-are-important-to- your-website/ V. Summarize article and describe how persona building is part of our website auditing service (soft call to action). ARTICLES https://www.inc.com/molly-reynolds/how-to-create-customer-personas-that-brealife-into-your-marketing.html https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/buyer-persona-research https://conversionxl.com/blog/creating-customer-personas-using-data-driven-research/?hvid=2AD8ar https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/blog/2017-4-27-the-beginners-guide-to-defining-buyer-personas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxA9SJmydeI https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/personas-why-and-how-you-should-use-them https://www.vieodesign.com/blog/8-reasons-use-buyer-personas-guide-marketing/ https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/buyer-persona-research https://blog.bufferapp.com/marketing-personas-beginners-guide https://www.intechnic.com/blog/what-are-buyer-personas-and-why-they-are-important-to-your-website/