Let’s delve straight into it, shall we? Also referred to as buyer persona, Hubspot describes marketing personas as a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers.

It personifies a vital section of your ideal clientele to help shape business decisions. Information such as interests, priorities...shape up the construction of a marketing persona and should be as ‘colorful’ as possible.

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Why is it important

I’m sure you are wondering why you need this. It’s simple. So that you can win your clients over! If you have a significant other, you would go out of your way to understand their ticks and nuances in order to do only the things that make them happy and create a pleasant relationship for both of you, right?

Products, services, and strategies work to our advantage when it is tailored around the understanding of the client.

How to build it

Building marketing personas, according to Simplifie is in five simple steps, which are Research, Analyze your findings, Create your personas, Add the Details and Start creating your persona-led marketing activity.

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Research

I can’t stress enough the importance of doing a thorough investigation. You need to Sherlock Holmes the hell out of it! It is hard work, but it is vital and will eventually pay off.

Online data, such as the number of site visits, user engagement, user location, bounce rate, page views, etc. can be achieved with google analytics and mentionlytics. Offline data, which includes income earned, spending patterns, marital status, etc., can be gathered by observation, surveys, focus groups, etc. The scope is vast, so collect what is relevant to you.‍

Analyze your findings

Hello Albert Einstein, let’s get into the lab, shall we?! The information collated is nothing without deducing its meaning. Identify any themes and patterns in the responses provided by using Microsoft Excel or other data analyzing tools such as Knime Minitab to plot out correlations. There may be a need for further research.

Create your personas

Now with all the hard work done, you are ready to be Bob the builder! Start building your marketing persona with the conclusions drawn from the research and analysis. Make sure to categorize the different personas according to their shared characteristics.

Add the Details

Bring the flavor to the fish, bring the flavor to the rice! Spice it up with as much detail as possible. Create a mood board with a story map if you must and add images, videos, quotes, music, memes, gif, etc. so that you can visualize and connect with real people. Don’t forget to give them names.

Start creating your persona-led marketing activity

The fun part is here…or not, lol. Now is the right time to strategize and create that post, campaign, resource, etc. you’ve always wanted to create, but now as a much informed professional ready to fire to precision!

Easy peasy five steps to help you build that marketing persona with exactitude. Happy building!