Persona
Once you have mapped your target audience, you can create a persona, or fictional character, which represents the different (sub-)groups of your target audience.
A popular saying in the digital marketing world is that when you communicate, the best way to do so is “One to one, to many, to millions”. This is because it’s very difficult to talk to an undefined group. Personas focus mostly on psychographic and behavioural information.
A persona, represents different characteristics of similar people (behaviour, motivation, goals and frustrations) into one fictional character through which a group can be understood. You can create multiple personas, to describe different target (sub-)groups. However, start with developing 1-2 personas, and try to keep your personas to a maximum of 6. Too many personas will result in a lack of focus and not help you and your team to create targeted, persona-specific content. Choose your most important distinctive personas, to be targeted in your activities.
Why Create a Persona?
Making a fictional persona can help you to get in the mindset of your target audience. It forces you to step into their shoes and think about the things he or she encounters in his or her day-to-day life. It also helps to create a visualisation and common understanding of your target audience, which makes it easier to relate to.
How to Create a Persona?
Although a persona is a fictional character, they should be realistic and based on research, perhaps one of the young people you interviewed comes to mind? In order to create a persona, you want to provide a clear picture on what the persona thinks, sees, hears and does.
You can include the following information:
- Name, age, gender, location, ethnicity, religion, education and income.
Also ask the following questions:
- What does (s)he think? What really counts, preoccupations, worries and aspirations.
- What other opinions does (s)he hear? What do friends, bosses, influencers say?
- What does (s)he do? This includes attitudes, appearance, behaviour towards others, and behaviour online. How does (s)he act on his or her opinions? What hobbies, what kind of music does (s)he listen to, what is his or her favourite brand, and how would I recognise him or her on the street?
- What are the grievances, values, interests and needs that feed into this behaviour?
- Values: community, tradition, ideology;
- Grievances: poverty, lack of things, frustrations, obstacles, fears;
- Interests: sport, community, parties;
- Needs: Safety, income, friends, acknowledgment.
Canvas: What would a typical member of your audience look like?
Create a persona.