But first, I want to talk about the step before you\u2019re ready to hammer out those personas: the research. Conducting thorough research is absolutely vital to creating detailed buyer personas that will be valuable to your organization. Without great research, a great buyer personas template becomes pretty much obsolete.<\/p>\n Research can be one of the scariest tasks when starting any project. That\u2019s why I want to walk you through the process and where to source the best information.<\/p>\n Interview your sales team, management, and talk to your customers. These are the individuals who will give you the best insights regarding your particular product. In this phase, there are a few things you\u2019re going to want to nail down:<\/p>\n After you\u2019ve spoken to all of the necessary parties and you\u2019ve pinned down appropriate job titles you want to target, begin doing the research one persona at a time. Don\u2019t just rely on one source. Look at multiple job sites for breakdowns of job descriptions to find the common factors.<\/p>\n When it comes to figuring out who your buyer is, just looking at a job description isn\u2019t going to cut it. Check out LinkedIn<\/a> to look at actual people who are in the positions and industries you\u2019re targeting. This will tell you about their work history, interests, if they\u2019re publishing papers, if they hold patents, where they\u2019re located, etc. All of this information is valuable. LinkedIn can provide the best blueprint to who your customer really is.<\/p>\n Now that you have an idea of what news sources your audience likes, read them for yourself. Get under the hood of why they find those publications interesting. Does it service their curiosity? Maybe they\u2019re trying to stay up-to-date with the latest trends. Or it could satisfy a need to stay ahead of the competition. Click on what those publications are linking to, and really get inside of the industry you\u2019re targeting. By doing this, you\u2019ll understand a journey your buyer might take on a regular basis.<\/p>\n The other advantage of reading like your customer is the ability to find new opportunities to showcase your solution. Those blogs and community sites might be prime advertising real estate for your business. You also might find a great place online to actively engage with your customers on a personal level. Your backlinks strategy<\/a> will thank you for this later on.<\/p>\n The whole point in making personas is that you need to know how to market to different people. You already have a general list of pain points or challenges that your customers face. Now you have to match the pain point to the correct persona. Use what you know about the each role to answer the question of what he\/she prioritizes.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s say you choose to target a Chief Data Officer (CDO) and a Developer. While the CDO might be concerned with the tools used by her team and overall strategic planning, the developer is concerned with the specific project he\u2019s working on. Their pain points are very different. The CDO needs to test and implement tools that will work for her developers as well as management. The developer is concerned with the efficiency of his project, his own work method, and ensuring what is required of him is implemented into the final product.<\/p>\n These users aren\u2019t going to have the same interaction with your product, and they shouldn\u2019t. The developer will have to see something that makes his day-to-day easier, and probably a great use case he can bring to his superiors. The CDO will need proof that a tool will positively impact business across multiple departments, since her concerns are increasing visibility for all involved parties on a project.<\/p>\n Understanding the unique difficulties your personas have in their working lives enables you to create content that answers the question \u201cBut how will this help me?\u201d That\u2019s the question we\u2019re always thinking when evaluating new tools. And the answer to that is going to be different for each persona you create.<\/p>\n You might come into building buyer personas with a lot of assumptions about your audience. While it\u2019s great to have a starting point, don\u2019t allow your own opinions to trump the research. If you do this, you\u2019ll only be giving your assumptions structure as opposed to developing in-depth, useful buyer personas based on your actual audience.<\/p>\n Label all of your current notes about your customer as \u201cassumptions.\u201d You\u2019re not doing research to confirm these assumptions, but to discover the truth. Don\u2019t bend your findings to fit what you already think you know about your customers. The whole purpose of doing this is to discover new avenues to reach your customers and how to speak to them.<\/p>\n Your product or service will evolve over time. And that means your audience will evolve, too. Revisit your buyer personas regularly to ensure the information is still valid. You might notice motivations, challenges, or even the entire persona itself will be drastically different from when you started.<\/p>\n Compiling all of the links to your research in one place can be a great way to keep all of your research in one place. You can link to the most important sources in your final document so that all of your team members have access to the same research that you did while creating it. It\u2019s not going to look pretty, but that\u2019s okay.<\/p>\n Research is supposed to be messy. And there\u2019s really no right way to compile all of your findings. So do what works for you, even if it\u2019s a document you might hide from the rest of your team.<\/p>\n There is never such a thing as too much information. Don\u2019t say no to information that gets offered up in an interview. If it looks interesting, click on it. While the material might wind up being irrelevant, you don\u2019t know that until you dig into it. Again, don\u2019t make assumptions.<\/p>\n Avoid getting overwhelmed by your own research. Try to focus on one persona at a time as you settle on audience roles. This way, when you get a little messy it\u2019s within the parameters you set for yourself.<\/p>\n If your head is spinning, take a break and come back to your work later with a fresh perspective. Don\u2019t give yourself hard deadlines to meet if you don\u2019t have to. And try to stress to any superiors that these things take time. In order to make these personas worthwhile, you will have to dedicate a good chunk of your workweek to them.<\/p>\n Now that you you know where to start. Start crafting your personas using\u00a0DemandZEN\u2019s Buyer Personas Template<\/a>. But beware: too many personas is not a good thing. Take only what you need to survive.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/demandzen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/DemandZEN-Buyer-Personas-Template-CTA.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nConduct Interviews<\/h2>\n
\n
Begin Googling<\/h2>\n
LinkedIn is your best friend<\/h3>\n
Read what they\u2019re reading<\/h3>\n
Matching Paint Points to Personas<\/h2>\n
Don\u2019t mislead yourself<\/h2>\n
The research never ends<\/h2>\n
Don\u2019t be afraid to get messy<\/h2>\n
Don\u2019t Let the Research Consume You<\/h2>\n
Your Turn<\/h2>\n
![\"Take](\"https:\/\/demandzen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/spaceballs-take-only-what-you-need-to-survive.gif\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"