In brief: A persona is a simplified, research-backed model of the typical decision-making context of part of the target audience. It helps a team maintain the same understanding of needs and obstacles.
How I use Target-audience personas in practice
In a persona, I record the situation, trigger, expected outcome, alternatives used, concerns, questions and role in the decision. I take them from interviews, sales calls, support, search and actual behaviour. A name and photograph can make the team’s work easier, but they are not insight. In B2B, I prefer creating a map of roles to one fictional person who simultaneously uses the product, holds the budget and signs the contract.
What to watch out for
A detailed story can appear credible even when it is entirely made up. A persona also quickly becomes outdated if the offer or market changes. Therefore, for every assertion I need a source or a hypothesis label and the date of last verification.
Questions for decision-making
- Which interviews or data does the assertion arise from?
- What will this persona decide differently in the offer or communication?
- Are different purchasing roles being conflated within it?
- Which hypothesis do we need to verify first?