Creating a business but not sure how to define your target audience and persona? Or have you even heard of these terms but don't know their differences and importance for the business? In this post, we will resolve these doubts!
If you already know which customer segment you want to reach, the next step is to be clear about the characteristics of your target audience and also define the personas that best represent them. The target audience is essential for us to know who our main customers are, to focus on actions that serve this audience and also to dimension the size of the market in which we are operating. The persona is important to the day-to-day of the company. It helps the marketing teams to think of more effective actions and also the product team with an even better solution.
Target Audience
Target Audience: Demographic, socioeconomic and/or behavioral clipping of a group that is a product and communication focus. Information is used as in the following example from a clothing company:
Age: between 16 and 24 years old
Gender: Male (30%) and Female (70%)
Educational background: Complete high school or higher education;
Occupation: Students
Monthly Family Income: BRL 10,000 - BRL 20,000
Location: São Paulo (SP)
Habits: They care about the clothes they wear, they always want to be well dressed and in fashion. They usually go to malls to try on clothes and, if they don't like them, even if they don't have a great need, they buy them. They frequently access online stores and enjoy going out with friends and friends to bars and having fun.
Social media they use: Mainly use Instagram, where they usually follow fashion-related profiles;
Where they look for information: Digital newspapers and blogs of great references in the fashion world;
People who influence them: Great role models or close friends and friends
What motivates them: They want to pass the course and universities they want or start their first job as soon as they graduate from a large fashion company.
What you're most afraid of: Not reaching your goals as a student and professionals right at the start of your career.
Persona
Persona: It is the personification of the target audience and aims to direct efforts towards the company's main customer. It is possible to define more than one persona for the business if more than one profile is perceived with great relevance within the target audience. To define a persona four steps can be used:
Previous studies and benchmarking: Knowledge acquired by the company through studies;
Internal data: Knowledge acquired through internal data and employees who speak directly to customers.
Interviews with customers: Conversations with customers to get to know them better;
Assessment of standards and structuring of profiles: Based on the information collected in the three previous stages, standards are identified and profiles are structured.
A tool that can also help in defining the persona is the Empathy Map.
It is important to define the persona, in addition to describing it as a person, including giving it a name and including an image of what it looks like. This complete personification will help the team and make it very clear who the company is serving, what the priorities are for improving the solution, and how to develop better marketing strategies. Considering the example above for a clothing company, we can have the following example of a persona:
Name: Luiza
Age: 20 years old
Gender: Feminine
Educational Background: Study Administration at USP
Occupation: Student
Monthly Family Income: R$17,000
Location: São Paulo (SP)
Habits: Enjoy shopping. He goes to the mall at least once a week and is constantly on sites like Amaro and Renner. You usually go out with your friends all weekend.
Social media it uses: It uses Instagram and follows brands such as Amaro and Renner and celebrities such as Gisele Bündchen, Kendall Jenner and blogger Chiara Ferragni.
Where do you look for information: Read the Folha de São Paulo newspaper for general news;
People who influence her: Models Gisele Bündchen, Kendall Jenner, blogger Chiara Ferragni and also her friends Camila and Júlia.
What motivates her: Dreams of working at Renner.
What you're most afraid of: Not being able to work in a big fashion company.
Realize that the persona fits within the target audience, but its characteristics are specified in greater detail.
In the example used, we saw that part of the target audience refers to the male gender, although it is less relevant as it represents only 30% of the audience, it would also be important to have a specific persona for him.