Your Ideal Buyer Persona Explained
Your Ideal Buyer Persona is a semi-fictional profile of your optimal client – the client you love and who loves you back. And it’s only semi-fictional because you already likely have several clients who match this description! You enjoy creating products for them or working determinedly on their behalf. They adore what you offer, they pay your fees, and they keep coming back. Now, you would simply love to have more clients just like them!
Discovering more details about your Ideal Buyer Persona will help you do just that. Examining who your ideal client is will clarify how you can better serve them—making yourself even more irresistible to them (and others) in the process.
You’ve probably never thought about it, but you happen to be someone’s ideal client, too. Know that companies you love have almost certainly taken time to consider who you are.
For example, if you’re a 40-year-old mother running a small business, you’re likely to be pressed for time and trying to figure out tonight’s dinner on the go. Thankfully, your local grocery store chain carries premade meals you can easily pick up on your way home.
Coincidence? Not a chance.
The companies creating ready-to-go meals know their ideal customer, and you’re it. They have a product just for you. In all likelihood, there are several companies vying for your attention and trying to solve your dinnertime challenges. But if you’re continuing to buy from a particular company again and again, they’re the one who did their homework and discovered just what you specifically need and want.
By focusing on your specific needs, a company can create a great product not only for you but many others just like you. Because here’s the thing—the single dad working full-time as a delivery person with hungry kids waiting at home has to solve the same problem. So does the teacher, attorney, architect, and every other busy person with a family to feed.
A successful business will pay attention to a particular person’s life in order to imagine the problem they can solve for them. And as a result, they create the ideal product or service for their Ideal Buyer Persona. They use a focused approach to their advantage, leveraging an understanding of one person to meet the needs of many.
How to create Your Ideal Buyer Persona
To create your Ideal Buyer Persona, start with some basic questions. Does your ideal client live in a rural area or in the city? What is their gender? How old are they? Do they have a family? What’s their average income?
Now ask some more insightful questions. What does your ideal client do for fun? What are their interests? Where do they like to vacation? What are their hobbies?
Finally, go deeper. What are your ideal client’s hopes and dreams? What are their deepest fears? What are their general strengths? What are their biggest challenges?
The objective is to create a clear picture of who your ideal client is. You want to know this person as if they were your best friend. You should know their likes and dislikes, their life goals, and what they need from you.
One thing to note. As you decipher your ideal client, make sure you understand your own strengths and weaknesses as a business. The clearer you are about your own capabilities, the easier it is to determine your consummate customer.
Once you have figured out your Ideal Buyer Persona, you may want to read 10 steps to building a powerful small business brand.