One of the key steps in developing a business-to-business (B2B) content marketing strategy is building the buyer persona. Buyer personas include goals, challenges, focuses and responsibilities—which are developed by interviewing clients or brainstorming in-house to envision what the end user will look like. Personas can also include information such as age, occupation, marital status and where they live. Let’s take a look at an example of some of the elements that make up a buyer persona:
Without a buyer persona, it is unlikely that your content marketing strategy will have the impact you want. Now let’s take a look at why buyer personas are so important and the tools you can use to build them successfully.
One of the first stages of building a buyer persona is evaluating the goals, motivations and challenges of the persona, which informs how the company should approach doing business with the persona. Understanding the needs and wants of the audience is critical in understanding the most effective way to market to them. Additionally, this stage might shed light on new strategies for marketing that you hadn’t yet considered.
With content marketing, it is important to understand how your audience consumes content. How long do they spend browsing the internet? What type of content are they typically interested in? What do they like to discuss with others? Understanding this can inform how you communicate with and reach new customers, as well as how to promote your content.
For example, social media platforms vary widely in terms of audience, content, purpose and more. Personas interested in Twitter may be different than those interested in LinkedIn, so you should seek to gain insight into how they behave on these sites. Note that these elements are notsubjective and are not based on client interviews.
Once you understand behaviors, you can better formulate a plan to reach them—whether it is through social media, email, paid advertising, or another avenue. Always seek to develop content that will connect with a large portion of your audience, targeting content to them that connects with their values.
It’s also important to understand the “A-Z” process of how your customers go through the process of making purchasing decisions. Buyer personas allow you to identify and act on different behaviors along the journey, enabling you to impact how and when customers decide to purchase. Documenting the customer journey will pay dividends down the road as you discover how customers think and come to final purchasing decisions.
All of this work will be worthwhile, as B2B companies that have incorporated buyer persona best practices consistently outperform other companies. Taking the time to understand and care about the needs and desires of customers will set you apart from the competition and put your company on a sustainable pathway with loyal customers.
Using True Content® can help identify unique elements that are valuable when creating a buyer persona. With the Brainstorm Topic tool you can choose a target audience to find out what types of content they are reading, discussing and engaging with as well as where they are consuming that content. You can choose from audiences including C-level executives, mid-level management, marketing executives, procurement executives, operations executives, and small and medium businesses.
Additionally, the Match a Writer tool can help you identify the characteristics you should be looking for in a writer. You can upload pieces previously written by your writers and receive a comprehensive analysis of who will best connect with your target audience. By utilizing these tools you will build a more comprehensive buyer persona.
Without a buyer persona, it will be much more difficult to effectively implement your B2B content marketing plan. By understanding the consumption habits, goals, and challenges of your personas, you can direct your content to them in ways that will connect with them and encourage them to engage with you.
