Buyer Persona: the first step in an editorial marketing strategy

When we talk about identifying the profile of the buyer of a product or service, we automatically refer to the field of advertising. In this area, the public is identified as a target. This term refers to an objective, a goal, as if it were that white point where the dart takes the most points, or the horizon at which to aim the sale. The concept of target is used in advertising or marketing to define the recipient that the dissemination campaigns intend to reach.

But how to relate the advertising target to our ideal reader?

It is important to mention that the audience of the marketing campaign and our ideal reader are very different objects of study, but both have an ideal construction that is developed from market studies. The main difference is that the creation of a target or target audience is more generalized, while when creating a Buyer Persona, real and decisive data is collected when making a personal and individualized purchase. In any case, in both cases the main thing is to determine the recipient. For example, if a company wants to sell a new brand of home furniture, they must attract the attention of adults with the financial capacity to invest in their homes. But if the objective is to launch a candy, which may not be so obvious to the target audience, the decision must be made whether to capture the attention of children or adolescents. If this is not clear, money may be spent on advertising that does not capture the attention of the ideal customer for that candy due to its characteristics, composition or flavor. As the world of children’s literature continues to evolve, so does the role of ghostwriting services They adapt to changing tastes, technological advancements, and new

What happens then with the publishing world?

You only have to replace the objects in these examples with books, differentiating their genre, length, writing style, authors, illustrations, among other characteristics. Although it seems that the book as an object can always be sold equally, it is clear that this is not really the case.

When selling books, you should not focus on the object but on the content because that is where you will find your ideal reader. If your idea is to sell books whose genre is teen suspense or horror, you must put yourself in their shoes and understand their movements on the web, both on your platform and on social networks. This way, you will discover the best strategy to reach them and boost your sales. But to understand, you must first know. Therefore, we give you some definitions to start your own search.

 

What is an ideal Buyer Persona or reader profile?

A Buyer Persona is a customer model (or, in this case, ideal reader) that potentially responds to the thoughts, opinions, decisions, searches and insecurities that specific users of the service or product we market may have. It is a profile that shows us the attitudes and criteria when making decisions about a purchase or subscription. But it is not just about designing and knowing your ideal reader, but the essential thing is to understand their behavior: what their movements would be like within your platform or virtual library.

Once you can know and understand your buyer persona, you can reach the next step, which will be planning strategies to improve your sales. And here lies the importance of creating the profile of your ideal reader. Unlike the target audience or advertising target, with the buyer persona you can create several different profiles that adapt to different needs within your content.

According to a study carried out by The Buyer Persona Institute, 44% of companies have Buyer Personas, but only 15% consider their profiles effective. This question is determined by the form, quality and plausibility of the procedure they carry out to represent their ideal profiles. Where is the loss in the business? In the interference that is created between the content and your potential client. This is because you may be creating excellent quality content, but the main mistake is who it is aimed at. For this reason, you must discover the interests of your clients and, thus, connect correctly with your service.

Step by step to create your Buyer Persona

To create our Buyer Persona model, it is necessary to comply with a series of steps that help to have the most accurate information possible. The ideal is to be very specific in the information on these profiles. We know that it is not an easy job, so there are some issues to take into account.

Collect data from your users through your store

Know your readers’ data, their consumption and detect how they handle the content you offer. To accomplish this first step, publica.la offers its clients different possibilities to gather information: Write a Book On Google Docs automatically saves changes, reducing the risk of data loss. Users can also access version history to track revisions and restore previous versions if needed.

• Capture the data of your printed book buyers by generating a QR code. How does this work? By offering the possibility of obtaining the digital version of the physical book by simply adding a QR code to the printed publication, you can find out who is part of your community of readers. ‍
• Analyze the key metrics that allow you to detect which posts are the most read, how many views each user had, the length of stay or the reading percentage.

Create forms

Incorporate forms on your website, platform or social networks to better understand your audience. The questions should be able to capture the information necessary to create the exact profile of your ideal reader. Remember the objective of designing a Buyer Persona: to know their motivations and insecurities when buying. If you are not focused on this goal, you can fall into one of the most common mistakes, which is simply describing the personality of the ideal client.

Get the most out of your sales team

If in your business or venture you have a team dedicated to service or sales directly with clients, you should take note of their knowledge due to the experience they have as client representation. Your direct contact and treatment is essential.

Conduct interviews with your readers

Another tool that cannot be overlooked are interviews, by phone or in person, with current clients. These can also be surveys with questions related, mainly, to the time of your purchases or access to the service. Keep in mind that the most important thing is to know the client’s real needs.

What to do with your Buyer Persona

Once you have collected all the information, you must separate it into more specific data such as personal data, demographic data, objectives and challenges, both personal and professional, main concerns, solutions that you manage within your work environment, and any other data that can help you decide. What tone will you use in the way you communicate.

Hub Spot is a platform that offers tools for marketing, sales, and customer service. CEO and founder Brian Halligan spoke at a conference in 2019 and expressed some very important ideas to keep in mind about customer insight. Halligan’s central message was that companies must refine their understanding of the buyer experience. Then, from there they will be able to build and align around strategies in product development, sales and marketing.

The importance of creating your Buyer Persona is to understand how the audience you are targeting behaves, the type of content they are looking to consume and how they do it, as well as determining the keywords they use when conducting their searches. in the web. Based on all this information, your editorial marketing strategy will be correctly oriented and defined. This chain of actions will ensure that your digital movements have the profitability you expected.