Lazy Way Of Designing Your Client Avatar
Boosting more traffic, increasing conversion rates and driving social engagement might be easier than you think. More and more frequently business owners share their frustration about some of their company clients behavior. Part of them seem not fully follow the product benefits, others expect something totally different than the offer suggested. It results in elevated frustration levels on both sides. How come these people turned into customers is a mystery for everyone. The deeper discussion informs about lack of any process for an ideal customer or client avatar description. Having the right client avatar will have a strong impact on your business. Designed well it will result immediately into the power of your content marketing, paid traffic campaigns, e-mailing, social media engagement and many more areas and Lazy way of Designing your Client Avatar.
Client is a king
Knowing your customer is a key to success, you may have heard that at least a million times. Yet, when there are no clients for your product, and you do not know why – something must be terribly wrong. The business does not exist without its clients. They generate revenue – the real energy source for the company. You need to know their pain and their desires, their thoughts and their convictions. Oh, come on! One can say – the client is not a complicated creature. Everybody knows it. It is a HE or SHE at a certain age, living in a big or small city and maybe he or she has a certain amount of money to spend for the specific need he or she has. That’s it! Well, that was true some time ago. Back in late 90-ties, I was managing international accounts in one of the biggest advertising agencies. The prospective clients were called back then “ the target audience” and we – account managers – were really focused on describing their needs and desires. Apart from the demographic description we were using also so called “psychographic profile”. Some profiles were extraordinary, others were quite a similar one to another. But we tried. We tried to describe what values, convictions, desires would be typical to our prospective clients – for toothpaste, shampoo, margarine or bank account. The most important of that description was media consumption i.e. were they rather broad audience that should be targeted by TV channels or rather niche ones to be reached by selective magazines. Media departments were the kings back then!
Why you need to be laser sharp when thinking about your clients?
Today we do not have “target audiences” anymore but there are “brand personas”, “customer avatars” or so called “ideal clients”. Their description process is also much more sophisticated than back in 90-ties when the client needs and desires were the key quantifiers. Nowadays you need to be laser sharp in the descriptions and as detailed and accurate as possible. You need to think about your client values, convictions, goals, challenges, information sources, and trust builders. You have to know what is your customer pain, what are his hobbies or passions, what is his role in the decision-making process (see picture below?). Is he a decision maker or also a buyer or a user? Does he require some support in the decision-making process? How does this the decision-making process happen, when is it starting – who initiates it? Are there any gatekeepers on the way to watch out?
Why some campaigns work and some does not?
These and many more other questions need to be answered to create an ideal client profile. It is a hard work that requires time, knowledge, some tools and a bit of investigator’s soul. But once it is done properly you all of the sudden know the language your client speaks, you follow the frustrations and worries he has, you recognize his pains and you know perfectly how to provide the compelling remedy in a way you are perceived as an expert, rescue ranger and a great friend in one.
