B2B Buyer Personas: Craft Effective Personas in 4 Steps

B2B Buyer Personas – Content Marketing Essentials Join the conversation: Tweet your comments to #b2bpersonas @concentricdots @idioplatform

How to develop B2B Buyer Personas

and create engaging content your customers love

Join the conversation: Tweet your comments to #b2bpersonas @concentricdots @idioplatform

B2B Buyer Personas – Content Marketing Essentials
Challenge
Of content
production
Fix
The stuff we
need to fix
Personas
Good and bad
buyer personas
Personas
How to craft
effective buyer
personas
Tools
What tools
you have to
help
Process
The process
involved
Time/Budget
Setting time
frames and
budgets
Map
Mapping
content to
buyer cycle
Demo
Demo of idio
technology
Q&A
Summary
and Q&A
Agenda
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

Today’s speaker
Stephen Bateman
DipM CIM
Concentric Dots
Andrew Davies
Co-Founder
idio Ltd
Today’s host


The Challenge
What are some of the challenges
faced by Content Marketers?
Measurement: measuring ROI and effectiveness1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Content Strategy: choosing quality content to engage
Content Quality: creating sufficient quality content
Content Frequency: developing sufficient content
Budget & Making the Case: insufficient budget or buy-in
Outreach: forming & managing partnerships to share content
Integration: integrating content marketing into other activities
Skills: lack of specific content marketing skills
Other
15.5%
15.5%
15.3%
15.3%
10.8%
9.7%
8.9%
8.3%
0.8%


49%
7%
44%
I am convinced of the value that investments in content can
deliver and that it can be a measurable ROI
I see opportunities from some content marketing channels but
measurement of ROI is limited
I'm not convinced of the potential of content marketing to deliver
value and see it as difficult to measure ROI.
Source:HubSpot and Smart Insights Driving Content
Marketing Success - European Edition!
How would you
rate the value of
content marketing for
your company?
We’re not disillusioned with content marketing


What’s the biggest hurdle to creating buyer-centric content?
“The content problem is that content is not
created based on intelligence about the
buyer persona and knowledge of how they
buy.”
This stems from poor access, availability
and accuracy of the data that organizations
have on buyers and their buying behaviour.


Plan
Create Strategic
Structure
Ideate
Generate Flow of Ideas Produce
Distribute and
Nurture
Generate traffic,
leads, sales
Measure &
Optimize
Customer
Needs
Business Goals
Personas
Buyer cycles
Keywords
Content
Assets
Internal
External
Buyer journeys
Themes Editorial plan
Editorial
Style
Format
Promotion
Moderation
Nurturing
Evaluation Optimization
Purpose Audience Audit Map & Gap Manage Create Market Justify Improve
What Do We Need To Fix?
Takeaway: To fix our content, we need to fix our buyer personas

The root cause of the pain occurs here

We feel the pain here


Bad Buyer Personas
Takeaway: “Guerrilla”-style personas only recycle the
intelligence we already have on our buyers
Out of Date Based solely on
conversations
internally
“Best Guess”
personas
Compiled from
analyst reports and
surveys


Good Buyer Personas
Takeaway: “Guerrilla”-style personas only recycle the
intelligence we already have on our buyers
Based on insights
gleaned from
speaking to real
customers
Put a distinct face and
name on an otherwise
faceless buyer
segment
Help focus on
commonalities, not
expectations
Make it possible to
converse with
audiences and market
to them in a cost-
effective way


Requires
Research
Requires
Organised
Approach
Take Time
Makes you put
your journalist/
story-teller hat on
How to craft effective B2B personas

Requires !
Organized !
Approach!
Takes !
Time!
!
Requires!
Research!
!
Makes you put !
your journalist/ !
story-teller hat on!
!


B2B Buyer Persona
What does a B2B buyer persona need to do?
•  A persona works as a relevance tool
•  Removes guesswork from creating valuable content
•  Helps us produce better content for each stage of
the buying cycle
•  Helps support the customer journey
•  Reduce bounce levels or disengagement
•  Avoid pitfall of writing about what we know a lot
about, but is of little value to prospects!


B2B Buyer Personas
The end in mind
Framework to
plan our work
Customers we
can speak to
Interview
questions
Interview
technique
Transcripts
Spreadsheet
Time
Budget
What do we need?


The B2B Buyer Persona Canvas


What are we aiming for?


The Project Statement
Central question
WHO?
Owner
Researcher
Stakeholder
Business context
WHY?
Project roles
Timeframe
# personas
Constraints
Interview notes
Comparative grid
Personas
Recommendations
Deliverables
Minimum
# responses
Requirements
1

2

3

4

5

6


Work Item

Owner

Output

Timing

Planning

Initial conversations with stakeholders to finalize
project scope and outcomes

Stephen

Finalized project statement
and work plan

Week 1

Internal Research

Collect all relevant customer info from internal team

Stephen

List of hypotheses

Week 1

Project Roles

Interviews with stakeholders to build out hypothesis on buyer
personas (gain, pain points, buying criteria, obstacles, etc)

Stephen

Interview guide and contacts list

Week 2

External Research

Schedule execute primary research
(target 2 responses per persona)

Stephen

Raw interview notes

Week 3

Generate Personas

Transition buyer insights to persona profiles

Stephen

3 persona profiles

Week 4

Recommendations

Develop See-Think-Do matrix
and make recommendations for specific assets

Stephen

See-Think-Do matrix for each
persona, asset recommendations

Week 4

Project plan


Customer

Role

Organization

Location

Intermediary

Deal status

Email
contact
made

LinkedIn
contact
made

Interview
date

Notes

Phil Johnson

MD

Portland Motor
Museum

Wiltshire

Justin

Closed deal

14 Feb, 17
Feb, 20 Feb

12 Mar

Rod Hart

FD

Fairview School

Portsmouth
Hampshire

Tarquin

Closed deal

14 Feb, 17
Feb

20 Feb

27 Mar

No response

Jill Fletcher

FD

Lush House
Labs

Gosport
Hampshire

James

Pending deal

26 Feb

14 Mar

Guy Klein

MD

BEH

London

Chris

Signature

3 Apr

Rod Bond

Operations
Director

N/A

Haslemere

Chris

TBC

3 Apr

3 Apr

Interview schedule


List of questions
For B2B
What business conditions trigger
the decision to buy?
What potential obstacles might
prevent them buying?
What results/outcomes do they
seek?
What features does the
buyer evaluate?
What trusted sources of
information do they have?


Intro
Thank, clarify
goals, give
clarification,
agree time, avoid
interruptions
Avoid script
Follow organic agenda,
shape questions around
buyer’s prior responses
Engage buyer
Let them tell their
story
Endure silence
Allow maximum
talking time
Record
Allow for maximum
concentration on
task
Practice interview technique
1
2
3
4
5


Commonalities


The DMU


How many personas do you need?
1. Will
you
generate
more
revenue
if
you

have
more
personas?

2. Do
you
have
the
resources
to
execute?


Remember our goal for 2005: “More from less”

Create 50% fewer items of content, but improve audience engagement by 150%

The more personas we create, the more content we need!


Action

Task

Who

Time

Cost

1

Interview Insiders

Project Leader

1 hour / per
insider

£90

2

Prep Statement of
Work

Project Leader

1.5 hour

£135

3

Interview Qs

Project Leader /
Specialist

2 hours

£180

4

Ask permission

Project Leader

1.5 hours

£135

5

Interview

Project Leader /
Specialist

40 mins / per
customer

£360

Timeframe and budget


Mapping content to buying cycle
Stages of the buying cycle
Mapping and gapping techniques
Content for each stage
£
A

D

I

A

Awareness ladder !
Adapted Wiley Pubs!


Stages of the buying cycle
£
A

D

I

A

Awareness ladder !
Adapted Wiley Pubs!
Jury
Judge
Detective
Bystander


Concentric Dots Ltd

Mapping content to buying cycle


Matching content to buying stage


Concrete Example: Identifying helpful content to assist buyer
•  idio provides predictive content analytics which helps marketers focus content creation budgets in areas that
get pay back (ROI)

•  The software helps marketers make better, more informed data-driven decisions

•  idio software is not bought by one person - there is a DMU

•  Within the DMU is a marketing manager

•  That manager is researching

•  The goal is to “pitch a predictive analytics solution to division head”

1

2

3

4

5

Locate data

Create visuals

Design deck

Schedule

presentation

Pitch idio

to boss

Boss

Marketing

manager loves idio


What type of content helps marketing manager achieve their goal best?
Content options:

1.  Articles - too light, not authoritative

2.  Ebook - too heavy, adds more pain

3.  Demo video - might help vary the pace during the pitch at stage 5

4.  Case studies

5.  Industry trend and benchmark report - provides valuable data to help stage 1

6.  Infographic - could help stage 2

1

2

3

4

5

Locate data

Create visuals

Design deck

Schedule

presentation

Pitch idio

to boss

Boss

Marketing

manager loves idio


Identifying Specific Content for Specific Buyer Problem at Specific Stage


Prospects fall out of funnel due to leaky pipework
Content hard to navigate

Content is irrelevant

Content missing call to action

Content message is vague

No content for stage of cycle

Buyer journey not understood or mapped

Prospects are attracted to website


Use the same process:

1.  Write down a common problem facing your buyer (use insights from
buyer interviews)

2.  Map the steps your persona must take to overcome their problem

3.  List the content resources you can create to help your buyer overcome
that problem

Use B2B buyer persona and journey mapping to create !
content that helps YOUR buyer(s) overcome their problems!


Summary: Matching content to buying stage
Match content to each stage of the journey
Knowledge of personas permeates
Use AIDA – overlay with matrices
Empathy – ask the right questions
Anticipate, avoid leaks, improve retention
Map topics to themes – content types

Thank you for your
time. Questions?
Stephen Bateman
Concentric Dots
stephen@concentricdots.co.uk
@concentricdots
Andrew Davies
idioplatform.com
andrew.davies@idioplatform.com
@idioplatfrom

B2B Buyer Personas: Craft Effective Personas in 4 Steps

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