Creating A Customer Avatar That Attracts Clients

Written on 25 May, 2017 by Julia Hammond
Categories Marketing

There is one vital step in a marketing strategy that is often overlooked. It is all well and good to have a great websiteoptimised content, a massive client email list and a following across social media, but they aren’t as important as a Customer Avatar.

It gives your marketing strategy a purpose, allowing you to picture the exact people you are marketing to. In the expanse of the internet, simply putting out a message without proper aim will get lost amongst the roar. Any successful marketing strategy will take the time to ensure that there is a person on the other end of the roar, receiving your message loud and clear. It allows you to determine how to connect with your ideal clients, who they are, and what they need. Stop throwing your marketing into the open and waiting for people to listen, and instead, find the people that will listen.

What is a Customer Avatar?

Don’t worry, no one is painting themselves blue for this. Customer Avatars are a fictitious character made to represent your ideal customers. These characters, which you create, is made up of the prospects which you would like to achieve from your marketing campaign. These key characteristics of your ideal customers can be anything, from demographics to psychographics. It allows you to picture what your ideal customers’ aspirations may be, what their motivations are, problems they may encounter, and how to best strategize your marketing campaign to their benefits.

The more specific you are with the description of your customer avatar- the more precise your marketing campaign can be. The main goals to achieve once you have created your customer avatar is:

  • Knowing where you should advertise in order to gain the best exposure.
  • Campaigns that would garner the most attention from the avatar
  • Language that will appeal to them
  • Any objections they may have, and how to combat these
  • Future products and services of interest

It sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? Being able to customise your marketing campaign to suit your ideal customer and drive the perfect sale. So, how do you do it?

How to create your Customer Avatar

Now that you understand what it is and why it is important, it’s time to know how to make the best custom avatar.

1.       Evaluate your market

There is a basis of hard data that comes into creating your customer avatar. You can’t just go into this process with nothing to back up why you’re delivering your marketing towards that person. There are few basics that you will need to gather in order to create viable description of your ideal customer. Do not base your marketing campaign on guess work, and instead, start with the following:

Quantifiable Characteristics/ Demographics

  • Gender percentages
  • Location
  • Age Range
  • Industry
  • Income
  • Job Title
  • Marital Status
  • Children
  • Education Background

Psychographics

  • Challenges they may be facing
  • Characteristics in their personality
  • Information Sources
  • Worrying factors in life
  • Their desired outcomes
  • Values
  • Hobbies

By identifying the key factors in their lives, and the factors surrounding them that my influence or impact their decision making can allow you to better optimise your marketing campaign to reflect positively to them. You are, at the end of the day, trying to solve a problem that they may be encountering in their life and offering a solution, no matter what industry that may be in.

  1. Identify the Gap

There is always something compelling the person to invest their money in your product or business. If they didn’t feel the motivation to solve a problem in their life, there would be no need for them to buy your product – plain and simple.  When creating your avatar, you need to identify why they may be compelled to buy your product or service. What in their life is pushing them? Dig deeper, instead of accepting the surface level response that they may give initially.

  1. Time to Create

Once you have identified the above factors, it’s time to put it to action! This is where you create your perfect customer avatar, and skyrocket your marketing.

The first step in this process is picturing the appearance of your avatar. How might they dress? Are they tall, or short? What hair colour do they have? Are they wearing a suit, or a tracksuit? The next step after you have identified the overall look of your ideal customer is to humanise them. Give them a name. Next, write their current life situation. Identify the problems that they may be facing in their lives, and how your product or service is going to solve it. What reaction might they have, and if its negative, how will you resolve it? The last step is to summarise. Make it easy for you to go back to and refer to when needed, and ensure that you understand your customer avatar inside out.

You have now discovered, and created, your ideal customer.

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