PR TIPS WITH ANIKA

PR TIPS WITH ANIKA

Knowing Your Customer

While you may feel that you know your brand story, you may still be stumped on what types of stories will resonate for your audience - whether consumers, future customers, or journalists. As you’re ramping up your holiday messaging, it’s important to hone in on your ideal customer, above all else. New York Times best-selling author Ramit Sethi said it best: “Algorithms change. Tactics change. But the fundamentals of learning what people want, seeing exactly where you can help them, and then telling the right people about it are classic strategies that worked 1,000 years ago and will work 1,000 years from now.” In order to be an effective marketer, it is vital to understand your audience(s) and tell your brand story or entrepreneurial journey in a way that they will identify with. This is where customer personas come in. First of all, if you haven’t yet, identify your ideal customer. How do you know your ideal customer, if you haven’t identified them yet?

They should benefit from your product or service. This is someone who gets their exact needs met by what you’re offering. They should be defined as someone you want to target based on your current business initiatives. For example, you’re an entrepreneur releasing a new book geared toward young professionals on how to thrive in corporate America. Targeting soon-to-be graduates would be an ideal customer.

This can feel strangely limiting, like you are excluding other audiences who might benefit from your brand. But focusing on the right people brings clarity to your marketing efforts which ultimately leads to a more profitable business. If you are focused and ready for PR as part of your marketing strategy, make sure to include journalists in your niche as one of your personas!

Once you have a list of at least two or three ideal customers, then you will create personas for each of these subgroups. Each persona is a semi-fictional character who represents key traits of each ideal customer.

This is an exercise in both patience and creativity! For each persona, come up with a name. Then write down the following information.

Demographic information: Where does this person live? How old are they? What gender? Relationship status? What kind of career do they have? What would their budget be for your offer?

Habits: What social media channels does this persona use? How do they get their news? What are their favorites: brands of clothing, books, foods, drinks, vacation spots, interests?

Psychographic information: Does the persona have any enemies? Who are their heroes? What do they want out of life, personally and professionally? How do they seek approval?

Most importantly: How do they want to be perceived? What are their pain points? And what problem are you solving for them?

Working through these two items will help you guide your brand and business efforts in creating more effective communication so that they meet your customers needs. Map back strategies to meet your ideal consumers where they live, take care of their pain points, and match your messages to each one individually.

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