User Personas: Reach Your Target Audience
Many business owners are afraid of alienating potential customers, so instead they market to the masses. What could go wrong? At Big Bad Marketing, we see this approach as a problem. Why? Because:
If you talk to everyone, you talk to no one.
User personas can help you identify ideal customers within your target audience, and speak directly to them.
Instead of casting a wide net, user personas guide you to use the right bait, and the right hook, and go to the perfect spot to catch your big, bad, fish!
What is a User Persona?
A user persona is a fictional, detailed description of your ideal customer. It outlines key demographics, preferences, and behaviors of those in your target audience. Personas help you create content for a specific customer, not a general, blanket audience.
Crafting specific user personas for your customer archetypes can help you better understand their pain points and how you can solve them, and speak directly to your prospects through your content.
How Do User Personas Help Small Business Owners?
Personas help business owners understand who their target audience is. Depending on your unique business structure and how you segment your audience, you might only need one persona, or you could create a few (more on this below.)
With this info, you’ll create engaging and compelling messaging that resonates with your customers and makes them feel understood. Then, they’ll buy!
For example, if you own a spa, your audience may be made up of a broad group of customers like:
✔️Young people
Your user persona would be a fictional character that represents your ‘young people’ customer base, so your messaging lands well and speaks to them.
Benefits of User Personas for a Small Business
✅Save Money: User personas allow you to make well-thought-out, data-driven decisions when it comes to your marketing and ad spending.
✅Make MORE Money: Since you’re targeting the right audience, and you’re being specific with your message, you’ll be more likely to convert leads and bump up your revenue.
✅Reach the Right People: No more guessing, no more assuming. Personas are like a map to actual customers. If you don’t have any customers yet, check out who your competitors are targeting (and while you’re at it do some competitive intelligence, or wait until you’ve got 5-10 sales under your belt.
Segment Your Audience: Make Multiple User Personas
Segmenting your audience, or grouping customers into categories, helps you better target your ideal people. For each segment, you’ll develop a user persona. Then, iInstead of lumping all customers together, content, messaging, and service offerings are tailored to each segment.
Your business probably has multiple distinct audiences. So, revisiting our spa example, let’s add a few more audience segments:
✔️Young people
✔️Athletes
✔️Self-care lovers
Each of these audience segments has a different intention, different motivation, and cares about different things. Let’s fill in a few more details for each segment:
✔️Young people ▶️ Millennial, mostly women, seeking relaxation, luxury experiences, and trendy treatments.
✔️Athletes ▶️ Athletes focused on post-game recovery, healing sports injuries, and minimizing pain.
✔️Self-care lovers ▶️ Older men and women looking for ‘me time’ and to treat themselves.
A one-size-fits-all marketing approach isn’t going to work because these groups will be convinced to buy for different reasons.
So, the more information we have as we build out our user personas, the better we can leverage marketing materials and speak to right people in the right way.
4 Steps to Create a User Persona (and 3 Real Examples!)
Creating a user persona for your small business marketing doesn’t have to be complex or overwhelming. Use this step-by-step guide to build out your user personas.
Download our free user persona template to start building yours. Plus, use our Big Bad Marketing sample user persona as an example.
Create A User Persona
1. Collect Data - Gather info like demographics, behaviors, and preferences, to understand what drives your customers to make a purchase. You can use data from customer history, surveys, reviews, and digital analytics in your research. Personas should be based on facts, not ideals or guesses. BONUS - Look at who your competition is speaking to in their marketing materials for clues and hints.
2. Analyze - Notice any patterns in purchases, commonalities among those who buy from you or express interest, and themes that emerge from the data.
3. Create Your Persona - Give them a name, age, and job. Describe general habits and behaviors. What are their motivations? Their values? List types of marketing and media they’ll be most likely to see and use.
4. Tell Their Story - Map out pain points that would lead them to buy your product. Consider obstacles or challenges that might get in the way of them buying. Create a narrative about how your product/service solves their problems and integrates their motivations, behaviors, values, and purchase drivers.
Once you’ve got your persona, print out their picture. Bring them with you to marketing meetings and ‘let them have a seat at the table.’ Your persona should have a presence in the decision-making. Think about how they would respond, react, and receive the messaging.
3 User Persona Examples
Check out these user persona we’ve developed for our three audience segments from the spa:
✔️Young people ▶️ Millennial women seeking relaxation, luxury experiences, and trendy treatments.
⏩ Olivia is a 28-year-old marketing professional who follows wellness influencers, books experiences over products, and finds spas through Instagram and TikTok. While she loves trendy treatments and aesthetically pleasing spa spaces, her busy schedule and price sensitivity make her selective. To win her over, spas need clear pricing, easy online booking, and influencer-backed promotions that fit seamlessly into her digital world.
✔️Athletes ▶️ Athletes focused on post-game recovery, healing sports injuries, and minimizing pain.
⏩ Jake is a 35-year-old personal trainer and former athlete who prioritizes performance and recovery. He researches fitness trends, values evidence-based treatments, and is skeptical of “fluffy” spa services. He’s interested in deep tissue massages, cryotherapy, and sports recovery treatments but needs to see clear benefits and expert-backed recommendations. Spas can reach him through YouTube, LinkedIn, and partnerships with coaches or fitness professionals.
✔️Self-care lovers ▶️ Older people looking for ‘me time’ and to treat themselves.
⏩ Linda is a 52-year-old HR manager who values relaxation and wellness but doesn’t always prioritize it. She prefers familiar, trusted brands and enjoys spa treatments that offer stress relief and a personal touch. She’s drawn to membership perks, seasonal specials, and referral discounts, especially when recommended by friends. Spas can connect with her through Facebook, email marketing, and local promotions that emphasize relaxation and self-care.
How User Personas Help
Through personas we acknowledge that each of our audience segments has different values, behaves differently, and is hanging out on different digital platforms.
When done correctly you’re able to create a holistic experience for leads. Prospects and customers feel understood and seen: they’re confident you can solve their problem and then they buy!
Put Your User Personas to Work
Once you’ve segmented your target audiences and made a few personas, you can craft landing pages, unique posts, and targeted content across channels that speak directly to each audience.
Get started now. Download our annual marketing calendar and map out a plan to align messaging about what matters most to each group at the perfect time.
Let’s check back to our spa’s segmented audiences for an example:
✔️Young people ▶️ Summer relaxation packages, influencer-led giveaways, and holiday gift guides.
✔️Athletes ▶️ Recovery content during peak sports seasons, injury-prevention workshops, and local athlete partnerships.
✔️Self-care lovers ▶️ Stress-relief promotions around the new year, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, pampering campaigns, and loyalty program perks.
Let Your Small Biz User Personas Evolve
Like your business, your fictional customer characters should change, grow, and develop over time. As the market and business landscapes change, so should your user personas.
Revisit them periodically (once a year or so) to update and refresh. If you’d like a hand creating your user personas, set up a FREE 15-minute call with the Big Bad Marketing Team. We’ll segment your audience, build a strategy, and get you talking to the right people, YOUR PEOPLE!
