Creating your customer profiles
Once you’ve spent some really valuable time talking to your customers and worked out who loves your product the most, we can now use this new learning to create our customer profile sheets. These profiles are the different types of customers that we really want to sell to. Like ‘Yana the Yoga Instructor’, we want to know who they are, why they buy your product and where we can find more of them.
When you have completed these profile sheets you should pin them to your wall, or stick them on your fridge, or put them anywhere you will see them regularly so that you are constantly be thinking of better ways to serve and communicate with them. You need to create a customer profile sheet not for everyone that is a customer, but for the main customer types you sell to (or want to sell to). How many profiles you create depends on your business, but two or three is a good number. You might also want to think about the 80 / 20 rule. This is a fairly reliable rule that traditionally companies get 80% of their profits from 20% of their customers. So, focus on creating profiles for those customers who are generating the most money for you. The 80 / 20 rule can also be turned upside-down, and it might be that you get 80% of your hassle and problems from 20% of your customers! If this is the case for you, then either make sure that the profiles you create avoid the kinds of customers that create the most problems, or specifically profile these problem customers as a separate exercise to find out why you’re getting it so wrong with them.
The first thing you want to do is give each profile a name. It should be a person’s name. It should be descriptive. It should rhyme or be easy to remember like ‘Kath the Cafe Owner’, ‘Erica the Stressed Exec (Stressed Erica)’, ‘Retired Ruby’, ‘Looking for a Bargain Bob (Bargain Bob)’. And yes, these are all real examples from companies I’ve worked with. Next, they need a picture. Have some fun! Find a photo online or in a magazine or use your amazing artistic skills to draw one yourself.
And now it’s time to bring this person to life in glorious detail. Remember, we’re thinking about our best customers here. Yes, ‘Stressed Erica’ might be any age between 21 to 55 – but in general if it’s the ones who are over 40 who connects the most with your product, then that’s the one we are going to create a customer profile for.
Your customer profiles should include:
Name: The name you are going to give this type of customer, to make them easy to remember and refer back to with your team.
Photo: Find a photo online, cut one out of a magazine or get creative and draw one!
Description: A one or two sentence description of who they are: Stressed executive who doesn’t have time to make food or read long emails; Yoga instructor who works early mornings and late evenings and does all her buying during the day.
What age are they? In general, are they under a certain age, over a certain age, in a certain age bracket?
Their gender: In the main, are they usually female, male or identify as something else? If they are genuinely a combination in equal measure, does that matter? Do they behave differently? If so, do you need a separate customer profile for each gender?
Where are they? Where do they live? To you this might be a general region, such as ‘South West’, or a specific city such as ‘Bristol’, or if you offer a personal service it might be a specific suburb such as ‘Clifton’.
Are they vegan? Yes, no or on their way to being. You might actually break down your different customers by if they are vegan or not: eg ‘Vegan Vinny’, ‘Vegetarian Valarie’, ‘Omni Ollie’.
How long have they been vegan? Again, we’re looking to generalise. Are they likely to be recent vegan converts, or have they been vegan for many years?
Why are they vegan? Are they currently vegan for their fitness, their health, the environment, for the animals, because their children are, or something else?
What’s their direction of travel? Will they still likely be vegan for the same reason as above in the future? If they are plant-based just for fitness then how long will that last? Will they stay that way for a long time, or in six months will they have moved further along their journey?
What main problem are they looking for your product to fix? Really drill down on this one. Is the problem you think your product solves actually the real reason they buy it? Are you saving them time with meal prep because they don’t think they have the time to eat healthily? Are you giving them something they need but struggle to find as vegan? Or are you letting them help the vegan cause by donating to you even though they don’t feel they have time to do any direct action themselves?
Do they need your product or is it a luxury? Is your product something that they really need in life (e.g. something they need to do their job, vegan pet food etc) or is it something they want rather than need? E.g. cake. Lots of cake.
How do they use your product or service? Do they use it in a way that is unique to them? Do they only use it when at home or in their lunch hour? Do they use it as social experience or just to get a job done?
What is their job? How are they likely to make a living? Are they full-time employed, do they run a business, are they a student? Do they work in an office, do they work from home, do they get a lunch break?
What is their income? How much do they earn (if you are not sure, do some research on what you think their likely job would be to work out a likely income) and how much money do they likely have left at the end of the month?
Do they impulse buy your product or do they go through a long decision-making process? Some products take a lot of time to research and make a decision on, others you buy off the shelf as you are passing. You might think your product is an impulse buy, but your customer might actually take a lot longer comparing options than you realise. It is really important you find this out in your research and put it here.
Where do they get their decision-making information? Are they going to YouTube to watch reviews? Are they going to Amazon to find products? Are they getting recommendations from their friends or are they being told what to buy by their boss?
Which influencers do they follow? Whose videos are they watching? Whose stories do they follow daily on Instagram? Who do they trust and like? Who do they identify with?
What websites do they use the most? Personally in their own time, but also if you are selling to business customers then what websites do they use as part of their job? Which sites do they love and why?
What social media platforms do they use? This is really important for you to know. It seems like nearly everyone is on Facebook but Instagram is also hugely popular with vegans. Again, if you are selling to other businesses, find out which social media they use for their company and where they get their most interaction.
