Personas are a hot topic. Marketers either love them or doubt their value. With customers and marketers alike becoming more demanding for content that's relevant to them, personas are the fuel that powers a marketer's ability to make meaningful connections.
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Personas and Content Marketing
1. Personas & Content Marketing
Ardath Albee
CEO & B2B Marketing Strategist
@ardath421
2. • This webinar is being recorded! Slides and recordings will
be sent to you later today
• Questions? Type them into the chat box and we will get
to them after the webinar is over
• Posting to social! Make sure to use #mktgnation and
@ardath421
Housekeeping
8. B2B Buyer’s Primary Reason for
Seeking Content
Economist – Executive Perceptions of Content 2014
16%
75%
8%
9. 85%of marketers say
that understanding buyers
will be their #1
responsibility in two years.
ITSMA
10. A persona is a composite sketch of a target market
based on validated commonalities that actively informs
content strategy to drive productive buyer engagement.
15. Characteristics:
What buyers need to
know to gain the
confidence to change
NO:
What features does your product have?
YES:
Given my situation, why should I care?
How do I eliminate X to achieve Y?
What can I do now that I couldn’t do before?
19. Characteristics:
Written from their perspective
Could be read out loud as a
dialogue
Puts you in their “shoes”
NO:
Sally is a hard worker who is determined to
make product launches more efficient.
YES:
I’m struggling to get products to market
faster because our processes are too
convoluted but my boss is worried that
changing them will create more chaos.
20. Characteristics:
Where your buyers are
What they will engage
with in each place
NO:
Pinterest is cool! We have to be
there!
YES:
LinkedIn – these groups / topics
Twitter for blogs & infographics
22. • Tell me about your job… (A Day in the Life)
• What happened that made you look for a solution? (Problem)
• What was the outcome you were trying to achieve? (Objective)
• What did you need to learn about? (Questions)
• Why couldn’t you solve this internally? (A Day in the Life)
• Who else was involved? (Persona identification)
• Where did you find the most useful information? (Engagement, channels)
• What kind of pushback did you get? (Obstacles, Questions)
• Do you remember the turning point when everyone got on board?
What happened? (Engagement scenarios, Sales enablement)
Customer Interviews
23. • Who do you interact with at a prospect company?
• Who influences them? Or who do they need to influence?
• What questions do they ask?
• How do they describe the problems they’re solving?
• Why haven’t they solved it already?
• What do they need to build the business case?
• What types of pushback do you get?
Sales Interviews
24. • LinkedIn – review profiles for people like your personas
• Responsibilities
• Orientation – look at their recommendations, length in career
• Groups
• Analyst & Research reports on the industry
• Leading industry, thought leader blogs
• Competitor websites, blogs, social media profiles, case
studies
• Adwords Keyword Tool
External Research
25. • Actively inform content strategy
• Increase relevance by showcasing value
• Make buyers the hero of the story
• Help drive buyer outreach
• A Flexible Framework for building relationships
• Alignment with sales teams
What to Expect from Buyer Personas
26. Thank You!
Ardath Albee
CEO & B2B Marketing Strategist
Marketing Interactions, Inc.
@ardath421
ardath@marketinginteractions.com
Hi Everyone!
Thanks so much for joining us today!
We are thrilled to have Ardath Albee here today to speak on Personas and Content Marketing.
Ardath Albee brings over 30 years of business management and marketing experience to help companies with digital marketing strategy and compelling content to turn prospects into buyers.
Ardath has written two books about her obsession, Digital Relevance and eMarketing Strategies for the Complex Sale. She’s been recognized as a 2014 Woman to Watch in B2B by FierceCMO and spent the last four years on the 50 Most Influential People in Sales and Lead Management list.