Creating a Customer Avatar

Why we need to do this …

We do this for a number of good reasons:

• It’s essential to have an image of who we are talking to when we design our products and marketing messages.
• Knowing their interests helps us find and target them more cost effectively

How we are going to do this …

• We divide our target market into segments. We can do this in a number of ways:
  • How good/skilled/experienced they are
  • What their appetite and budget is 
  • What their desired outcome is
• For each one, create an avatar using the questions below. 

Section 1: Demographics

• Name:
• Age:
• Gender:
• Marital status:
• Age and # of children:
• Location:
• Field of occupation:
• Job title:
• Annual income:
• Education level:

Section 2: Challenges & Pain Points

• What are this customer’s top 3 challenges?
• What are this customer’s top 3 pain points?
• What is your customer not good at?
• What is your customer uncertain about?
• What does your customer no longer want to experience?
• What does your customer no longer want to feel?
• What does your customer have bad dreams about?

Section 3: Goals, Desires and Values

• What are this customer’s top 3 goals?
• What are this customer’s top values?
• What are they committed to? What do they believe in?
• What they want to get better at?
• What do they want to experience?
• What do they want to feel?
• What does your customer have pleasant / daydreams about?

Section 4: Sources of Information

• What books does your customer read (which other people would be unlikely to)?
• What magazines does your customer subscribe to (which other people would be unlikely to)?
• What blogs and websites does your customer visit (which other people would be unlikely to)?
• Which conferences and events as your customer attend (which other people would be unlikely to)?
• What experts does your customer follow (which other people would be unlikely to)?
• What other interests or activities as your customer have or do (which other people would be unlikely to)?

Section 5: Buying Behaviour

• What objections would your customer be likely to have?
• What role does the customer have in the purchase process?
• Who else would be likely to influence the customer in terms of buying?
• How comfortable is the customer likely to be at buying online versus face-to-face or over the phone?

Section 6: Outcomes & Alternatives

• What transformation is the customer looking for (from and to what):
• How would they visualise that transformation? (Where would they be and what would they be doing?)
• What alternatives do they have to our solution, and why don’t they give the same result?

Section 7: Context of Problem or Need

• How or when do they discover they have a need?
• Who do they first discuss solving this problem with?
• Where do they usually do their research to solve this problem?
• Where do they look to find companies to solve this problem?