Copywriting Q&A: What’s a Persona?

Today’s question comes from Dave G., who asks: “I have kick-off next week to write a persona. So I don’t walk in there completely blind…what’s a persona?”

Good question! And we would never let you go into a kick-off completely blind–so here’s some illumination. A “persona” is a description of an imaginary person that represents one of your brand’s target audiences. It’s basically a composite of all of the most pertinent details of the demographic: age, interests, income; and things relevant to what you’re trying to sell, like buying habits and favorite brands.

You’ll work on personas most often when a company or product is just being created or when it’s going through a rebranding. They can be great for helping the team that’s building the new product (or rebranding a current one) to keep the wants and needs of their target audience front and center. They’ll help you “put a face” on your target audience; both figuratively and literally, since a persona is also usually named (Power-Shopper Pauline, for example) and paired with a stock photo of what this person might look like.

In your kick-off, you’ll probably be given the demographic information and what key personality points they’d like you to include. (And, if for some reason they don’t give you this information–ask for it.) From there, it will be up to you to craft a personality from all of the data.

Good luck and let us know how it goes!