A big product launch is coming soon. You’re the one tasked with developing the promotional marketing plan. You’re agonizing over an array of marketing tactics. Some you’ve come up with and some others in the company are recommending.
Imagine a scenario where every time you approached the creation of a marketing plan for a launch, you had the confidence to know which tactics were most likely to attract the right kind of buyers.
Attendees of the product launch class I teach often ask my opinion about marketing tactic ‘A’ or tactic ‘B’. While I don’t specifically address marketing tactics in the class, in this three-part series I’ll share with you 3 success tips that will help you choose the most effective product launch marketing tactics.
Why do product launch marketing programs fail?
Marketing programs fail when they don’t connect with the buyers they’re intended to influence. The reason they don’t connect is because not enough is known about the buyers in the first place. Without a solid understanding of your buyers, you will be guessing and in the process wasting valuable time and money.
Know your buyers
Engineering teams use a tool called a user persona to help guide them in the creation of a useful product. A user persona is a typical example of a user. For more complex products there may be multiple user personas to represent different kinds of users. User personas remove individual bias about who a user is and create a common vision of the user, resulting in better products.
This model can be extended to buyers that are referred to as buyer personas. Just like user personas, buyer personas are archetypes – representative examples – of the people who would buy or influence the purchase of your product. Buyer personas represent typical buyers, not edge-cases or one-offs. They are the people you want your product launch marketing programs to connect with.
Build buyer personas
Start by brainstorming with your colleagues to develop a list of potential buyer personas. Then shorten the list until it represents the typical set of buyers who would be involved in a buying decision. Remember we’re building a tool to help with product launch marketing, not an exhaustive list of every permutation of buyer that could be encountered.
For each buyer persona create a profile that contains details about them – the companies they work in, the titles they might have, who they report to, what they do, the problems they encounter, where they go for information, etc. Start with what you know and identify what you don’t know. Over time make it a point to evolve each buyer persona as more is learned about them.
Through the process of building buyer personas you will develop a deeper understanding of your buyers and what motivates them. As each buyer persona becomes more rich and complex, your ability to find them and connect with them will become more intuitive.
Next Step: Know how buyers buy
The next article in the series expands on the practice of using buyer personas as a tool for marketing by aligning buyer personas with the steps in the buying process. By doing so you create a better understanding of howmarketing programs can influence buyers through their buying process.
Are you using buyer personas now?
How are they helping your marketing efforts?
Read Part 2
