Buyer Personas: The Difference Between B2C and B2B Personas

Buyer Persona: Putting a Name to the Face

– Profiling customers has long been known to directly impact sales and lead to more beneficial customer relationships. A Buyer-focused strategy is essential to both B2C and B2B focused organizations, however B2B marketing? requires a slightly different approach.

The Buyer Persona

A buyer persona is a fictional representation of a business? real key purchaser. The main purpose for creating buyer personas is to gain insight into the buyer?s goals, concerns, preferences and decision process to enable both marketing and sales the ability to identify and empathize with real prospects.

The typical B2C buyer persona is comprised of the ideal buyer persona?s personal attributes. These attributes then make up the overall buyer description and explains the reasons why they buy. This is called a scenario. The scenario is dependent on the buyer persona?s physical and emotional needs which is often comprised from a combination of factors like:

• Gender
• Education
• Income
• Marital status
• Occupation

The B2B Buyer Persona

For B2B focused organizations, the buyer persona is utilized in a slightly different way. The buyer persona focuses on shared characteristics and the roles in the purchasing business? organization. The personas are developed to understand pain points and motivators of the buyer in order to capitalize on them.

A B2B buyer persona is made up of the answers to things like:

• What are the key performance indicators for the individual in that role?
• What are their goals and ambitions in relation to their job performance?
• What is their educational background?
• Are they more strategic, tactical or resourceful?
• Who do they turn to for advice, justification of their buying decisions?

Marketing and sales teams should adapt their sales approach to the individual as they familiarize themselves with the personas. The personas also help administration and executives relate and identify with prospects the same way. Successful salespeople and Inbound Marketers should know who they are selling to and should sell directly to the role as designed by the personas strategy.

An effective set of buyer-focused materials can help the teams identify the roles and guide them in selling and marketing.

Benefits of the B2B Buyer Persona:

B2B buyer personas are not complicated. They can add another dimension to sales and marketing, increasing productivity and decreasing the amount of time spent training. Personas ultimately:

• Enable a the organization to empathize with the buyer
• Informs the sales team on the way the buyer will most likely react and behave during the purchasing process
• Identify ways to overcome common misconceptions and reasons for not buying

Buyer personas improve sales and marketing strategies and tactics. They also enhance brand alignment and get everyone speaking the same language.

B2B buyer personas are rooted into organizational objectives and business-related targets. While personal characteristics are still important, it should be adapted in a different way to enhance overall B2B business strategy.

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Marketing Matters Inbound?is an inbound marketing firm specializing in online conversions, content?strategy, call-to-action mapping and traditional media placement. Our experience in?B2B digital?marketing?and traditional media allows us to deliver results through a strategic media mix. We believe in?aligning and merging marketing and sales/operations for optimal return on your marketing investment.