{"id":2667,"date":"2023-03-16T18:56:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-16T18:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecontentconsultancy.com\/?p=2667"},"modified":"2023-03-17T10:15:18","modified_gmt":"2023-03-17T10:15:18","slug":"the-customer-avatar-myth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecontentconsultancy.com\/the-customer-avatar-myth\/","title":{"rendered":"The Customer Avatar Myth"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>This is a totally controversial one, but I have to be honest and admit that I have always found it quite difficult to write for &#8216;a customer avatar&#8217;. I feel it is actually a bit of myth that it helps with consistency, voice or formality.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What about you?<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>In this blog, I explain what a customer avatar is and the idea behind using them to help with messaging&#8230;and then I&#8217;ll give you an alternative approach that I use. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What is a customer avatar?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>When you have done work around your target audience and slimmed this down to an &#8216;ideal client&#8217; or &#8216;ideal clients&#8217;. A common device is then to create a customer avatar&#8230;or two&#8230;or more&#8230;which is a profile which builds an imaginary person that encapsulates all of this detail. The profile can include a stock image type photo and the list key personal information and demographic details, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>age<\/li><li>gender <\/li><li>family and\/or marital status<\/li><li>place of residence or business&nbsp;<\/li><li>education <\/li><li>occupation &#8211; job title, type and income<\/li><li>income<\/li><li>preferred social media platforms<\/li><li>TV\/films\/magazine preferences<\/li><li>interests and hobbies<\/li><li>values <\/li><li>pain points<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>As a marketeer, the idea is that you then imagine this person and write for or create content for them &#8211; an imaginary figure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What do you mean by customer avatar myth?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The above sounds sensible BUT for I know that many find it really difficult to truly imagine this person. Even if they do the work to create the avatar (which many don&#8217;t even get around to), they struggle to really digest and get a feel for who they are and what they will be interested in.  I know some people find it really hard to truly believe in and buy in to who the &#8216;fake&#8217; or &#8216;avatar&#8217; person really is and the details they have assigned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have never written one, it is not always the easiest to create either.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What happens next? It can leave you feeling quite lost. You over analyse what to write or create because, in truth, you can&#8217;t really visualise this imaginary avatar. The over analysis can even extend in to lots of very different styles or &#8216;feel&#8217; of content, as you try to cover all bases. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, it is really important to be &#8216;on message&#8217; and it is essential, I believe, to know exactly who your audience is for any piece of content and hence who you are creating it for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What can I do instead?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>In big corporate businesses this may not work so well, but for small businesses I have the most non-revolutionary solution (!) <strong>&#8230;instead of a made up customer avatar use a real person&#8230;someone who you know.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the privacy of your own desk, imagine that person who you LOVE working with&#8230;.that person who you LOVE that buys from you. Because for most of us, that&#8217;s who we want more of! <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you don&#8217;t have that one person yet&#8230;consider two&#8230;and pick their best features! You can then use the list above to create a profile (and you can even change their name if you want, if you are worried about someone seeing it) but trust me I think it is so much easier to write and create content for someone you know. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you don&#8217;t have the &#8216;perfect person&#8217; for all sections of your market or if you are simply a start up or new business and not quite there yet, then you can use someone you &#8216;dream&#8217; of working with. No matter how new your business is, I bet there is someone you would love to snag! <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This alternative approach can also be a lot quicker than trying to &#8216;make up&#8217; all of the answers to the above listed sections. Most of them you probably know already&#8230;you are actually just recording facts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Depending on your relationship with the individual, you could even ask them to help you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Why does it work?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>For me (and this is my personal experience), when I work with clients who have a made up customer avatar, I instantly try to &#8220;map&#8221; it on to someone I know, who is very similar in real life. It is so much easier. I am lucky that with a wide network of people and a bit of life experience, there is often someone I have met that fits closely enough or I can use a combination of a couple of people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, when I am writing I have really clear vision in my head of THAT exact person reading what I am writing. I can imagine (and sort of &#8216;hear&#8217;!) their responses as I start drafting something. I&#8217;ll &#8220;hear&#8221; criticisms too like &#8220;Well I don&#8217;t know what that means?&#8221; or &#8220;Why are you telling me that?&#8221; &#8230;as well as compliments &#8220;Oooh that&#8217;s useful!&#8221; or  &#8220;now, I didn&#8217;t know that&#8221; or &#8220;where can I buy\/invest\/find out more?&#8221; .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ok&#8230;I sound a bit crazy now, I know, but I hope you get the sense that using this &#8216;real life person&#8217; gives me real clarity of who I am writing the content for, their level of knowledge, the reason for their interest, their potential intent, and also what the call to action should be. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Your real-life ideal client<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have been struggling with consistency, messaging or feeling like you don&#8217;t really know who you are trying to reach, give this approach a try.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>I would love to hear how you get on. Has it made it easier? Does your content creation feel freer? Is it flowing more?<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Identifying our key messages and who our content should engage with and appeal to is an important part of what we do in The Content Club. Fancy joining us? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-layout-flex wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button aligncenter is-style-fill\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link has-white-color has-text-color has-background\" href=\"https:\/\/thecontentconsultancy.com\/the-content-club\/\" style=\"background-color:#9a2e65\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Learn more about The Content Club<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is a totally controversial one, but I have to be honest and admit that I have always found it quite difficult to write for &#8216;a customer avatar&#8217;. I feel it is actually a bit of myth that it helps with consistency, voice or formality. What about you? In this blog, I explain what a&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":9523,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,32],"tags":[180,62,302,182],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Customer Avatar Myth - The Content Consultancy<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This is a totally controversial one, but I have to be honest and admit that I have always found it quite difficult to write for &#039;a customer avatar&#039;. 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