Free Guide! The 8 Key Ingredients for Effective Email Marketing
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We’ve all been there before—you’re scrolling through your Instagram feed, and an ad comes up that perfectly resonates with you. The product looks like it could solve all your problems, the caption sounds like your bestie wrote it, and the gal in the ad looks like she could be part of your girl gang. You may wonder how the social media algorithms can target you so well. It all comes back to one key equation: customer personas for digital marketing.
Customer personas are your secret weapon for targeted, impactful digital marketing. They’re not dry and dusty stereotypes of who you think your customer is. Customer personas are vibrant portrayals of your ideal clients, built from real data and insights that you’ve uncovered—like their demographics, interests, online behavior, and most importantly, what they want and need (even if they don’t know it yet).
So why are personas so important to your digital marketing? Think of your personas as guides, steering you towards who to engage with, what content you should create, and how to build meaningful connections.
Gone are the days of sending an email to your list just for the sake of it. By using customer personas, you can discover the important details of your audience, like their demographics, online behavior, and preferred platforms. And once you know that, you’ll know exactly where to spend your time and energy so you don’t spread yourself thin. No more wasted efforts, just targeted digital approaches that hit the mark every time.
Every audience has its own way of communicating. Not only what you create for your audience is important; how you say it is just as important.
When you create a customer persona, you can find out your audience’s preferences on what digital platforms they use (like social media) and what type of content they like to consume (like blogs or videos)—then use that to help guide what you communicate to your audience. You’ll want to connect with your ideal client in a way that feels like a casual conversation, not a sales pitch. The best advice we’ve heard: create content as if you’re talking to your best gal pal.
It’s a common misconception about digital marketing that you have to be doing ~all the things~ in order to shine on the internet. But when you consider where your target customer shows up online, you’ll find that you don’t need to spread yourself thin and be everywhere all at once.
For example, at Maribloom, we recognize that our ideal customer isn’t spending any or much of their time on Twitter—and that’s exactly why we don’t have a presence on that platform. (Plus, we’re not fans of supporting billionaires in their space adventures, but we digress!)
What we do know is that our customer personas are more likely to digest content through emails and social media, which is why we send a weekly email (sign up for it here) and post frequently on Instagram.
By being present where your personas are most likely to engage, you’re spending your time and energy wisely. Plus—bonus—when you show up where your audience is likely to hang out, you’re more likely to create lasting connections, build trust, and create a community. Which leads us to our next reason why customer personas are important to digital marketing…
At Maribloom, we’re huge advocates for relationship-based marketing. We don’t see our products and services as one-and-done transactions. We want our clients and customers to succeed, and we’re here to support them with their ever-evolving digital ecosystems.
You may feel the same about your business—you see your customers as more than just transactions with random people. By creating customer personas, you can help you see your audience as individuals with real stories, real goals, and real wants and needs. This will help foster trust, strengthen loyalty, and transform your customers into enthusiastic brand advocates.
Remember, lasting online connections built on support and trust will transcend a single transaction any day.
Creating insightful customer personas requires gathering data and translating it into actionable insights. Luckily there are several free tools that can streamline the process and make it more efficient for you. Here are a few of Maribloom’s favorites:
This interactive tool guides you through a step-by-step process, asking key questions and generating a basic persona template. It’s a great starting point if you’re new to customer personas for digital marketing and aren’t sure where to start.
These customer persona templates from SEMRush can help you easily and quickly assemble your customer persona profiles. Their editable and customizable tool lets you select various modules to build your buyer and user personas.
If you’re going to survey your audience, Google Forms is a free option to gather lots of info. We use Google Forms for just about every touchpoint where we’re requesting a lot of information at once.
Remember, creating a persona isn’t about stereotyping, but about really *getting* your customer. Once you discover your customer personas, you’ll be able to create targeted messaging, build authentic connections, and make data-driven decisions for your digital marketing.
Nicole is the CEO & founder of Maribloom Digital Studio. When she’s not nerding out over digital strategy, you can find her reading, traveling, doing pilates, or hanging with her husband and corgi.
Hey there! I'm Nicole—founder of Maribloom, digital strategist, and your business's new biggest fan...
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Read more about me
I'm Nicole, digital strategist and your business's new biggest fan...
sign up to receive our digital tips, tricks, and advice
sign up and get our best digital tips, tricks, and advice
THANKS!