Whether you are a B2B or B2C marketer, it’s important to be able to group your customers and consumers into meaningful buying behavior groups or segments. Within those segments, buyers will reflect different personas. Developing a persona schema or model takes time and solid research. It can be efficient and helpful to work from an existing model.

Leverage an Existing Persona Model

Claritas created one of the most established persona models based on life cycle.  This type of model can work well in the financial and health care industries.  Another option is to use the consumer personas developed by Acxiom which has consumers falling into three main groups:

1. ‘Secure and better off’
2. ‘Status quo’
3. ‘Worse off and worried’

While both of these groups apply to consumers, B2B buyers are people too. And as people it is possible to see some of the same characteristics of consumers within a B2B buyer.

Seven Persona Types

Here’s how you might leverage the research by Acxiom as a starting point. From their groups there are 7 personas:

Cautious But Confident
This would be your buyers who are well established in their profession. They can be visionary and will take calculated risks. They are often in the position of making buying decisions and will do so after conducting a great deal of due diligence. They are open to new ideas and change. If convinced they can be valuable champions/advocates.

Protecting The Plan 
While smart and with a lot of business savvy; these buyers are invested in the current plan of action, perhaps even created it or will benefit from its completion. They will be wary of deviating off course. It will take extremely solid reasons for them make a change. They have the authority or influence to bring about change if it is to their benefit.

Business As Usual
These are the buyers who are comfortable with how things operate today. They may posses both control and authority. They are unlikely to rock the boat and are not particularly visionary. 

Head Down, Fingers Crossed
These are buyers who focused on what needs to be done now.  Their only view is what’s right in front of them which is completely in their control.  They are not particularly concerned or focused on the long term. They are motivated by how the “purchase” affects things NOW.

Up Against It
These are buyers are stressed and feel a sense of risk for real or perceived reasons – such as impending reorgs, new technology, new management, tight deadlines.  They often worry about keeping their job and/or failing.  They tend to be risk averse but do exert control over their domain.  They lean towards proven and accepted options.

Victims of Casualties
These are buyers who have for various reasons been forced numerous times into roles and/or new companies not of their choosing. It may be due to circumstances beyond their control – layoffs, reorgs, mergers.  Like the up against it, they worry about keeping their job and feel they are not in control.

Life Goes On
These are buyers who are typically nearing the end of their career or time with the company. They’ve seen it and done it. They may even feel they are worse off now then before and that’s just how things go in business. They may be in positions of control and authority, but their eye is on making it to the finish line.

The Value of Behavioral Targeting

The beauty of personas is that they support the idea of behavioral targeting. More and more companies are investing in behavioral targeting. The concept of behavioral targeting is to collect and analyze customer purchase patterns and activities over a period of time.  This data provides critical information about the purchasing process and triggers. Ideally you would want to connect the behavior to specific personas, and then tailor your communication in order to serve the right message and right time to the right people.

Putting Behavioral Targeting into Practice

How might you use it? For example, let’s say you do a fair amount of online advertising and use an advertising network. By using behavioral targeting you would pay to reach only potential customers who have demonstrated interest, and serve ads only on Web pages that these customers visit and have affordable ad space.

There are some challenges associated with this approach; the biggest one being is overcoming privacy concerns. Customers are wary of being monitored and tracked whether they are consumers or business customers. And the ability to distinguish multiple people using the same computer or reconciling the same person on multiple computers with different user names is still difficult.

Still, the merits outweigh the drawbacks.  And one of the key tenants of behavioral targeting is to target the right customers and to have a very clear idea of the persona for the correct set of customers. Remember, personas are different than profiles and roles in that they incorporate goals and behaviors. The objective of developing personas is to enable you to create a unique message and experience for that group of customers

Perhaps some of the personas identified here reflect some of the buyers you encounter. If so, design a Marketing strategy that addresses their concerns. If not, develop your own schema.

You will need to develop questions to help you identify which persona matches a particular buyer.  Once you have your personas identified, consider adding personas as a field in your contact management database (you may need to re-tag your contacts). and your customer journey maps.

FAQ:

Q1:Why should marketers use persona models in segmentation?
A: Personas help group customers into meaningful buying behavior segments, enabling tailored messaging and strategies that resonate more deeply with distinct buyer types, improving engagement and conversion.

Q2:What are some established persona models I can leverage?
A:

• Claritas Life Cycle Model: Effective in financial and healthcare industries, based on customer life stages.
• Acxiom Consumer Personas: Groups consumers into “Secure and Better Off,” “Status Quo,” and “Worse Off and Worried,” with further refinement into seven detailed persona types.

Q3:What are the seven Acxiom-based persona types for B2B buyers?
A:

1. Cautious But Confident: Visionary, risk-calculating decision makers open to new ideas.
2. Protecting The Plan: Wary of change, invested in current strategies, influential in decision-making.
3. Business As Usual: Comfortable with status quo, unlikely to initiate change.
4. Head Down, Fingers Crossed: Focused on immediate tasks, less concerned with long-term.
5. Up Against It: Stressed, risk-averse, focused on proven solutions.
6. Victims of Casualties: Often displaced by external factors, feeling lack of control.
7. Life Goes On: Nearing career end, experienced but disengaged.

Q4:How does behavioral targeting complement personas?
A: Behavioral targeting analyzes purchase patterns and online activities to deliver the right message to the right persona at the right time, enhancing relevance and marketing efficiency.

Q5:What are challenges with behavioral targeting?
A: Privacy concerns and technical difficulties in accurately identifying individuals across devices pose challenges, requiring careful, ethical implementation.

Q6:How can I apply persona and behavioral targeting insights practically?
A: Use persona-based questions to tag contacts in your database, update customer journey maps accordingly, and tailor online advertising to reach prospects exhibiting behaviors aligned with your target personas.

Q7:What if existing persona models don’t fit my buyers?
A: Develop a custom persona schema based on your customer research, ensuring it captures goals, behaviors, and concerns unique to your market.

Q8:Where can I get expert help to develop personas and implement behavioral targeting?
A: VisionEdge Marketing offers research, persona development, and behavioral targeting advisory to help you create precise, actionable customer segments and strategies.

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