“Understand the difference between a profile and a persona.
A profile is the person who buys your stuff. A persona gives insights into how customers make their decisions.”
Best practice “Personas for a SaaS software (online appointment scheduling) in the e-health sector”
The company sells a SaaS software (online appointment scheduling) in the e-health sector. The target groups are practices and clinics.
A broad target group description would be as follows:
- Age: late 20s to 65
- Gender: male or female
- Profession: doctor or manager in a practice/clinic
- Origin: Germany
- According to the medical association, there are approx. xxx doctors in private practice and approx. xxx doctors in a managerial position in a clinic. This would give us a quantitative outline of the target group for the time being.
This only tells us how many potential customers we would have. But who do we address, how and with what message? Next, we should look at the decision-making structures. In a single practice the matter is clear, the doctor decides on purchases there. In group practices it is more difficult.
In a clinic, the doctor may not be the decision-maker at all, but the commercial clinic management. Nevertheless, the doctor is probably strongly involved as a user and forms an important secondary target group.
In the last step, we can further segment the target group with the help of personas and differentiate even more precisely. With the personas we can also include “soft” factors, e. g. emotional states such as fears, drivers, motivators and much more. These can also significantly influence the purchase decision! For a persona from the doctors’ target group, this could look like this, for example:
Name: Prof. M.D. Frank Kuhn
Age: 53
Occupation: Medical director of a clinic
Origin: Rhine-Main
Needs: Seeks appointment software that will better utilise his operating theatres.
Fears: Security, budget, hiring the wrong provider.
Information behaviour: exchanges information with peers at conferences.
Name: M.D. Michelle Mueler
Age: 42
Occupation: General practitioner
Herkunft: Berlin
Needs: burdened by deadline stress; looks for digital solutions that help her.
Fears: She is not sure whether the MFAs (receptionists) will accept a new solution.
Information behaviour: exchanges information with peers at conferences.
With the help of such profiles, even a short persona makes it clear how different individual customers are in the target group. The more detailed the profile, the more accurately the customer is portrayed.
The relevant contents for an activation are as different as the characters and their framework conditions. Professor Kuhn and M.D. Mueller have different needs and they also inform themselves differently. Accordingly, they are interested in different content – its relevance depends on the persona.
Integrating the personas into the sales and marketing process helps to develop better concepts for a tailor-made approach. They can also serve as a guiding principle for internal communication or communication with external (agencies).
PS.: And this is not the end of the subject of target group analysis. It is also worthwhile to take a closer look at other stakeholders who can influence a decision positively or negatively. And thus, represent secondary target groups. To stay with our example: what about the MFA (medical assistants), formerly called receptionists? They usually regulate access to the actual target group. In the worst case, they prevent a direct exchange with the doctor, so that we cannot even present the advantages of our great product to him. Conversely, in the best case, they can become advocates of the solution if they see advantages for themselves.
Literaturtipp:
»Copyright © 2021 Georg Doerner – All rights reserved.«