Avatar, buying persona, customer profile, targeted audience…you may have heard these terms before.

But what are they really?

Marketing personas are more than just fictional profiles. They can be strategic tools that help your business connect with the right audiences in the right way. For small to midsize B2B companies, developing straightforward, research-backed personas can improve the effectiveness of everything in your marketing, from messaging to lead quality.

Many businesses skip this step or treat it as a box to check. In doing so, they miss an opportunity to tap into meaningful customer insight.

I had my team put together a guide to walk through what marketing personas are, why they matter, how to build them, and how to use them effectively.

Before we begin, let’s examine some statistics that demonstrate how impactful marketing personas can be:

• According to one study, using buyer personas in email campaigns improved open rates by 2x and clickthrough rates by 5x.
• HubSpot reported that using marketing personas made websites 2-5 times more effective and easier to use by targeted users.
• According to Marketing Insider Group:
  56% of companies generated higher-quality leads using buyer personas
  36% of companies have created shorter sales cycles using buyer personas
  24% of companies generated more leads using buyer personas
  93% of companies that exceed lead and revenue goals segment their database by buyer persona

What Are Marketing Personas?

A marketing persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on real data and insights. It captures the key characteristics, behaviors, goals, and pain points of your target audience segments. While often used interchangeably with “buyer personas,” marketing personas focus more broadly on engaging potential customers across channels—not just how they make purchase decisions.

Example:
Name: Operations Olivia
Role: Director of Operations at a mid-sized logistics company
Goals: Streamline internal workflows, reduce costs
Challenges: Limited internal resources, inefficient tech stack
How she researches: Prefers industry webinars, LinkedIn, and peer recommendations.

This is a very high level persona, a more detailed sketch might include her age, education level, career aspirations, and many other details that help the marketer speak directly to her avatar.

Why Marketing Personas Matter in B2B:

Marketing personas act as a blueprint for building campaigns, creating content, and aligning with sales. Here’s why they’re especially critical for B2B:

• Improved targeting – Personas help refine who you speak to, so you’re not wasting resources on the wrong audience.
• More relevant messaging – Knowing what matters to your audience, you can speak directly to their goals and pain points.
• More substantial alignment – Personas give marketing and sales a shared understanding of the customer, leading to smoother handoffs and better conversions.
• Better content strategy – Personas help you choose the right topics, formats, and channels.

How to Build a Marketing Persona:

Talk to your customers. Create a committee of existing clients, not just your happiest ones. Ask about their role, responsibilities, challenges, goals, and how they found and evaluated your solution.

• Review touchpoint interactions. Look at your CRM, sales notes, support tickets, and website analytics. What patterns emerge in company size, job title, buying behavior, or content engagement?
• Gather insights from sales and customer success. These teams talk to prospects and clients daily. Their input on common objections, deal-breakers, and decision-making dynamics is gold.
• Segment your audience. Group similar profiles based on role, industry, or pain points. Start with two to three core personas. Avoid going into too many personas, and keep in mind that you can always refine or expand later.

Key Elements of a Strong Persona

Demographics and Firmographics:

• Job Title & Role: What is their position and responsibilities within the company?
• Industry: What industry does the persona work in? This is where you want to look at generalities of your audience.
• Company Size: Do they work at or own a large enterprise, a small business, or something in between?
• Location: What state, city or region is their company based?
• Years of Experience: How much experience do they have in their field?
• Education: What is their educational background?

Goals and Motivations:

• Professional Objectives: What are their primary and secondary goals in their role?
• Company Goals: How do their goals align with the company’s objectives?
• Personal Goals: Even though this is a B2B marketing persona, the lines between professional and personal lives are often blurred.
• Motivations: What drives their decisions and actions? What is their why?

Challenges and Pain Points:

• Obstacles: What challenges do they face in their job?
• Pain Points: What are their biggest frustrations or problems?
• Uncertainties: What are their concerns or hesitations?
• Green Flags: What is important to them? What makes their job easier?

Decision-Making Process:

• Influencers: Who else is involved in the decision-making process? Do they have a committee? Do they require final approval from above?
• Buying Criteria: What factors are most important to them when making a purchase?
• Decision Style: How do they typically make decisions (e.g., data-driven, relationship-based)?

Information Consumption and Communication Preferences:

• Information Sources: Where do they get their information (e.g., industry publications, social media, webinars)?
• Preferred Content: What types of content do they prefer (e.g., articles, videos, case studies)?
• Communication Channels: How do they prefer to communicate (e.g., email, phone, in-person)?

Values and Fears:

• Values: What are their priorities, and what do they value in a solution?
• Fears: What are their biggest concerns or reservations?
• Language: Key phrases or language they use when describing their challenges

How to Use Personas in Your Marketing

This is important – give your persona a name! Use a photo that aligns with that person – you can use stock or have AI create one for you.  Once you’ve built your personas, use them to guide for the following:

• Content creation – Tailor blog topics, email campaigns, and case studies to address specific goals and challenges.
• Ad targeting and segmentation – Build more precise audiences based on persona traits.
• Website messaging – Align your homepage and landing page copy with the language and priorities of your core personas.
• Lead scoring and qualification – Use persona attributes to prioritize leads more accurately.
• Sales enablement – Equip your team with persona-based talking points, objections, and content recommendations.

The point is, don’t just use them as a guide.  Is that person’s name Julie or James? Sarah or Frank? Visualize Julie, James, Sarah or Frank as you are writing. Write the way you would talk to them or draft an email.

4 Common Mistakes to Avoid:

1. Creating too many personas. Focus on the few that drive the most business.
2. Getting too generic or too niche. Find a useful middle ground.
3. Letting personas go stale. Update them at least once a year based on new insights.
4. Not using them. Personas are only valuable if they inform real decisions. Integrate them into campaign planning and team training.

Marketing personas can be foundational tools for B2B marketing. They bring structure to your strategy, clarity to your messaging, and focus to your campaigns. If you haven’t revisited your personas in a while or never built them at all, now’s the time. You are sure to gain a sharper image of your customers, gain insights that shape strategies to reach them and hone in on how you speak to them.

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Jackie Awve Marketing & Design specializes in helping businesses create marketing initiatives that drive results. Our industry experience includes commercial real estate, retail properties, executive suites, trade associations, contractors and agency consulting.

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