How to conduct a Buyer Persona Interview

Having a deep understanding of your Buyer Persona is crucial to: 

1. Understand why your product/service exists, and what makes it unique; 
2. Understand the challenges your solution solves; 
3. Provide value to your prospects throughout the entire sales cycle; 
4. Build a relevant outreach strategy.

This article will give the full understanding of how to conduct a Buyer Persona interview to get the most out of it.

Check out the questions you should be asking your customers in order to build a complete and effective buyer persona profile in “How to conduct a Buyer Persona Interview - Moderation Questions Guide”.

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What Are Buyer Personas?

Buyer personas are fictional, generalized representations of your ideal customers. They help you understand your customers (and prospective customers) better, and make it easier for you to tailor content to the specific needs, behaviors, and concerns of different groups.

The strongest buyer personas are based on market research as well as on insights you gather from your actual customer base (through surveys, interviews, etc.). Depending on your business, you could have as few as one or two personas, or as many as 10 or 20.

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Why is it important to properly understand your Buyer Personas?

• Challenges that need to be solved 
• The reason why your product actually exists 
• When you can’t find any hint/trigger for personalization (Relevance > Personalization) 
• Provide value in your interactions

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How to conduct a Buyer Persona Interview - Moderation Questions Guide

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1. Role Questions

• Describe your role in a nutshell 
• How is your job measured? KPIs?
• What does a typical day look like?
• What knowledge and tools do you use in your job?
• Who do you report to? Who reports to you?

2. Goal Questions

• What are you responsible for?
• What does it mean to be successful in your role?

3. Challenge Questions

• What are your biggest challenges in general?
• How do those challenges translate into consequences?

4. Context Questions

• What are the challenges of your industry specifically?
• What are the challenges of working in this size of a company?
• What are the challenges of this specific year we’re in?
• What are the challenges of this [INSERT TRIGGER]?
• What are the consequences of those challenges on your job?

5. Watering Hole Questions

• How do you learn new information for your job?
• What publications or blogs do you read?
• What associations and social networks do you participate in?

6. Shopping Preference Questions

• How do you prefer to interact with vendors (e.g., email, phone, in-person)?
• Do you use the internet to research vendors or products? If yes, how do you search for information?
• Describe a recent purchase. Why did you consider a purchase, what was the evaluation process, and how did you decide to purchase that product or service?

7. Show a couple of emails

• What’s your feedback on these prospecting emails?

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