Communicating with personas workbook

Communicate Your Way to Success:How to Use Personas to Bui ld Relat ionships and Boost Your Revenue

Communicate Your Way to Success:

How to Use Personas to Build Relationships and Boost Your Revenue

2 3© All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 2012 © All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 2012

Table of ContentsDisclaimer ...................................................................................................................... 4

Introduction .................................................................................................................. 5What is a Persona? ............................................................................................................................ 5

The Persona Advantage .................................................................................................................. 5

Benefits of Using Personas ............................................................................................................. 6

The Four Personas ....................................................................................................... 8Competitive 9

Persona Scenario ........................................................................................................................................... 10

Dorothy’s Story .............................................................................................................................................. 11

Anatomy of Communicating with Competitives .............................................................................. 12

What Motivates Competitives? ................................................................................................................ 12

Example Competitive Motivations ......................................................................................................... 12

Example Competitive Core Values .......................................................................................................... 12

Valued Words for Competitives ............................................................................................................... 13

Example Competitive Valued Words ...................................................................................................... 13

Uncovering Competitive Buying Needs ............................................................................................... 14

Competitive’s General Buying Needs .................................................................................................... 14

Competitives focus on language that answers WHAT questions ................................................ 14

How to Present to Competitives ............................................................................................................. 15

What Will Appeal to Competitive in a Presentation? ....................................................................... 15

Spontaneous 16

The Spontaneous personality is encapsulated by these ................................................................ 16


Lion’s Story ...................................................................................................................................................... 18

Anatomy of Communicating with Spontaneous .............................................................................. 18

Spontaneous Motivations ......................................................................................................................... 18

Example Spontaneous Motivations ....................................................................................................... 18

Example of Spontaneous core values ................................................................................................... 19

Valued Words .................................................................................................................................................. 19

Spontaneous Valued Words ...................................................................................................................... 19

Uncovering Spontaneous Buying Needs ............................................................................................. 20

Spontaneous Buying Needs...................................................................................................................... 20

Spontaneous people focus on language that answers WHY (and sometimes WHEN) questions: 21

How to Present to Spontaneous ............................................................................................................. 21

What Will Appeal to Spontaneous in a Presentation? ..................................................................... 21

Methodical 23

The Methodical personality is encapsulated by these: ................................................................... 23


Scarecrow’s Story .......................................................................................................................................... 25

Anatomy of Communicating with Methodicals ................................................................................ 25

Methodical Motivations ............................................................................................................................. 25

Example Motivation for Methodicals .................................................................................................... 25

Example Methodical Core Values ............................................................................................................ 26

Valued Words .................................................................................................................................................. 26

Methodical Valued Words .......................................................................................................................... 26

Methodicals focus on language that answers HOW questions ................................................... 27

How to Present to Methodicals ............................................................................................................... 27

Methodical Presentation Needs .............................................................................................................. 27

Humanistic 28


Tin Man’s Story ............................................................................................................................................... 30

Anatomy of Communicating with Humanistics ................................................................................ 30

Humanistic Motivations ............................................................................................................................. 30

Example of Humanistic Motivations ...................................................................................................... 31

Example core values .................................................................................................................................... 31

Valued Words .................................................................................................................................................. 31

Humanistic Valued Words .......................................................................................................................... 31

Humanistic Buying Needs: ........................................................................................................................ 32

Humanistic Buying Needs ......................................................................................................................... 32

Humanistics focus on language that answers WHO questions ................................................... 33

How to Present to the Humanistic .......................................................................................................... 33

Humanistic Presentation Needs .............................................................................................................. 33

Making Decisions with the Four Personas ..............................................................................35

Competitive - Quick & Logical Decisions .............................................................................................. 36

Spontaneous - Quick & Emotional Decisions ..................................................................................... 36

Methodical - Deliberate & Logical Decisions ...................................................................................... 37

Humanistic - Deliberate & Emotional Decisions ................................................................................ 37

Put Knowledge Into Action ..........................................................................................................38




DisclaimerWhile every attempt has been made to verify information provided in this course, neither the author(s) nor the publisher assumes any responsibility for any errors, inaccuracies or omissions. Any slights of people or organizations are unintentional. We make no warranty (express or implied) or make any representations as to the quality, content, accuracy or completeness of the information, text, graphics, links, and other items contained in this course.

We are not responsible for any action taken in reliance on the information contained herein and for any damages incurred, whether directly or indirectly, as a result of errors, omissions, or discrepancies contained herein.

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All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 2012.All materials contained in this transcript are protected by copyright laws, and may not be copied, changed, modified or otherwise exploited in any manner.

Introduction

Welcome to Communicate Your Way to Success: How to Use Personas to Build Relationships and Boost Your Revenue. As part of Pendulum In Action Fundamentals, this guide will help you understand Personas better. With this increased

understanding, you’ll be able to communicate clearer and get faster results in your business. You’ll enjoy more than better results—understanding personas will also make it easier to write emails, copy and give you audience information they will actually use.

For the rest of this guide, when you see references of applying Personas in business, keep in mind that these techniques can also be applied to your book, your services or products and even a charity you might be promoting.

Personas are applicable in any form of communication with people. You can even use these communication techniques in your personal life in areas like enlisting volunteers and getting them excited about supporting your child’s sports team. To keep it simple, in this booklet we’ll focus on applying Personas in a business setting. But feel free to apply it in other areas in your life where you’re motivating people to take action.

What is a Persona?

Personas are an example of a specific person that’s interested in your book, business, product or service. Just how specific are Personas? Very specific. From demographics, to life history and personal needs, Personas need to be clear and specific to get results.

Just as discussed in the 12 Steps of Intimacy Module, Personas are a way to build loyal relationships in your business. This is why it’s so important to be clear and specific in the details of a Persona. The more you know about someone’s motivations, the more you can answer the questions he or she is thinking without needing to ask out loud. By answering those unspoken questions, you’re able to emulate an intimate environment, in a non-intimate setting.

The Persona Advantage

What’s the purpose of using personality traits and temperaments? Because these details help each persona that you create become like a real person to you. The details help you make an emotional connection with your audience, who are represented by the personas you create. Success in business in this ‘We’ cycle requires that you build intimacy with your audience. It’s much easier to build that intimacy when you know who your audience really is.

This emotional connection is critical, because people cannot make decisions without emotion. When you engage emotionally with your readers, you can relate to and “read” their what they are thinking and feeling. With that insight, you’re able to easily generate ideas and words that will resonate with your audience’s emotional biases, needs and preferences.




Benefits of Using Personas

By following exercises in this manual, you’ll understand some of the Personas’ fears, hopes and attitudes. You’ll also understand their biases and dreams. This understanding will help you empathize, sympathize and emotionalize with all four personas about their lives, their needs and their desires—enough to feel like you’re one of their best friends. When you understand people, you can communicate more effectively in your copy, your product offerings and in the other methods you use to engage and interact with your audience.

Before your audience will open their wallets to you, you must first help them feel comfortable enough to open their hearts to you—they need to get to know, like and trust you. Remember, all your potential buyers are driven by their core values in order to satisfy certain needs.

In today’s ‘We’ cycle, people want community and to connect with other people and groups who share similar values, interests and ideals. When you satisfy your audience’s needs and values, they’ll feel at home in your community and comfortable building a deeper relationship with you. You can further that relationship by using your knowledge of Personas to help you identify your audience’s problems and needs—allowing you to meet those specific needs in a persona-specific manner.

Consider the following scenarios:

Scenario 1You have two minutes to sell your business to a person you’ve never met, a person you can’t see and one that you know nothing about. Now, because you’ve learned a few things about sales, you decide to utilize your knowledge about the strategic advantage of addressing the benefits of your product or service. Good first move, right? After about 30 seconds, though, you begin to panic. You just realized that you’re assuming this person knows something about your business. Maybe they don’t! So you start over again with the basics, and then you start telling this unknown person how your business solves this his or her problems better than your competitors.

Suddenly, you realize you only have about 30 seconds before this person loses interest, and you haven’t even told them about all the benefits your business can bring into their life. So you switch gears and try to squeeze in all the benefits you can think of. They all come out in a jumbled, random heap in the order they pop into your mind—and you’re just hoping and praying that you’re actually influencing their thinking. Ding! Two minutes are up! You’re dripping in sweat. Phew! That was frustrating, wasn’t it?

Scenario 2Later that night, you go out to dinner with your best friend, whom you haven’t seen in years. Over appetizers and drinks, you have a two-minute window of opportunity to tell your best friend why your business is exactly what she’s been looking for.What a complete turnaround! You know this person! You know what she likes and doesn’t like. You’re relaxed and you’re more animated in your presentation because you know her language and her hot buttons, her likes and her dislikes, her experiences and her aspirations—all the things that are meaningful to her that you can relate your business to. Your presentation is very different this time because your focus is on your friend. Ding! Two minutes are up! And you’re smiling, not sweating—and so is your friend.

Which sales presentation do you think will be more successful?

Personas are geared to give you the advantage you had in Scenario 2—pitching your business to your best friend. All the facts, information and core values you will research in this guide to include in the Personas specific to your business will allow you to sell to your audience just as you would to your best friend. To make the most of this guide, open the Persona document you received in Module 4 that digs deeper into the Wizard of Oz personas.

Let’s get started with a refresher of the 4 types of Personas:


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The Four Personas

People have been interested in the correlation between personality types and human behavior for thousands of years. As early as 400 BC, Hippocrates noted that there were four basic types of people. In his book Air, Water and Places he classified them these four types

as Sanguine, Phlegmatic, Choleric and Melancholic. While the names of these four personality types have changed through the years, the basic theory holds true and it’s highly relevant to your life and business today.

Persona Architecture takes the theory behind personality types and makes it applicable to your everyday operations. To help you understand and apply Personas in your business, we are going to walk you through the critical components of Personas.

After compiling all the nuts and bolts of a Persona, the portion of this process that makes the Persona come to life is the scenario. The scenario or narrative of a Persona is like a quick synopsis of a person’s life story. They cover important life events that shape a person’s wants, needs and motivations—it’s the back story of a person’s life, and it explains what makes him or her tick, making the persona feel like a real person.

The ability to connect to your audience through your copy, your products and your marketing with people you’ve never met or spoken with will set you apart from your competition. Personas give you that advantage.

People crave that connection in today’s ‘WE’ cycle. Before they will trust you to solve their problems, they want to feel like you know who they are, that you know their concerns and that you understand them.

There’s a process to building an intimate relationship, as we covered in Module 3: Relationship Marketing using the 12 Steps of Intimacy. Personas will help you apply those 12 Steps in your communications and in tailoring the products and services you offer your audience.

So open your copy of the Wizard of Oz Personas from previous module. Let’s look at the components of a Persona to help you build those intimate relationships.

Competitive“The risk of insult is the price of clarity.”

Competitive types seek competence in themselves and others. They can be intense and very persuasive about getting their own way. They are particularly irritated by inefficiency. Competitive types want to control life: their own and the lives of others as well.

A Competitive has a deep appreciation for challenges, where they see themselves competing with themselves. They are supremely goal-oriented and constantly look for methods and strategies to help complete tasks that move them toward their goals. A Competitive person usually reaches decisions quickly after obtaining a clear vision about his or her goals. Competitives are success- and goal-oriented, highly motivated, hard-working, image-conscious, good planners, good at promoting their own ideas and can subordinate their present needs to ensure future success.

Attitude: Businesslike, power-orientedUsing Time: Disciplined, strategically pacedQuestion: What can your solution do for me?Approach: Provide rational options, probabilities and challenges

The Competitive personality is encapsulated by these:

Characteristics Likes & Dislikes Useful Words

Controlling

Competitive

Daring

Enthusiastic

Independent

Risk-taker

Witty

Likes challenges

Likes being unique

Likes possibilities

Likes achieving goals

Likes strategy

Dislikes tactics

Dislikes incompetence

Complexity

Dominate

Entrepreneur

Possibilities

Precision

Solution

Superior/winner

Wants: A challenge. Address a Competitive by telling them, “You’re wrong, I’m right, here’s why this is a better way to get the results you want.”




Embraces Avoids Core Values

Meeting new people in his/her niche

Making partnerships with successful people in niche

Looking good to potential clients

Talking sports with business acquaintances

Relatives who try to bum things off him/her

Wasting time just fooling around or hanging around

Getting burned (being taken advantage of )

Being controlled by others

Controlling

Excelling

Winning

Mastery

Competitiveness

Achieving goals

Remember our Competitive, Dorothy Gale? She was driven and determined to get home. She only had one goal, and throughout the movie she focused on reaching that goal. These traits are true to the nature of Competitive type personalities.

Typically, Competitives tend to be driven and highly-motivated. Success is the only option for them, and when faced with roadblocks, they quickly find another path that leads to the same goal. Competitive-type people are the most intentional of the four types—most of their actions (if not every action) are calculated to move them closer to their goal. When playing a game, Competitives usually start having fun about the same time they win the game.

Persona ScenarioThe scenario or narrative of a Persona is like a quick synopsis of a person’s life story. Persona scenarios cover important life events that shape a person’s wants, needs and motivations—it’s the back story of a person’s life, explains what makes him or her tick and makes the persona feel like a real person. Let’s look at one of the Wizard of Oz Personas.

Dorothy’s Story

Dorothy, a recently orphaned teenage girl, lives with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry on a farm in Kansas. Her life isn’t bad—she has food to eat and a roof over her head—but she longs for something more than counting chickens and feeding pigs.

You see, Dorothy has big ideas and aspirations. She dares to believe in big dreams—somewhere over the rainbow. Dorothy seeks solutions to problems and takes action quickly. When her controlling and intolerant neighbor, Miss Gulch, confiscated Toto and threatened to take him to be euthanized for biting, Dorothy quickly found a solution and took immediate action, retrieving Toto from Miss Gulch’s possession and running away from home. Dorothy was unafraid of the consequences and completely focused on achieving her goal of saving Toto’s life.

Dorothy is supremely goal-oriented. After finding herself stranded in Oz, she doesn’t waste time and immediately determines that she wants to find her way back home. With this plan in mind, Dorothy sought counsel from a qualified resource, Glinda the Good Witch of the North. Glinda told Dorothy the way to reach her goal of getting home was to seek the Wizard of Oz—another highly respected expert. Dorothy persisted in reaching her goal in spite of a host of obstacles set in her path by her nemesis, the Wicked Witch of the West.

A natural leader, Dorothy met and enlisted the assistance of three companions she met along her path to reach her goal: returning home to Kansas.

Dorothy demands competence from those around her and continually motivates her four companions to utilize their inner strengths and resources, with the aim of helping the group achieve their objectives.




Anatomy of Communicating with CompetitivesTo use the technique of communicating directly with Personas, you need to identify and focus on the core values of the Competitive Personality type:

Driven by the need to control, excel and win, a Competitive seeks mastery so she can achieve her goals.

Now that you have an insight to the core values of the Competitive, it’s important to show how this particular Competitive Persona was influenced by those core values to be interested in your business. The best way to do this is to answer a few questions while considering the Persona’s specific needs.

What Motivates Competitives?Do you know what motives Competitives like Dorothy to want what you’re offering? Dorothy has a bigger ‘unspoken question’ that needs answering before she’ll take an action. Basically, it’s the sum of her internal dialogue and it drives her daily actions. If you put yourself in Dorothy’s shoes, what do you suppose her motivation is? The more in touch with her motivation you are, the more you’ll be able to meet her needs.

Example Competitive Motivations • Influenced by her need to find the best and most effective route to reach her goal—to

return home to Kansas.

• Wants her friends to be able to control their own destiny, not be at someone else’s mercy (specifically the Wicked Witch of the West).

• Looking for the most effective route to get back to Kansas that will also help her companions reach their individual goals in the most efficient way possible.

Example Competitive Core Values• Controlling

• Excelling

• Winning

• Mastery

• Competitiveness

• Achieving goals

What are 5 motivations that your Competitive audience has?

Valued Words for CompetitivesValued words are words that specific Personas use and look for when gathering information to make a decision. These words tend to be part of the Personas vocabulary, and he or she will respond more readily to these words. Keywords for search engine results also fit into this category.

Valued words are the words you use when writing copy for Personas. Beyond writing copy for this person you could consider how you can use these words also in places like your voicemail in your office. Competitives tend to be attracted to words that get to the results. Tell them right away why your business will solve their problem, faster and with efficiency. They also like to be challenged.

Example Competitive Valued Words • Complexity

• Dominate

• Entrepreneur

• Possibilities

• Precision

• Solution

• Superior/winner

What are 5 value words that fit your Competitive audience?




Uncovering Competitive Buying Needs What is the need/problem/opportunity? How will Competitives recognize their need/problem/ opportunity for your product or service? Is the need explicit? Where is the need anchored? What does the Persona need to know before buying from you? What might a Competitive, such as Dorothy like to know before buying from you? In the Wizard of Oz Personas, you can find Dorothy’s Wants & Needs. This is an insight to specific needs of Competitives.

Competitive’s General Buying Needs • Wants the very best product/service she can get for the lowest price on the premium

product.

• Wants the products and services that will make her and her business the best .

• Needs to know that the best authorities endorse whatever product she’s buying.

• Needs assurances that the book/ product /service you’re selling will help her be the best.

A Competitive such as Dorothy, must feel that the product or service you’re offering will give her a distinct advantage over most of her competitors. A Persona’s buying process needs are what that Persona needs to be able to make a buying decision. If their needs aren’t met, they probably won’t buy.

What are the needs that Competitives would have that your business can solve?

Competitives focus on language that answers WHAT questions • What are your competitive advantages?

• What makes you a superior choice?

• What makes you a credible company?

• What can you do to help me be more productive?

• What can you do to help make me look “cutting edge”?

• What are your credentials?

• What is your research?

• What can you do to help me achieve my goals?

Answer the above questions about your business for the Competitive:

How to Present to Competitives Presentation is what a business plans to do to meet the needs of Personas. It’s done using all of the above information. It also helps with strategic brainstorming.

What does this Competitive to know in order to buy from you? That’s right, what does Dorothy need to know to buy from you? How do you communicate your value to this Persona? What is special about your product or service will appeal to this Persona? What are her objections to purchasing and how will you overcome them?

What Will Appeal to Competitive in a Presentation? • A simple website to get her quickly to her need, with no distractions, and with all copy

short and to the point—bare bones copy.

• The website needs to make her feel that it is the authority and can help her be a winner.

• She must feel that the product offered will give her a distinct advantage over most of her competitors.

What specifically can you do to increase your communication to the Competitives in your audience?


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Spontaneous“How fast can you deliver that product?”

Spontaneous personalities live almost entirely in the moment. Their sensing preference makes them most grounded in the immediate world of their senses. Coupled with their perceiving preference, this helps them to remain poised and fully present in any situation. They are available, flexible and engaged in a personal quest for action and impact, which defines who they are. For the Spontaneous, integrity means the unity of impulse with action. Spontaneous personalities prefer the personalized touch and are in search of new and exciting personal experiences. They dislike dealing with traditional details, they are often quick to reach a decision and they fear “missing out” on whatever life has to offer.

Attitude: Personal, activity-orientedUsing Time: Spontaneous, fast-pacedQuestion: Why is your solution best to solve their problem now?Approach: Address immediate needs with relevant credible options

The Spontaneous personality is encapsulated by these

Characteristics: Likes & Dislikes: Useful Words:

Creative

Entertaining

Fast-paced

Friendly

Impatient

Sensitive

Undisciplined

Likes action

Likes quick challenges

Likes ‘the experience’

Likes personal ‘touch’

Dislikes conflict

Dislikes details

Dislikes ‘missing out’

Clever

Exciting

Flexible

Fun

In the moment

New

Playful

Wants to know: “How can you relieve pain or give pleasure right now?”

In the Wizard of Oz, the courage-seeking Lion is loveable and charismatic. He’s afraid of almost everything, but for some reason people are still attracted to his sincere and fun-loving character. He loves to be the center of attention and involved in everyone else’s business—a common characteristic of Spontaneous people.

embraces avoids core values

Quick Fixes

Meeting new people and trying new things

Excitement and adrenaline rushes

Long explanations

Being bored especially by monotony

Too much commitment

Enjoying the moment

Excitement

Attention

Fast-paced living

Filling immediate needs to enjoy

Spontaneous-type people tend to excel at staying in the moment, being present and enjoying what is right in front of them. Usually they are playful, full of energy and adept at multitasking. They will work with the first business that fills their immediate need. If they have a wonderful experience with you, they’ll be sure to send friends your way—and share your business in any way they can.

Persona ScenarioThe scenario or narrative of a Persona is like a quick synopsis of a person’s life story. Persona scenarios cover important life events that shape a person’s wants, needs and motivations. Basically, it’s the back story of a person’s life, explains what makes him or her “tick” and makes the persona feel like a real person. Let’s look at the Lion’s story.




Lion’s Story

Most of the time, Lion enjoys being King of the Forest. He enjoys meeting people and the excitement and privilege that accompanies being a ruler, but some days, the mundane details of ruling a forest bore him to tears.

Lion has a bit of a secret he tries to hide from his subjects: he’s afraid...of almost everything. He knows that if they find out, he will lose face big time, putting his position as king in jeopardy. (This would be a travesty - his favorite mane-dresser doesn’t come cheap!)

Lion has a stunning collection of Tiffany lamps (he’s afraid of the dark). He picked most of them up at auctions - he adores the excitement of winning and collecting unique items.

His charisma and friendliness make it easy for his subjects to love him. He loves being involved in everyone else’s business and keeping tabs on what’s new and hot in the Forest of Oz. He just needs to address his little issue of courage.

Anatomy of Communicating with SpontaneousTo best communicate with your Spontaneous Persona for your business, you need to identify and focus on the core values of the Spontaneous Personality type:

Driven by the need to enjoy the moment, a Spontaneous seeks excitement, attention and fast-paced living to fill immediate needs for enjoyment.

Now that you know the core values of the Spontaneous, it’s important to show how this particular Spontaneous Persona was influenced by those core values to get interested in your business.

Spontaneous Motivations What motivates this Persona to use your product or service? What is the person’s bigger “unspoken question”—the sum of their internal dialogue, the “life mantra” that makes them tick as a person? Persona motivations are the driving force behind a Persona’s decision to buy. Motivations are the reason why they are looking for a product/service. Motivations are based on their core values.

In the case of the Spontaneous the motivation stems from the core value of getting quick results and connecting with people.

Example Spontaneous Motivations

• Motivated to his need to feel good about himself in this moment.

• Driven by the excitement of being the leader, the energy keeps him excited.

• Wanting a challenge to have experiences that are exciting.

Example of Spontaneous core values• Enjoying the moment

• Excitement

• Attention

• Fast-paced living

• Filling immediate needs to enjoy

What are 5 motivations that your Spontaneous audience has?

Valued Words Valued words are words that specific Personas use and look for. They tend to be part of the Persona’s vocabulary, and he will more readily respond to these words. Keywords for search engine results also fit into this category. Valued words are the words you use when writing copy for Personas.

Spontaneous Valued Words• Exciting

• Enjoy

• Sleek

• Good Looking

• Edgy

• Sexy

• Money




What are 5 value words that your Spontaneous audience has?

Uncovering Spontaneous Buying Needs What is the need/problem/opportunity? How will this persona recognize their need/problem/ opportunity for our product or service? Is the need explicit? Where is the need anchored? What does the persona need to know before buying from you? What might the persona like to know before buying from you?

Spontaneous Buying Needs • He needs to feel like he is special, awesome and amazing

• He needs quick information that is easy to read

• He needs validation of his sales style

• He needs to know that he will be able to do better than his co-worker

A persona’s buying process needs are what a persona needs to be able to make a buying decision. If their needs aren’t met, they probably won’t buy.

What are the needs that Spontaneous would have that your business can solve?

Spontaneous people focus on language that answers WHY (and sometimes WHEN) questions:

• Why does it work that way?

• Why do you think you can get me what I need quickly?

• Why is your service superior?

• Why do you/won’t you let me customize your product or service?

• Why do you offer to help me narrow down my choices?

• When can I take action and achieve my goals?

• When will this let me enjoy life more?

Answer the above questions about your business for the Spontaneous:

How to Present to SpontaneousPresentation is what a business plans to do to meet the needs of Personas. It’s done using all of the above information. It also helps with strategic brainstorming.

What does Lion need to know to feel comfortable buying from doing business with you? How can you communicate your value to the Spontaneous Persona? What qualities of your product or service will appeal to this Persona? What are this Persona’s objections and how will you overcome them?

What Will Appeal to Spontaneous in a Presentation? • Quick, flashy copy that sounds exciting and makes him feel like working with you will

give him an edge in the attention he’s seeking.

• Quotes from people who have worked with you before and succeeded, with their pictures (they must look good).

• Language shouldn’t be complicated.


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What specifically can you do to increase your communication to the Spontaneous in your audience? Methodical “There are reasons and methodical processes for everything.”

Methodical personalities prepare and organize before taking action. And for them, task completion is its own reward. They appreciate facts, hard data and information presented logically, as inseparable from the truth of any matter—disorganization of information undermines credibility and trust.

They do not appreciate or value the “personal touch.” Above all, they fear negative surprises and irresponsibility. Methodicals have a strong internal frame of reference. They prefer to think and speak about details and specifics. They look for mismatches as they compare everything to a standard ideal (what’s missing or what’s wrong, as compared to the standard ideal). Methodicals like order and predictability. They are thoughtful. They plan in advance and want to know all the details. Methodicals need to know the details before they will feel comfortable making a buying decision.

Attitude: Businesslike, detail-oriented Using Time: Disciplined, methodically paced Question: How can your solution solve this problem? Approach: Provide hard evidence and superior service

The Methodical personality is encapsulated by these:

Characteristics Likes & Dislikes Useful WordsAnalytical

Conservative

Inner Standards

Methodical

Self-Disciplined

Likes facts, data

Likes hard evidence

Likes organization

Dislikes human ‘touch’

Dislikes mismatches

Logical

Plan

Process

Responsibility

Security

Wants: A step-by-step process to solve a problem, increase efficiency.




Embraces Avoids Core Values

Sequential logic and processes

Facts unhindered by strong emotions

Certainty and clear thinking

Surviving

Confrontation

Making messes or mistakes

Failure

Dealing with people, generally

Responsibility

Order

Self-discipline

Completeness

Logical

Process

In the Wizard of Oz, The Scarecrow is organized. He prides himself on being thoughtful, loyal and a good friend. He has the best of intentions and certainly likes when he can predict what is coming.

Persona ScenarioThe scenario narrative of a Persona is like a quick synopsis of a person’s life story. Persona scenarios cover important life events that shape a person’s wants, needs and motivations. Basically, it’s the back story of a person’s life, explains what makes him or her “tick” and makes the persona feel like a real person. Let’s look at the Scarecrow’s story.

Scarecrow’s Story

Scarecrow is driven by a strong sense of duty to his family and to helping other scarecrows in the community. He’s worried about providing for his sizable family—six children is a lot to provide for, but he’s a devoted husband and an awesome dad.

Scarecrow yearns to do something big—something that will make a big difference in the lives of his friends and neighbors.

The economy is tough in Oz. Crime rates in his area have increased due the two wicked witches and their gang of winged monkeys. The winged monkey gangs have been terrorizing scarecrow families with matches and fireballs, lighting innocent scarecrows on fire.

Scarecrow wants to create a flame retardant spray to keep scarecrows safe from the winged monkey mischief. But there’s a lot of science behind creating a product like this (he also wants the formula to be organic without harmful chemicals).

Scarecrow’s head full of straw makes it difficult to plan, structure and organize the necessary research and facts to move forward.

He needs the brains to pull this off and he’s willing to sacrifice a lot to reach this goal.

Anatomy of Communicating with MethodicalsTo best communicate with the Methodicals in your audience you need to identify and focus on the core values of the Methodical personality type:

Driven by the need to live a responsible life of order, a Methodical seeks slow-paced self-discipline so he can do everything in thorough processes, logically, rationally, perfectly, and by-the-book.

Now that you know the core values of the Methodical, it’s important to show how the values of this particular Methodical Persona influenced him or her to spark interest in your business. The best way to do that is to answer a few questions while considering their specific needs.

Methodical Motivations What motivates your Methodical audience to use your product or service? What is the person’s bigger “unspoken question”—the sum of their internal dialogue, the “life mantra” that makes them tick as a person? Persona motivations are the driving force behind a Persona’s decision to buy. Motivations are the reason why they are looking for a product/service. Motivations are based on their core values.

Example Motivation for MethodicalsThe Scarecrow’s immediate motivation was to get help in organizing his own business and life—help him get a brain. His deep motivation was to prove to himself, and maybe to just show that he is a very organized and not scattered person.




Example Methodical Core Values• Responsibility

• Order

• Self-discipline

• Completeness

• Logical

• Processes

Valued Words Valued words are words that specific Personas use and look for. They tend to be part of the Persona’s vocabulary, and she will more readily respond to these words. Keywords for search engine results also fit into this category. Valued words are the words you use when writing copy for Personas.

Methodical Valued Words • New business

• Thorough

• Complete

• Detailed

• Fine print

• Process

• Responsibility

• Management

• Business management

• Methods

What are 5 value words that your Methodical audience has?

Methodicals focus on language that answers HOW questions• How do the details fit together to affect the process?

• How important is the fine print?

• How can I plan ahead with this?

• How detailed are the product specs?

• How can you prove it?

• How can you guarantee that?

• How does this work?

Answer the above questions about your business for the Methodical.

How to Present to MethodicalsPresentation is what a business plans to do to meet the needs of Personas. It’s done using all of the above information. It also helps with strategic brainstorming.

What do we need this Persona to know in order to buy from us? How do we communicate our value to this Persona? What qualities of our product or service will appeal to this Persona? What are this Persona’s objections and how will we overcome them?

Methodical Presentation Needs • Show him how your business is used and has been used by real people.

• Make sure he knows that you are credible and can back up your claims with evidence,

• Let him experience a sample from your business that show parts or details of the main process


29© All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 201228© All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 2012

Humanistic“I live to love, laugh and build community.”

Humanistic types have a tendency to put others’ needs before their own. They are creative and entertaining. Their highest ideal is helping others, so they greatly value the quality of their relationships. They’re usually slow to reach a decision because they rely on their feelings to help them make decisions.

Humanistics are generally willing to lend a sympathetic ear. They focus on acceptance, freedom and helping others, preferring the big picture of doing their small part to help mankind. They greatly value personal development, including their own.

Attitude: Personal, relationship-oriented Using Time: Open-ended, slow-paced Question: Who has used your solution to solve my problem? Approach: Offer testimonials and incentives

The Humanistic personality is encapsulated by these:

Characteristics Likes & Dislikes Useful WordsCreative

Mentor

Open

Slow, easy-going

Teacher

Warm/friendly

Likes the ‘big picture’

Likes giving

Likes harmony

Likes recognition

Dislikes details

Dislikes fast pace

Caring

Commonality

Helping others

Personal relationships

Sympathetic feelings

Unique

Wants: You to engage him/her with a touching story that tugs at the heartstrings and brings tears of sadness or tears joy to his/her eyes.

Embraces Avoids Core valuesMeeting new people

Giving people a “leg up” when they desperately need help (cash or advice or friendship)

Likes to tell jokes and fun

anecdotes “around the water cooler” at work

Learning new techniques for helping people to be happy in their work and to be more productive without too much pushing from management

Hurting peoples’ feelings

Tedious, technical work

Discouraging people when correcting them

Relating to others

Personal relationships

Sympathy

Feeling ideals of togetherness

Brotherhood

Love

In the Wizard of Oz, Tin Man wanted everyone to be his friend—more than anything he wanted a heart to connect with those around him.

Persona ScenarioThe scenario or narrative of a Persona is like a quick synopsis of a person’s life story. Persona scenario cover important life events that shape a person’s wants, needs and motivations. It’s the back-story of a person’s life, explains what makes him or her “tick” and makes the persona feel like a real person. Let’s look at the Tin Man’s story.




Tin Man’s Story

Tin Man loves his job as the Human Resources Manager at the Oz Lumberyard. He really enjoys working with people and helping them resolve conflict to create a healthier, happier work environment.

Tin Man is a great listener and is particularly skilled in giving advice that people really connect with. He’s extremely effective in helping people with both work and personal issues.

But he’s so passionate about helping other people that he has a hard time setting boundaries and taking care of himself. He often works long hours at the lumberyard to fill in where needed and to make sure everyone is taken care of. His dedication to his job ended up costing him at home.

About six months ago, Tin Man came home from a long day at work at the lumberyard to an empty home. Instead of finding his wife and two kids waiting for him, he found only a note that she was leaving him and taking the kids with her. She was always jealous of the time and energy he devoted to his job and to other people. This was a huge blow to Tin Man.

He felt his heart shatter into a million pieces that evening. Distraught, he grabbed his ax and did the only thing he could think of started chopping trees. He was so intent on his chopping that he didn’t see the dark rain clouds roll in. Rain mixed with his tears. Due to his severe rain allergy, his joints were soon rusted solid. He couldn’t move or speak he was trapped motionless with only his grief for company.

After what seemed an eternity, Dorothy and her companion found Tin Man in his immobile state and greased him up with his oilcan. While his body may be functioning again, there is an empty space where his heart used to be. More than anything, Tin Man needs to find a new heart.

Anatomy of Communicating with Humanistics

Before communicating with your Humanistic Persona for your business, you need to identify and focus on the core values of the Humanistic Personality type:

Driven by the need to relate to others, a Humanistic seeks Personal relationships so he can pursue sympathetic, feeling ideals of togetherness, such as brotherhood, love and family.

Now that you know the core values of the Humanistic, it’s important to show how the values of this particular Humanistic Persona influenced him or her to spark interest in your business. The best way to do that is to answer a few questions while considering their specific needs.

Humanistic Motivations What motivates this Persona to use this product or service? What is the person’s bigger “unspoken question”—the sum of their internal dialogue, the “life mantra” that makes them tick as a person?

Example of Humanistic Motivations• He wants to be successful in his career so he’ll have financial freedom he desires so he

can spend time with his children.

• He wants to have enough affluence so he can help his children to be at least as successful and happy as he is.

• He is looking for a book that will help him have more of an impact on society, as well as help him to be more profitable for the sake of his kids.

Example core values• Relating to others

• Personal relationships

• Sympathy

• Feeling ideals of togetherness

• Brotherhood

• Love

• Family

Valued Words Valued words are words that specific Personas use and look for. They tend to be part of the Persona’s vocabulary and he will more readily respond to these words. Keywords for search engine results also fit into this category. Valued words are the words you use when writing copy for Personas.

Humanistic Valued Words • Relating to others

• Personal relationships

• Relationships

• Empathy

• Feeling ideals of togetherness

• Brotherhood

• Love

• Family




What are 5 value words that your Spontaneous audience has?

Humanistic Buying Needs: What is the need/problem/opportunity? How will this he recognize their need/problem/ opportunity for our product or service? Is the need explicit? Where is the need anchored? What does the Persona need to know before buying from you? What might the Persona like to know before buying from you?

Humanistic Buying Needs • He needs to know that he is helping others when making a purchase.

• He needs information that reassures him with its apparent authenticity.

• He wants lots of testimonials by experts and laymen to back up marketing information.

A Humanistic’s buying process needs are what a Persona needs to be able to make a buying decision. If their needs aren’t met, they probably won’t buy.

What are the needs that Humanistics would have that your business can solve?

Humanistics focus on language that answers WHO questions • Who uses your products/service?

• Who are you? Tell me who is on your staff, and let me see bios.

• Who can tell me what it’s like to work with you?

• Who can trust you? Can I trust you?

• Who can tell me how your product or service will make me feel?

• What are your values?

• How will this help me strengthen relationships?

Answer the above questions about your business for the Humanistic:

How to Present to the Humanistic Presentation is what a business plans to do to meet the needs of Personas. It’s done using all of the above information. It also helps with strategic brainstorming.

What do we need this Persona to know in order to buy from us? How do we communicate our value to this Persona? What qualities of our product or service will appeal to this Persona? What are this Persona’s objections and how will we overcome them?

Humanistic Presentation Needs• A colorful, easy-to-navigate, open, helpful-feeling website

• Needs to provide Personal feedback from you and/or experts giving testimonials

• Should contain links to other people-oriented marketing websites

• Needs to provide a lot of information about your life and your story




What specifically can you do to increase your communication to the Humanist in your audience? Making Decisions with the Four Personas

As mentioned at the beginning of this guide, emotion plays a major part in the decision making process. Once you understand the general emotional motivations that drive people to make the decisions they do, you’ll be able to connect more

powerfully with your audience.

As a final example, let’s look at the thought processes of each persona when buying eggs.




Competitive - Quick & Logical Decisions

1. Wants to buy the best possible product possible.

2. Willing to pay a premium to know what he/she is buying is better than what everyone else is buying.

3. Looks for eggs infused with special nutrients or omega fatty acids or other characteristics that show these are the best possible eggs available.

Spontaneous - Quick & Emotional Decisions

1. Likely won’t want to spend the time to buy eggs, let alone cook them.

2. Spontaneous want quick, easy results.

3. Most Spontaneous people will head out to their favorite fast-food restaurant,McDonald’s for example, and buy an Egg McMuffin.

Methodical - Deliberate & Logical Decisions

1. Methodicals don’t want to be wrong.

2. They want to get the best possible deal that they can.

3. Methodicals will look for eggs that are buy one get one free, and will drive across town to make sure they get the best possible deal.

Humanistic - Deliberate & Emotional Decisions

1. The humanistic wants to make certain that everyone else around them is being taken care of.

2. Humanistic people want to buy the cage-free eggs because chicken are people too.

3. Humanistics are willing to pay a premium to support humane treatment of chickens.

That gives you an overview into how each persona makes decisions. Use this to review your current products and messaging. Test it. Make adjustments in your business to fit the needs of the Personas and see the difference it makes.


38© All content copyrighted by Pendulum In Action 2012

Put Knowledge Into Action

You now have the knowledge and tools to become a better marketer—a much better marketer. The ability to connect to your audience through your copy, your products and your marketing with people you’ve never met or spoken with will set you apart from your

competition. Personas give you that advantage in all of your endeavors.

Moving forward, remember that the importance of making a connection with your audience. People make decisions primarily based on emotion. Use that knowledge and the understanding of Personas to engage emotionally with your audience to help fill a need or solve a problem. Sincerity, authenticity and transparency will go a long way in the current ‘We’ cycle.

What’s the next step in connecting with your audience? Get started! Spend some time and take look at your business through the eyes of the four Personas. How well are you doing speaking to their needs? Do your products and services solve their problems and concerns in a way they can relate to?

Documents

Communicating with personas workbook