Have you ever tried to get someone’s attention? How did you get their attention? Did you call their name? In order to get someone’s attention, you have to say something that relates to them, or something that they are. In order to get engaged people into your content, you must know your audience. One way you can get to know your audience is by putting yourself in their shoes. You can create a persona of your audience. This is helpful for SEO because it helps accurately target consumers that will engage with your content. It is important to not deceit consumers with your content to drag them in. Consumers will lose trust and interest. For example, if you have a company about chocolate chip cookies and you are trying to learn more about your audience, you can create a persona. Let’s say your persona’s name is Pete and he is an avid chocolate chip cookie fan. Pete is obsessed. How will you get Pete’s attention? If you were Pete what would your needs or desires be? Thinking through Pete’s mind and thought process will help you create advertisements catered to Pete and what he wants. For example, pictures of chocolate chip cookies should be on the front lines of the company and website. Pete will get hooked. After the appeal of the cookies, Pete will have curiosity strike, and desire to see more of the website. Personas are also extremely helpful when it comes to writing out keywords. Without a persona, the information on the website will not be as appealing to consumers, because the company did not think clearly about who they were making the content for. Developing a persona is a hack all businesses should use. Why not pretend you are your consumer for better understanding of how they think? It will assist the company in having empathy for their consumers, which is a beneficial tool that can be used. Know your company, know your audience.
2 Responses
I like your point about how consumers can lose trust and interest. The reason we do the personas is to truly understand the consumer so we know how to better reach them, not just to sell more of something they may not need. I found it helpful to complete the search persona assignment because I was able to break down the potential thoughts and pains someone may feel when they are making a search.
I appreciate your perspective on this, that in the digital age it is so easy to lose the humanity of a person behind the screen and to address them and their humanity as well.