Is there anything new about Buyer Personas?

With campy 1960s space show Star Trek getting yet another rehash, it really does seem that everything old is new again.  A couple years ago buyer personas came to the fore as the newest way to fine-tune marketing efforts. But is this idea at all new? On the surface, it feels like marketing 101, i.e., know your customer. Even in the golden age of advertising, copywriters could zero in on what housewives wanted to serve their families and they created advertising accordingly:  

Getting to know you - better than ever before 

Actually the news in persona development isn’t the “what,” it’s the “how.” Now we can know our customers’ habits on a very intimate level thanks to social listening, click tracking, Facebook likes, and numerous other online data collection.  It all adds up to a level of specificity about our customers  that was never possible before.  For a good breakdown, check out this article.  

Whether you have a huge pool of data on potential customers, or you just talk to shoppers in your bricks-and-mortar store, it's always been critical to know your customers before trying to market to them. That's why robust persona development can provide a powerful tool in your marketing.

Persona development - where's the but? 

Everyone agrees that an accurate persona can help, but only if they're effectively used.  If you battle product managers who still want to emphasize meaningless features rather than customer concerns or desires, you will still produce ineffectual marketing.  And all the money spent on building personas, focus groups, surveys or any other customer discovery will be for naught.

I encourage marketers to explore building buyer personas – but take time to get buy in from the rest of the organization  so you won’t be wasting your time.