Archive for November, 2007

Developing persona’s of your customers can be a tricky and long process for a small business. Creating persona’s of your typical customer base can help you with the navigation, construction and wording of your site. You need to answer the questions your customer and direct them appropriately has so they will take the action you want the to with regards to your site.

Typically you can create yourself 4 persona’s. You need to think carefully about your customers, look back through contacts and also ask your customer service and sales teams. Some generic questions you can ask about your customers are:

1. What is their background?
2. What is their level of computer literacy?
3. What position do they hold in life? E.g, school teacher, pharmacist, mother, father
4. How much do they typically spend on a single purchase online?
5. What do they look for in a sale? e.g free shipping, extended guarantee
6. How do they phrase their own needs?
7. What keywords do they use when searching your site or contacting you? (you can look at logs from your site and also through customer service emails)

So with a basic set of questions, you can start to build a basic set of persona’s to represent your customers. Once you have this data you can start writing and addressing the needs of your customers and planning their route through your site.

You need to make sure you have key metrics to show the exit points for your customers. You can theorise about why your individual persona’s might be leaving at that point, before they have taken the action you want. (e.g., register their interest or buy) Have you addressed their needs and communicated in their language?

A good example of language for you the retailer and your typical customer, we can take the example of a digital camera. I want to spend around £130 on a new digital camera.

The camera that has taken my fancy is: Fujifilm FinePix Z10 7MP Digital Camera – Red.

The Argos description is:

# Design/style: Slim.

# 7m pixels.

# 3 x optical zoom.

# 4.8 x digital zoom.

# 2.5in LCD screen.

# Digital anti-blur.

# Face detection.

# SD/XD memory card compatible.

# 26MB internal memory.

# Movie capture with sound.

# Maximum ISO range: 1600.

# 15 scene modes.

# Pictbridge compatible.

# Accessories included in the box – NP45 battery and charger, wrist strap, AV cable, USB cable, CD ROM, PC and Mac software.

# NP45 battery supplied.

# Weight 135g.

# Size (H)5.6, (W)9.1, (D)2.3cm.

Yeah, well knowing nothing of digital cameras, I got the fact it used SD cards and it has a charger.

on eBay however, a seller explained the camera as:

The Z10fd has all the power of Real Photo Technology. The guiding principles behind RPT are simple; to set the highest possible standards for overall image quality, to expand digital photography opportunities and to give you fewer wasted shots

With the human eye as the ideal, Real Photo Technology cameras are designed from the ground up to capture ‘real’ photographs with stunning quality – giving you the power to capture the moment exactly as the eye sees it, no matter how challenging the shooting conditions.

Ultra-fast Face Detection
The FinePix Z10fd boasts Fujifilm’s acclaimed ultra-fast Face Detection technology, which will seek out faces in the darkness of a party (edited to add – this seller has used a real life and common situation to illustrate the features) to give perfectly focused and exposed pictures every time.

A green square surrounds the face of the primary subject on the camera’s LCD screen, whilst white squares identify up to nine other subjects. Movement tracking keeps the camera ‘locked on’ to its subjects until they move out of the picture. The technology works regardless of the subject’s position in the frame, and is not confused by anyone wearing glasses.

Anti blur
Users will immediately appreciate the benefits of Fujifilm’s Super CCD sensor. The increased surface area means it is more sensitive to light, enabling faster shutter speeds to help reduce image blur and the need for flash when taking photos in low light.

The Picture Stabilisation mode on the Z10fd uses high sensitivity (up to 1600 ISO) to help reduce camera shake, freeze subject movement and improve low-light background detail to deliver virtually blur free images.

Ahh, now that makes a bit more sense to me! I would have been taking a chance with the argos purchase as I didn’t really know what it meant. I saw this camera back in August, but have not got round to purchasing it because, well I knew I had to do my research. Not everyone (I would say about 90% of digital camera buyers are like me) is a professional photographer and knows exactly the effects of all the specifications.

So when you are writing your titles and descriptions to suit your persona’s……… remember, where as one persona might have the technical knowledge, another might not and you would have got this from your research! Don’t ignore your persona’s.

Remember you are selling to me, not to yourself or your staff!

This is especially important during the fury of the Christmas Season when snap buying decisions are made.