persona-generator

What this skill does

# Persona Generator

> Create research-backed buyer personas that drive real marketing and product decisions. Combine Buyer Personas methodology with Jobs-to-be-Done to build profiles based on actual behavior, not demographics fiction.

## When to Use This Skill

- **Starting customer discovery** to define who you're validating with
- **Marketing campaign planning** to target the right messages to right people
- **Content strategy** to create content that resonates with specific audiences
- **Product roadmap prioritization** to build features for real users
- **Sales enablement** to help sales understand who they're talking to
- **Team alignment** to get everyone speaking the same customer language

## Methodology Foundation

| Aspect | Details |
|--------|---------|
| **Source** | Adele Revella - "Buyer Personas" (2015) + Clayton Christensen - Jobs-to-be-Done |
| **Core Principle** | "Buyer personas built on real research reveal the thinking behind buying decisions—not just demographics, but motivations, anxieties, and decision criteria." |
| **Why This Matters** | Most personas are demographic fiction ("Marketing Mary, 35, likes yoga"). Useful personas explain WHY someone buys—their anxieties, trigger events, and decision process. |


## What Claude Does vs What You Decide

| Claude Does | You Decide |
|-------------|------------|
| Structures production workflow | Final creative direction |
| Suggests technical approaches | Equipment and tool choices |
| Creates templates and checklists | Quality standards |
| Identifies best practices | Brand/voice decisions |
| Generates script outlines | Final script approval |

## What This Skill Does

1. **Generates research-based personas** - Built on behavior, not demographics
2. **Identifies buying triggers** - What events cause someone to seek a solution
3. **Maps decision criteria** - What factors drive the purchase decision
4. **Surfaces anxieties and barriers** - What stops them from buying
5. **Documents the buyer's journey** - How they research and decide
6. **Creates actionable segments** - Personas that drive real decisions

## How to Use

### Generate Personas from Customer Interviews
```
I've completed [X] customer interviews. Here are my notes: [summary]
Generate buyer personas using the Buyer Personas + JTBD methodology.
Focus on buying triggers, decision criteria, and anxieties.
```

### Create Hypothesis Personas (Pre-Research)
```
I'm building [product] for [market].
Generate hypothesis personas I should validate through customer discovery.
Include questions to ask to validate each persona.
```

### Analyze and Improve Existing Personas
```
Here are our current personas: [paste personas]
Analyze them against best practices.
What's missing? What questions should we research to make them useful?
```

## Instructions

When generating personas, follow this evidence-based methodology:

### Step 1: Understand What Makes Personas Useful

```
## The Persona Problem

### BAD Personas (Demographic Fiction)
"Marketing Mary"
- Age: 35
- Income: $80K
- Lives in suburbs
- Likes yoga and organic food
- Uses Instagram

**Why this fails:**
- Describes demographics, not motivations
- Doesn't explain why she would buy
- Can't drive marketing/product decisions
- Could describe millions of people

### GOOD Personas (Behavioral/JTBD-Based)
"The Overwhelmed First-Timer"
- **Trigger:** Just got promoted to manager, now responsible for [task]
- **Job-to-be-Done:** Make me look competent to my boss
- **Current Behavior:** Using spreadsheets, asking colleagues, stressed
- **Decision Criteria:** Easy to learn, makes me look good, won't fail publicly
- **Anxiety:** "What if I choose wrong and look incompetent?"

**Why this works:**
- Explains what triggered the search
- Reveals what they're really hiring the product to do
- Shows how they decide
- Surfaces what might stop them
- Drives specific marketing and product decisions
```

---

### Step 2: The Five Rings of Buying Insight

```
## Adele Revella's Five Rings

### Ring 1: PRIORITY INITIATIVE
**What event triggered their search?**

Questions to research:
- What was the trigger event?
- Why now vs. 6 months ago?
- What finally made this urgent?
- What was the breaking point?

Example insight:
"They start looking when they get a new boss who asks 'why don't we have...' or when a competitor does something that makes them look behind."

---

### Ring 2: SUCCESS FACTORS
**What outcome are they trying to achieve?**

Questions to research:
- What does success look like?
- How will they measure results?
- What would make them a hero internally?
- What would make them regret the decision?

Example insight:
"They don't actually want [product feature]. They want to be seen as innovative by their CEO while not risking a high-profile failure."

---

### Ring 3: PERCEIVED BARRIERS
**What could stop them from buying?**

Questions to research:
- What concerns came up during evaluation?
- What almost made them walk away?
- What would cause them to delay?
- What do they fear will go wrong?

Example insight:
"Their biggest fear isn't that it won't work—it's that their team won't use it and they'll have wasted budget on something that sits unused."

---

### Ring 4: DECISION CRITERIA
**How do they evaluate options?**

Questions to research:
- What features/capabilities are must-haves?
- How do they compare options?
- Who else influences the decision?
- What trade-offs are they willing to make?

Example insight:
"They create a spreadsheet comparing 3-5 options. Integration with existing stack is #1. If it doesn't connect to Salesforce, they won't consider it."

---

### Ring 5: BUYER'S JOURNEY
**How do they research and decide?**

Questions to research:
- How did they first learn about the category?
- What resources did they use to research?
- Who did they talk to?
- What was the decision timeline?

Example insight:
"They google '[category] vs [category]' then ask for recommendations in a Slack community. Reviews on G2 are the final checkpoint before talking to sales."
```

---

### Step 3: Add Jobs-to-be-Done Layer

```
## JTBD Analysis Per Persona

### The Job Statement
"When I [situation], I want to [motivation], so I can [expected outcome]."

### Three Types of Jobs

**Functional Job:** What they need to accomplish
- "I need to get this report done faster"
- "I need to track our campaigns across channels"

**Emotional Job:** How they want to feel
- "I want to feel confident presenting to the board"
- "I don't want to worry about this anymore"

**Social Job:** How they want to be perceived
- "I want my team to see me as innovative"
- "I don't want to look like I made a bad decision"

### Forces That Drive Switching

**Push (away from current):**
- Pain points with current solution
- Frustrations with status quo
- External pressures (boss, market, competition)

**Pull (toward new):**
- Desired outcomes
- Attractive features
- Vision of better future

**Anxiety (about switching):**
- Fear of failure
- Implementation concerns
- Uncertainty about claims

**Habit (keeping current):**
- Familiarity with status quo
- Sunk costs
- "Good enough" mentality

For a persona to buy: Push + Pull > Anxiety + Habit
```

---

### Step 4: Persona Template

```
## PERSONA: [Name Based on Behavior, Not Demographics]

### Snapshot
| Aspect | Detail |
|--------|--------|
| **Role** | [Job title / responsibility] |
| **Environment** | [Company size, industry, team structure] |
| **Primary JTBD** | [Job statement] |
| **Current Solution** | [What they use today] |

---

### Ring 1: Priority Initiative (Trigger)

**What triggers the search:**
- [Specific event 1]
- [Specific event 2]
- [Specific event 3]

**Why now (urgency drivers):**
- [What makes them act now vs. later]

**Quotes:**
> "[Verbatim from research]"

---

### Ring 2: Success Factors

**Desired outcomes:**
1. [Functional outcome]
2. [Emotional outcome]
3. [Social outcome]

**How they'll measure success:**
- [Metric or indicator]

**What makes