Category: Marketing Automation

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I always wanted to build something big. When I started Tech Ladies in 2015 as a coffee meetup in New York City, I could immediately see the potential for it to grow into something larger. As a woman in tech myself, I craved a network to support me through the unique challenges I faced in the workplace. I also realized I was sitting on the answer to the “pipeline problem” that every tech company at the time was claiming prevented them from hiring more women in tech. It seemed like such a simple solution to connect our community with those who wanted to diversify their teams. Of course, when you’re building something big in tech, most people expect that you’ll raise money to help you grow that big thing faster. While nearly all the founders around me were going the VC route, I decided bootstrapping would be better for us. And now, all these years later, I’m so glad I built it this way.Don’t get me wrong, there are downsides to bootstrapping your business: You will move slower in staffing up your team, you will operate in lean ways that make you miss out on some opportunities to test at scale, you could lose out to a well-funded competitor who gets market share of what you’re doing (although I find that last one to be somewhat rare). And sure, I had moments when I felt wistful about the glamor of raising venture capital. It would have been nice to have a quick win, to be able to say I raised millions and therefore had a solid idea that important people thought was going to be profitable for them. Sometimes I wished I had a shiny office like all of my founder friends, and the ability to hire right away, staff up, and get this thing as big as we could make it. But ultimately, none of that stopped our growth. Today, Tech Ladies is the largest community of women in tech with over 150,000 members and generating millions in revenue. We’ve helped hundreds of women find jobs in tech and helped companies diversify their teams. We’ve offered events, training, networking, and resources to women in tech and have had a huge impact in the industry. And I got to do it all without sacrificing my vision (or a percentage of my company).Damn, I really built a company that employs 6 people, has helped hundreds of women get jobs in tech (where we are still grossly underrepresented) all without a dime of venture capital and now we are doing millions in revenue to continue our mission 🚀— Allison Esposito Medina (@techladyallison) April 23, 2022

Here are some of the reasons why bootstrapping was the right path for me and the ways it has helped our company succeed since.I Proved My Vision Quickly, But It Wasn’t VC ScaleThe first indicator that I could bootstrap was the pace at which I started generating revenue that would, in turn, support business growth. Early on, we started charging companies to place job postings in our weekly newsletter. At the time, the community only had 3,000 members but, because it was an incredible high-quality group of smart women in tech, it was a great pool to hire from. When the postings started bringing in around $5,000 a month and I didn’t have time to reply to every request coming in, I knew it was time to leave my job and work on building Tech Ladies full-time. Since it seemed like everyone around me was raising money from venture capital firms, I figured I should take a few meetings with some VC connections I had made over the years. From the first meeting, a friendly VC encouraged me to put together a pitch that would promise outsized returns. “How is this a billion dollar company?” he asked. Embarrassingly, I returned with a blank stare and fumbled some answer off the top of my head. Another VC offered me a $50,000 check on the spot if I would just tell him I was “building the LinkedIn for women.” I went back to my desk later that night and started drafting up some copy around how Tech Ladies could be a billion-dollar business. But everything I wrote felt out of touch with reality, or like a huge exaggeration. When I thought about becoming a massive social network, it didn’t sit right, and I wasn’t sure we could maintain our quality at that scale. I glanced over at the whiteboard next to me where I had clearly mapped out a bootstrapped pathway to make $500,000 our first year, a million after that, and $10 million in the following years. I was the sole owner of this company. Why would I not take a swing at that? I canceled all the rest of my VC meetings and got back to building. Very early on a VC I met with told me “Tech Ladies” wasn’t a good name because it didn’t “sound serious enough.” So glad I didn’t listen 🙉— Allison Esposito Medina (@techladyallison) August 29, 2022

Going all in on your business without venture capital can be scary. But I asked myself: Do I want to be the founder who burned through $20-30 million in capital trying to build something I don’t totally believe in, or the founder who made even $5-10 million building something smaller but meaningful? Yes, some companies need to raise venture capital because they can’t create revenue until they spend years finalizing their product. But a surprising number can start making an impact (and a profit) quickly. I felt in my gut that was the right path for Tech Ladies.I’ve Had to Make Everything Work ASAPAs we all know from watching the rise and fall of unicorn startups, raising money actually says very little about whether a company will succeed. Many companies that go the VC route spend a lot of time and money spinning their wheels without ever quite figuring out how to make a profit.The thing I always tell people about bootstrapping, on the other hand, is that everything has to work. You don’t have six months to ponder revenue models—you have to get to profitability as soon as possible. You don’t have time to debate different strategies—you need to start trying them and see what sticks. That’s the hard part about bootstrapping, but also the great part. Building a successful company isn’t about getting a few rich people to believe in you, it’s about putting something out into the world that people think is valuable enough to pay for. I’m glad we were forced to figure that out instead of having the money to try a business model for years and have it ultimately not work out. This isn’t to say we never had failures, we just had to learn from them and adjust very quickly. For example, when you’re bootstrapping it’s very easy to be overprotective of your revenue. After all, that’s your money at the end of the day, so investing it back in the business is another muscle you need to learn to build. For me, one of our biggest mistakes was not hiring full-time people to the team sooner. I think we could have accelerated our growth by about two years if we had made one to two strategic hires, instead of me stubbornly running everything on my own with a few freelancers. Of course, there were times when I looked at venture-backed companies and dreamed of sitting in their beautiful offices with their massive teams. But I was okay with learning to live without that so I could stay focused on what really matters: the thing we were building and whether it serves people. I’ve Been Able to Stay Dedicated & Responsive to My CommunityBootstrapping has been especially powerful because I’ve been able to stay focused on our community and our clients as our bosses, rather than having to balance shareholder interests, too. Like many community-oriented businesses, we have a tight feedback loop with our members and are always paying attention to how we can better serve them. Unlike VC-backed businesses, we can stay really nimble and adjust with our members as their needs change over time. We’ve had instances where we’ve beaten companies with huge amounts of venture capital because we were able to ship something quickly while they were still running things by their biggest investor, putting together reports, and debating the plan.While they were scaling up global teams that never panned out, we were focused on getting hires for our partners, hosting events that resonated with our community, and building a paid community to help women in tech grow their careers. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Tech Ladies (@tech.ladies) Ultimately, my favorite thing about bootstrapping a business is that it’s available to everyone and ready for the taking. The only thing holding any of us back is limiting beliefs about what we can build, how we can build it, and if we even deserve it. That’s especially important given that only 2 percent of venture capital funding went to women-owned businesses in 2021. We can talk about all the societal changes that need to happen to fix that—and I’m personally investing my own capital in women-founded companies I believe in—but in the meantime, I hope more founders will stop waiting for permission from the VC powers that be and start working on their ideas on their own terms. You can build any company you want on the internet right now and make millions of dollars doing it. Why not get started?Want to learn more of my bootstrapping strategies? Subscribe to my newsletter, Bootstrap to Millions (with Allison), for more regular advice and stories from Tech Ladies’ growth.

Quality leads create more conversions.
But what exactly does “quality” mean when it comes to leads? Put simply, quality leads are those with a higher likelihood of moving down the sales funnel from awareness to interest to intent to conversion.
Finding quality leads doesn’t happen by accident. To achieve this goal, brands need a lead qualification process that effectively pinpoints key characteristics that make potential customers more likely to become loyal buyers.
To help you get started, we’ve got 10 expert tips for improving lead quality.

Lead qualification typically takes the form of stock questions that depend on your offering. For example, if you’re selling insurance you might ask questions about age, current health conditions, and previous medical histories. If you’re selling a B2B service, you might ask a lead if they’re the one in charge of the decision-making. If not, you may need to speak with someone else.
An effective lead qualification process helps eliminate leads that aren’t currently in a position to buy, in turn allowing sales teams to focus their efforts more likely prospective purchasers. This also lets businesses funnel prospects that aren’t quite ready for sales into future marketing campaigns so they can stay in the loop about any updates and reach out again when they’re ready to take the next step.
3 Reasons Why You’re Getting Bad Leads
So why are you getting bad leads in the first place? If prospective customers are interested in your product, what’s standing in the way?
Three causes are common culprits of bad leads:
1. Poor quality pay-per-click (PPC) leads
Are your PPC purchases returning leads that are actually qualified to make purchases or just providing more generic lead details? If so, consider more specific PPC guidelines or changing PPC providers.
2. Ineffective offers and calls to action
Have you covered your entire sales funnel, or are you only offering early-funnel conversion opportunities? Are your offers for free materials that have nothing to do with your business? Do you have calls to action on your website? Are they shiny and compelling?
3. Lack of targeted landing pages
Do your landing pages conform to best practices? Does the text actually describe the offer? Does the text help to qualify WHO should be filling out the form? If the answer to those questions is “yes”, you should consider adding more qualifying fields to your forms. Find out from sales what their top 3 qualifying questions are, and put them on your forms.
1. Define Your Audience

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Getting more qualified leads means making sure you know who your audience is and what they’re looking for. Start by creating your ideal buyer persona. Maybe you’re looking for a business decision-maker with access to capital and the drive to solve specific pain points within their organization.
While the ideal audience will differ for every company, defining this audience goes a long way toward improving lead quality.
Here, tools like Google Analytics can help pinpoint your audience.
2. Choose Your Keywords

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Along with your audience, choose keywords that align with what your brand is trying to sell and what qualified leads want. Achieve this goal with keyword research: See what comes up when you search your target keywords, such as the top-ranking posts and the most popular questions.
Using this data, create content, forms, and offers that reflect buyer preferences and align with your offerings.
Consider solutions like Google Ads to find your ideal keywords.
3. Create Targeted Content

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Targeted content helps you get ahead of potential questions or concerns. By creating landing pages and FAQs that address common issues and answer common questions before your sales team connects with leads, you can reduce the amount of time staff spend covering common ground and instead let them focus on the details of making a sale.
Try HubSpot’s survey tools to find out what your audience wants.
4. Develop Detailed Forms

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By developing detailed contact forms, marketing teams can reduce the risk of sending unqualified leads to sales times.
First, ensure that all relevant form fields are required. These may include company name, contact email address, the full name of a potential lead, and their position within the organization.
It’s also worth creating forms that allow potential customers to describe their current pain points along with the type of solution or service they’re looking to find.
Use HubSpot’s Free Online Form Builder to create targeted forms.
5. Identify Decision-Makers

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While more detailed forms can help increase total lead quality, they can’t guarantee that decision-makers are the ones reaching out.
Instead, companies can boost lead quality by proactively identifying decision-makers and initiating conversations. Start with a look at your current clientele: What role(s) do decision-makers in these companies usually hold? Then, do some research on prospective clients to see who holds similar positions and reach out to them directly. Not only does this increase the overall quality of the lead — provided you create compelling content — but also streamlines the sales process.
Solutions like people.ai can help you find decision-makers.
6. Automate Where Possible

 
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The sheer amount of leads that companies can now generate from both traditional marketing campaigns and PPC efforts means that it’s easy to get overwhelmed and lose the plot on who’s qualified and who’s not
As a result, it’s worth automating both contact and evaluation processes where possible. For example, email automation tools can help take care of reaching out to potential prospects without having staff compose hundreds and hundreds of messages, while automated evaluation software can pinpoint potential issues with collected data that may indicate a prospect is not ready to buy.
Check out HubSpot’s Marketing Automation Software to streamline key tasks.
7. Align Sales and Marketing

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Sales and marketing are two sides of the same coin, but often end up on opposite sides of the lead qualification process.
While marketing focuses on bringing in new leads, sales wants to make sure these leads are qualified before putting in the time and effort required for conversion. If sales teams feel like marketing isn’t delivering quality leads, and marketing thinks that sales is being too picky, the result is a disaster waiting to happen.
Instead, align sales and marketing from the get-go. Sit both teams down in a room and hash out what a great lead looks like, what getting these leads required, the process of handing off leads from marketing to sales.
Products like Ruler Analytics help with this alignment at scale.
8. Ask for Referrals

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Sometimes it’s OK to take the easier route. Instead of building a new lead roster from scratch, it’s worth asking current customers for referrals. You can offer them discounts or other benefits, but if they like what you’re doing it shouldn’t take much convincing to have them pass on the contact data of decision-makers in similar companies, or to reach out on your behalf.
Consider a solution like Referral Factory to streamline this process.
9. Track Your Data

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To ensure your lead quality is stable, track your initial and repeat sales conversions. If you notice that either one of these metrics is falling, it may be worth reexamining lead qualification processes to ensure that the leads you’re generating have the means and motive to make a purchase.
Act-On can help you track relevant lead data across your organization.
10. Make Changes as Needed

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Last but not least? Don’t get stuck in a rut. If current lead generation tactics aren’t delivering the quality you want, make changes. Rethink your keyword strategy, create new content, or broaden your target market. In other words, focus on the outcome, not the operations, to inform your lead generation.
Take charge of your changes with HubSpot’s Marketing Software.
Taking the Lead
Higher quality leads help boost the quantity of sales conversions. But quality leads don’t just fall in your lap — to get the best leads for your business, you need to find the right audience, target your content, track your data, and make changes as needed to keep quality high and sales steady.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2010 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

How do you become a thought leader?
It’s an important question: If you can become a trusted voice in your market, you’ve got a leg up on capturing the interest of your target market.

Ready to level up your leadership? While your style and substance may vary, these 10 tips can help boost your thought leadership strategy.

1. Maintain an Active Business Blog
Launching a blog that covers important topics relating to the industry in which you’re selling is perhaps the best way to establish and uphold your image as a thought leader. A well-written blog will make prospects and current customers confident that the products and services they buy from you are created using industry expertise. Not only will maintaining an active business blog reward you with a more credible industry presence, but when done right, it will also afford you additional business benefits such as improved lead generation and a boost in search engine optimization.
2. Contribute Guest Blog Posts
Once you start gaining traction as a credible business blogger using your own blog, it’s also a great idea to seek opportunities to contribute guest articles to the blogs of other industry thought leaders. Being recognized by already-established thought leaders as credible sources and contributors will further legitimize your industry expertise.
3. Publish Long-Form Content
Publishing longer-form content such as ebooks, whitepapers, and even webinars shows prospects and customers that your knowledge about given topics expands beyond 600-word blog posts. By publishing well-crafted, educational ebooks or other downloadable content, you’ll demonstrate that you’re capable of thought leadership on an even higher scale.
4. Launch Your Own Podcast
An alternative or complement to blogging, launching a regularly scheduled audio or video podcast is another great way to exhibit thought leadership. Consider discussing important industry-related topics or news and inviting other industry experts to join you as guests to create an even deeper level of credibility.
5. Speak at Conferences/Events
Your thought leadership doesn’t have to be limited to the web. Live, in-person conferences and events are valuable marketing assets, and a presence at these gatherings can be valuable to any business’s marketing efforts. Apply to speak at these types of industry events. Start with smaller events to introduce yourself to your industry’s speaking circuit, and work your way up to larger, more prestigious events once you’ve gained more experience and respect as a speaker. Once you’ve secured speaking engagements, always be sure to make your presentations as educational and non-promotional as possible to achieve maximum credibility.
6. Answer Questions on Social Media
This is perhaps one of the easiest thought leadership tactics to keep up with on an ongoing basis. Social media is littered with people trying to learn more or find answers to questions they have. Monitoring social media sites for industry-related questions can help you identify opportunities to share your expertise.
LinkedIn Answers is the perfect platform for this, allowing you to search users’ questions by industry and topic. Also, consider using Twitter Search to find users’ questions on Twitter. Quora and Facebook are also great places to search.
Once you’ve identified questions for which you can provide a helpful response, answer it in an informative, non-promotional way. (Bonus points if you can link to a blog post you’ve written that expands on the topic in question!)
7. Highlight Your Area of Expertise
You can’t be great at everything. For thought leaders, this general statement comes with specific advice: Don’t try to be the end-all, be-all for users’ questions. Instead, lean into your area of expertise to provide reliable insight and advice.
For example, if you’re an expert in business tax and invoice processes, this should be the focus of your content. If users ask questions that are outside this area, direct them to another leader that might know the answer rather than trying to fill in the gaps.
Not only does this boost your credibility in the eyes of your audience but gives you the chance to learn something new.
8. Dive into detail
Want to build an audience? Dive into detail about what helped you get to where you are today and what you learned along the way.
Here’s why: The Internet is full of generic posts and blogs that offer “tips” or “tactics” without much detail, making them more frustrating than functional for users. To become a thought leader, apply your expertise and provide detail, from descriptions of your big successes to in-depth analysis of your failures and what you took from the experience.
Put simply? The more authentic detail you can provide, the better.
9. Keep your ear to the ground
Your industry isn’t static. New tools and technologies are constantly being developed and deployed, in turn changing or replacing familiar practices.
As a result, being an industry thought leader means keeping your ear to the ground and keeping up on what’s happening so you can provide your audience with the latest news. This is often made easier when combined with the fifth tip on our list — speaking at conferences and events. If you can create a solid business network, you can be one of the first people in the know about new developments.
10. Listen to (and learn from) feedback
Not everyone will like your content. Some users simply won’t enjoy the way you structure and deliver your blog or podcast, while others will have more genuine criticisms.
Although it can be challenging, it’s worth taking this legitimate feedback to heart, especially if it’s consistent. If multiple users are saying the same thing about an error you’re making or have a concern about how complicated you’re making a topic, it’s worth taking some time to consider their feedback and make changes accordingly.
Thought leaders are human — listening to and learning from feedback shows the capacity to grow and can boost your reputation.
Become a Genuine Thought Leader
Genuine thought leaders focus on providing value to current customers, potential buyers, and business partners alike. Their primary goal isn’t to drive up website visits or sales conversations — although the indirect result of trust and respect will likely be more business — but deliver content that’s engaging, compelling, and trustworthy.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in August 2011 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Marketing Margie. Sales Sam. IT Isabel. Accounting Alan.
Do you know who your business’s buyer personas are? And if so, how much do you know about them?

Buyer personas are semi-fictional representations of your ideal customers based on data and research. They help you focus your time on qualified prospects, guide product development to suit the needs of your target customers, and align all work across your organization (from marketing to sales to service).

As a result, you’ll be able to attract high-value visitors, leads, and customers to your business, who you’ll be more likely to retain over time.
More specifically, having a deep understanding of your buyer persona(s) is critical to driving content creation, product development, sales follow-up, and really anything that relates to customer acquisition and retention.
“Okay, so personas are really important to my business. But, how do I actually make one?”
Ahh! The million-dollar question. The good news is, they aren’t that difficult to create. It’s all about how you obtain your market research and customer data, and the presentation of that information within your business.
Follow this guide and download these persona templates to simplify this process. Before you know it, you’ll have complete, well-planned buyer personas to show off to your entire company!

Before we dive into the buyer persona-creation process, let’s pause to understand the impact of well-developed buyer personas on your business (most specifically, your marketing efforts).

Why exactly are buyer personas so important to your business?
Buyer personas help you understand your customers (and prospective customers) better. This makes it easier for you to tailor your content, messaging, product development, and services to meet the specific needs, behaviors, and concerns of the members of your target audience.
For example, you may know your target buyers are caregivers, but do you know their specific needs and interests? What is the typical background of your ideal buyer? To fully understand what makes your best customers tick, it’s critical to develop detailed personas for your business.
The strongest buyer personas are based on market research and insights you gather from your actual customer base (through surveys, interviews, etc.).
Depending on your business, you could have as few as one or two personas or as many as 10 or 20. But if you’re new to personas, start small. You can always develop more personas later if needed.
What about “negative” buyer personas?
While a buyer persona is a representation of your ideal customer, a negative — or “exclusionary” — persona is a representation of who you don’t want as a customer.
For example, this could include professionals who are too advanced for your product or service, students who are only engaging with your content for research/ knowledge, or potential customers who are just too expensive to acquire. The potential customers may be too expensive because of a low average sale price, their propensity to churn, or their unlikeliness to purchase again from your company.
How can buyer personas be used in marketing?
At the most basic level, developing personas allows you to create content and messaging that appeals to your target audience. It also enables you to target or personalize your marketing for different segments of your audience.
For example, instead of sending the same lead nurturing emails to everyone in your database, you can segment by buyer persona and tailor your messaging to what you know about those different personas.
Furthermore, when combined with lifecycle stage (i.e. how far along someone is in your sales cycle), buyer personas also allow you to map out and create highly targeted content. (You can learn more about how to do that by downloading our Content Mapping Template.)
And if you take the time to also create negative personas, you’ll have the added advantage of being able to segment out the “bad apples” from the rest of your contacts. This can help you achieve a lower cost-per-lead and cost-per-customer — and, therefore, see higher sales productivity.

Different Types of Buyer Personas
While beginning work on your personas, you may ask yourself, “What are the different types of buyer personas?” From there, it’d be simple to adjust one for your business — right?
Well, that’s not exactly how it works. There isn’t a set list of universally-recognized buyer personas to choose from, nor is there a standard for the number of personas you need. This is because each business (no matter how many competitors they have) is unique. For that reason, their buyer personas should be unique to them, too.
That’s why identifying and creating your different buyer personas can, at times, be slightly challenging. This is why we recommend using HubSpot’s Make My Persona generator (as well as HubSpot’s persona templates) to simplify the process of creating different personas.
Just like buyer personas are unique to each company, so is their name for them. You may see buyer personas referred to as “customer personas”, “marketing personas”, “audience personas”, or “target persona”. Each of these carry the same meaning but will look unique within your company.
In general, companies may have the same, or similar, categories for their buyer personas (e.g. a marketer, an HR rep, an IT manager, etc.). But the different personas your business has and the number of them your business requires will be tailored to who your target audience includes and what you offer your customers.
What goes into persona development?
Now that we’ve discussed the importance of buyer personas and the different types, let’s explore the nuances of developing your buyer personas.
Before you begin creating your buyer personas, you need to identify the people on your team who will have a role in its development. Who should create your buyer persona? Frankly, any customer-facing team member should be a part of the process. While that sounds like you’ll have too many cooks in the kitchen, it’s important you select one representative from each department. Each department has unique experiences with the customers that will serve as valuable information in identifying your target audience.
When building your team, start with representatives from sales and marketing. Sales employees directly communicate with customers. Your marketing staff can conclude and create data based on information about your customers. Additionally, your team should include an executive leader who ensures that the brand mission and values are upheld through every step of development.
Persona development teams need sales, marketing, and executive members. You’ll find these individuals in almost every business, which leads to the question,“What type of business needs to create buyer personas?” Answer: all of them. Every business needs customers or clients. As long as this concept is true, buyer personas should be a staple in every business, regardless of the industry.
While developing buyer personas is crucial, it’s equally important that your business regularly reviews and updates them. Take the time to do this annually. It might feel like a tedious task. However, identifying your target audience is the first step to securing these buyers as future and repeating customers.
Now, are you ready to start creating your buyer personas?

How to Create Buyer Personas
Buyer personas can be created through research, surveys, and interviews — all with a mix of customers, prospects, and those outside your contacts database who might align with your target audience.
Here are some practical methods for gathering the information you need to develop personas:

Look through your contacts database to uncover trends about how certain leads or customers find and consume your content.
Use form fields that capture important persona information when creating forms to use on your website. For example, if all of your personas vary based on company size, ask each lead for information about company size on your forms.
Consider your sales team’s feedback on the leads they’re interacting with most. What generalizations can they make about the different types of customers you serve best?
Interview customers and prospects to discover what they like about your product or service.

Now, how can you use the above research to create your personas?
Once you’ve gone through the research process, you’ll have a lot of meaty, raw data about your potential and current customers. But what do you do with it? How do you distill all of it so it’s easy for everyone to understand all the information you’ve gathered?
The next step is to use your research to identify patterns and commonalities from the answers to your interview questions, develop at least one primary persona, and share that persona with the rest of the company.
Use our free, downloadable persona template to organize the information you’ve gathered about your persona(s). Then share these slides with the rest of your company so everyone can benefit from your research and develop an in-depth understanding of the person (or people) they’re targeting every day at work.
Here’s how to work through the steps involved in creating your buyer personas in more detail.
1. Fill in your persona’s basic demographic information.
Ask demographic-based questions over the phone, in person, or with online surveys. (Some people are more comfortable disclosing personal information like this.)
It’s also helpful to include some descriptive buzzwords and mannerisms of your persona you may have picked up on during your conversations to make it easier for people on your team to identify certain personas when talking to prospects.
Here’s an example of how you might complete Section 1 in your template for one of your personas:

Download this Template
2. Share what you’ve learned about your persona’s motivations.
This is where you’ll distill the information you learned from asking “why” during those interviews. What keeps your persona up at night? Who do they want to be? Most importantly, tie that all together by telling people how your company can help them.

Download this Template
3. Help your sales team prepare for conversations with your persona.
Include some real quotes from your interviews that exemplify what your personas are concerned about, who they are, and what they want. Then create a list of the objections they might raise so your sales team is prepared to address those during their conversations with prospects.

Download this Template
4. Craft messaging for your persona.
Tell people how to talk about your products/ services with your persona. This includes the nitty-gritty vocabulary you should use, as well as a more general elevator pitch that positions your solution in a way that resonates with your persona.
This will help you ensure everyone in your company is speaking the same language when they’re having conversations with leads and customers.

Download this Template
Finally, make sure you give your persona a name (e.g., Finance Manager Margie, IT Ian, or Landscaper Larry), so everyone internally refers to each persona the same way, allowing for cross-team consistency.
And if you’re a HubSpot customer, add your persona to Marketing Hub by following this step-by-step setup guide.

How to Find Interviewees for Researching Buyer Personas
One of the most critical steps to establishing your buyer persona(s) is finding some people to speak with to understand, well, who your buyer persona is.
That means you’ll have to conduct some interviews to get to know what drives your target audience. But how do you find those interviewees? There are a few sources you should tap into:
1. Use your current customers.
Your existing customer base is the perfect place to start your interviews because they’ve already purchased your product and engaged with your company. At least some of them are likely to exemplify your target persona(s).
Don’t just talk to people who love your product and want to spend an hour gushing about you (as good as that feels). Customers who are unhappy with your product will show other patterns that will help you form a solid understanding of your personas.
For example, you might find that some of your less happy customers have bigger teams and need greater collaboration functionality from your product. Or, you may find they find your product too technical and difficult to use. In both cases, you learn something about your product and what your customers’ challenges are.
Another benefit of interviewing current customers is that you may not need to offer them an incentive (e.g., gift cards). Customers often like being heard. Interviewing them gives them a chance to tell you about their world, their challenges, and what they think of your product.
Customers also like to have an impact on the products they use. So, as you involve them in interviews like this, you may find they become even more loyal to your company. When you reach out to customers, be clear that your goal is to get their feedback and that it’s highly valued by your team.
2. Use your prospects.
Be sure to also interview people who have not purchased your product and don’t know much about your brand. Your current prospects and leads are great options because you already have their contact information.
Use the data you do have about them (i.e., anything you’ve collected through lead generation forms or website analytics) to figure out who might fit into your target personas.
3. Use your referrals.
You’ll probably also need to rely on some referrals to talk to people who may fit into your target personas, particularly if you’re heading into new markets or don’t have any leads or customers yet.
Use your network (coworkers, existing customers, social media contacts, etc.) to find people you’d like to interview and be introduced to. It may be tough to get a large volume of people this way, but you’ll likely get some very high-quality interviews out of it.
If you don’t know where to start, try searching on LinkedIn for people who may fit into your target personas and see which results have any connections in common with you. Then, reach out to your common connections for introductions.
4. Use third-party networks.
For interviewees who are completely removed from your company, there are a few third-party networks you can recruit from. Craigslist allows you to post ads for people interested in any job, and UserTesting.com allows you to run remote user testing (with some follow-up questions).
You’ll have less control over sessions run through UserTesting.com, but it’s a great resource for quick user testing recruiting.
Now that you know how to identify interviewees, let’s look at some tips for recruiting them.
Tips for Recruiting Interviewees
As you reach out to potential buyer persona interviewees, here are a few ideas to improve your response rates.
1. Use incentives.
While you may not need them in all scenarios (e.g., customers who already want to talk to you), incentives give people a reason to participate in an interview if they don’t have a relationship with you. A simple gift card is an easy option.
2. Be clear that this isn’t a sales call.
This is especially important when dealing with non-customers. Be clear that you’re doing research and just want to learn from them. You are not getting them to commit to a one-hour sales call. You’re getting them to commit to telling you about their lives, jobs, and challenges.
3. Make it easy to say yes.
Take care of everything for your potential interviewee. Suggest times but be flexible. Allow them to pick a time right off the bat and send a calendar invitation with a reminder to block off their time.
4. Decide how many people you need to interview.
Unfortunately, the answer is, it depends. Start with at least three to five interviews for each persona you’re creating. If you already know a lot about your persona, that may be enough. You may need to do multiple interviews with each category of interviewees (customers, prospects, people who don’t know your company).
The rule of thumb is when you start accurately predicting what your interviewee is going to say, it’s probably time to stop. Through these interviews, you’ll naturally start to notice patterns.
Once you start expecting and predicting what your interviewee will say, that means you’ve interviewed enough people to find and internalize these patterns.
5. Determine which questions you’ll ask interviewees.
It’s time to conduct the interview! After the normal small talk and thank you’s, it’s time to jump into your questions. There are several categories of questions you’ll want to ask in persona interviews to create a complete persona profile.

20 Questions to Ask in Persona Interviews
The following questions are organized into eight categories. Feel free to customize this list and remove or add more questions that may be appropriate for your target customers.
1. Role Questions

What is your job role? Your title?
How is your job measured?
What does a typical day look like?
What skills are required to do your job?
What knowledge and tools do you use in your job?
Who do you report to? Who reports to you?

2. Company Questions

In which industry or industries does your company work?
What is the size of your company (revenue, employees)?

3. Goal Questions

What are you responsible for?
What does it mean to be successful in your role?

4. Challenge Question

What are your biggest challenges?

5. Watering Hole Questions

How do you learn new information for your job?
What publications or blogs do you read?
What associations and social networks do you participate in?

6. Personal Background Questions

Describe your personal demographics (if possible, ask their age, whether they’re married, and if they have children).
Describe your educational background. What level of education did you complete, which schools did you attend, and what did you study?
Describe your career path. How did you end up where you are today?

7. Shopping Preference Questions

How do you prefer to interact with vendors (e.g., email, phone, in-person)?
Do you use the internet to research vendors or products? If yes, how do you search for information?
Describe a recent purchase. Why did you consider a purchase, what was the evaluation process, and how did you decide to purchase that product or service?

8. The “Why?” Question
This is the number one tip for a successful persona interview.
The follow-up question to pretty much every question in the above list should be “why?” Through these interviews, you’re trying to understand your customers’ (or potential customers’) goals, behaviors, and motivators. But keep in mind that people aren’t always great at reflecting on their behaviors to tell you what drives them at their core.
For example, your main concern is not the number of visits to their websites. What you care about is that they measure these visits as a way to show their higher-ups that they’re doing a good job.
Start with a simple question. For instance, “What is your biggest challenge?” Then spend a good amount of time diving deeper into that one question to learn more about that person. You learn more by asking “why?” than more superficial questions.

Buyer Persona Examples
Let’s go over some examples of completed buyer personas to get a better understanding of what they look like.
B2B Buyer Persona Example
The image below is a B2B buyer persona for someone who works in HR. The persona paints a clear picture of the target customer’s struggles and how the business can best meet those needs. In this case, HR recruiting tools streamline processes, make recruiting easier, and help HR expertly manage their overall job duties.

B2C Buyer Persona Example
The image below is a B2C buyer persona for a music streaming service.

Based on this persona, a streaming service would want to ensure that it has a mobile app that’s user-friendly, sends new music notifications, and makes it easy for users to discover new music related to their interests and share content with friends.
Create Your Buyer Personas
Create your buyer personas to understand your target customers on a deeper level and ensure everyone on your team knows how to best target, support, and work with your customers. This will help you improve reach, boost conversions, and increase loyalty.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in May 2015 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

It was a Saturday night, around 11 PM, and I was innocently scrolling on Amazon to look for a gift for my best friend’s birthday. But then, it happened.
I had an impulse to purchase everything. The female empowerment mug? The wine tumbler? The pillow that said “Nap Queen”? I wanted it all. I added everything I liked to my cart, but bailed once I realized the total had reached $200.

My hesitation to check out triggered abandoned cart emails which attempted to persuade me to make the purchase.

Abandoned cart emails are one way to convert lost business and turn a lost prospect into a brand enthusiast.
Morgan Jacobson, an inbound marketing specialist on the ecommerce team at HubSpot, wrote about abandoned cart emails in this blog. He says, “First off, if you’re doing any kind of shopping cart abandonment you’re way ahead of the game. Currently, only 19% of even the top 1,000 ecommerce companies engage in any kind of shopping cart abandonment recovery. Which is interesting, given that up to half of the customers who abandon their carts will complete the purchase when asked.”
Here, you’ll find abandoned cart email templates to get you started, plus effective abandoned cart email examples to inspire your own.
Abandoned Cart Email Templates
To build your abandoned cart emails, you can find templates in any email marketing tool. Tools like Squarespace, Wix, or HubSpot will have templates to help you get started. For instance, you can use a pre-made template for the layout, but customize the message, images, and design. Here’s an example template from our marketing kit:

Downlaod HubSpot’s Abandoned Email Template
The messaging in abandoned cart emails is fairly simple. Below is an outline of the basic structure:

Snappy subject line
Introduction text
Items left in the cart
Offer or discount
Checkout button or call to action (CTA)
Reviews or social proof
Closing text

While this outline is helpful if you’re sending one abandoned cart email, you might consider a drip campaign for your cart recovery emails. A drip campaign is a series of automated emails.

Abandoned Cart Email Sequence
For an abandoned cart workflow, the emails could be structured like this:

Email 1: Cart reminder (sent a few hours after cart abandonment)
Email 2: Follow up (sent a few days later)
Email 3: Promotional discount (sent a few days after email two)

According to Omnisend, a series of emails works 63% better than a single email for abandoned cart emails.
Jordan Pritikin, a team manager for HubSpot’s email and growth marketing team says, “When you’re writing an abandoned cart email, personalization is key. What was the actual product or service that was abandoned? What are the value propositions that most resonate with the individual you’re sending to? Why did they object to the purchase initially and how can you, as the business, help assuage those objections? The more personal your abandoned cart email, the more likely it is to succeed!”
Abandoned Cart Email Best Practices
Whether you send one email or implement a full drip campaign, there are a few best practices to keep in mind when planning an abandoned cart email. For example:
Timing
Send your abandoned cart emails within a few hours after a customer abandons their cart. For example, if you work at a company like Zappos, and someone doesn’t complete their purchase, you might send an abandoned cart email anywhere from three to five hours after they leave your site without completing a purchase.
At the very least, you want to make sure you are sending the first abandoned cart email within 24 hours. However it’s important to note that the efficacy of those emails goes down if sent after the 24 hour window.
Personalization
Abandoned cart emails should be personalized to the customer you’re sending them to by including the items that were left in their cart and addressing them by name.
Including a list of the items they left behind may persuade them to go ahead and complete the purchase since they’ve already expressed interest by adding them to their cart.
CTA
Your abandoned cart email should encourage customers to complete their purchase. For example, the CTA might be something like “Buy Now” or “Resume Your Order.”
Creating a CTA that takes them directly to checkout will save your customers time, make it easy to review their times, and further encourage them to complete the purchase.
Copywriting
The copy should be snappy, concise, and compelling. Great copywriting is interesting enough to entice someone to complete their purchase. It should be friendly and mirror your brand voice. Check out some examples in the following section.
Subject line:
Your subject line should be interesting enough to get people to open the email. For example, using something like discounts, humor, or questions could intrigue the customer enough to click. If you wanted to include a promotional offer, your subject line could be something like “20% off all purchases.”
Social Proof
You can use reviews and testimonials to strengthen your branding and create FOMO (fear of missing out) among customers who abandoned their cart. For example, including reviews in your abandoned cart emails for specific products can tempt someone to purchase.
Best Abandoned Cart Email Examples
1. Prose
The email above was sent to me by hair care company, Prose after I left the site before completing my transaction. This email checks several boxes:

Uses a catchy tagline “Ready When You Are” as friendly reminder to revisit the site.
Has an enticing CTA encouraging folks to “Make My Custom Formula.”
Uses social proof in the form of ratings.
Combined with a friendly tone and clean graphics, this email is pretty persuasive.

2. Whiskey Loot

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Whiskey Loot’s abandoned cart email utilizes unique and engaging copywriting to entice customers to complete their purchase. They include a list of reasons to purchase their whiskey, provide answers to frequently asked questions, and use clean design to draw your eye to the CTA. With this abandoned cart email, the customer has all the information they might need to complete a purchase.
3. Peel

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The best element of Peel’s abandoned cart email is the free shipping offer. Not only do they encourage customers to purchase what’s in their cart, but they also include an incentive for buyers to add more items to their cart and complete checkout. In addition, this is a classic layout for an abandoned cart email: intro text, items in cart, CTA, questions, and footer.
4. 23andMe

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Short, sweet and to the point, 23andMe has an abandoned cart email with only a few elements: introduction text (“Don’t forget to order your kit”), CTA (“Order today”), and closing text offering answers to questions (“Have additional questions?”). With this email, customers won’t get distracted by extraneous information and will focus on the action 23andMe wants: purchase completion.
5. Dyson

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In this example, Dyson does several things very well:

They use clear text that is helpful and fun to read. For example, “All is not lost” and “We saved the contents” let the customer know that Dyson wants to be helpful.
They include an image of the product and list the item still in the customer’s cart.
The add a sense of urgency. The text, “Your basket for this promotion was saved, but the offer is only for a limited time” creates a sense of importance about this purchase.
They include two CTA buttons. This allows customers on mobile to see a CTA button even as they scroll down. These buttons make it easy to complete their purchase at every touchpoint.

Overall, this email includes the right elements, while also showcasing a sleek, clean design that makes it easy to read.
6. Virgin Atlantic

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In this example, Virgin Atlantic uses engaging text and three CTA buttons to encourage customers to complete their purchase. The personalized intro text, “Smiles Davis, you’re so close…” makes customers feel like they’re being spoken to directly, while also reminding them how close they are to travel.
This email also includes flight information, so they have everything they need to make a purchase. When writing your own abandoned cart emails, this is a good example to follow because it takes away any roadblocks for the customer.
7. Ugmonk

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Ugmonk uses a different approach to their abandoned cart email. They focus entirely on personalization, making it seem like the owner and designer is reaching out directly to answer any questions. Plus, this includes two in-line CTAs so the customer can finish checking out instantly if they want. This is a simple approach that your target audience may prefer.
8. Drop

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Drop’s abandoned cart email is a good example because of its use of images and copywriting. Drop creates urgency in the bolded text “ends in 19 days.” After they create urgency and include their CTA, they also add other items that the customer might be interested in based on what’s in their cart. This is a good strategy to get the customer back on their site browsing other items they might want, hopefully turning into a completed purchase.
9. Google

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This is a perfect example of an abandoned cart email because it includes every element: Great copywriting, clear CTA, personalization by showing the customer’s cart, and urgency. With text like “Going, going, (almost) gone” and “Our popular items sell out fast” customers are engaged. They also feel compelled to complete their purchase so they don’t miss out. This email closes with a CTA to answer questions and subscribe to their product updates. Again, Google focuses on ensuring the customer feels like they don’t want to miss out on anything.
10. Target

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Target takes a different approach in their abandoned cart email by offering a discount on the items in the customer’s cart. The text “New price alert” and “Time to check out” make it hard to walk away. But if that approach doesn’t work on their customer, Target also includes similar items to get their customer browsing and shopping again.
11. Casper

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What I love about this example is that Casper uses social proof. Word of mouth and reviews are becoming increasingly important in the world of marketing. When people don’t complete a purchase, it might be because they haven’t finished their research. Casper’s abandoned cart email makes it easy for the customer to pick up where they left off in regard to their research. Plus, it includes snappy text and clear CTA buttons that entice the customer to continue shopping.
12. Dote

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Funny, interesting text is the way to your customer’s heart. Dote excels at it with humorous copywriting. In their email, they say “Your shopping bag has abandonment issues” and “Save these items hours of therapy and give them a loving home.” This text is entertaining, which makes the brand compelling to its customers. This example showcases how to use abandoned cart emails to illustrate your brand’s personality and create brand enthusiasts. Plus, this is short, sweet, and to the point, making it easy to continue shopping.
13. Moschino

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The bottom of Moschino’s email is unique because it includes information on secure payments and easy returns. For clothing ecommerce businesses, these are some of the top reasons that customers don’t want to make a purchase online. With their abandoned cart email, Moschino is trying to quell any doubts and take away any reason for hesitation. In addition, they also list the items in the cart and use clear CTAs.
Create Abandoned Cart Emails That Convert
Undoubtedly there are many different approaches to the abandoned cart email. We suggest A/B testing different variations to see what works for your audience. Do they prefer personalized emails? Discounts? Humorous text? It’s important to find out.
Abandoned cart emails can create brand enthusiasts and delights customers at every touchpoint. With stellar copywriting and branding, you can earn your customer’s trust and loyalty.
Editor’s note: This article was published in September 2019 and has been updated for comprehensive.

An active email list is an essential pillar of email marketing. As a business owner that sends out emails regularly, you want an email list with contacts that engage with your content and purchase your offers for email marketing success, great ROI, and increased business revenue. An average worker battles with up to 121 emails…
The post Stop Sending Emails to Unengaged Subscribers appeared first on Benchmark Email.

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