Personas

Personas

Personas are fictional – but realistic – character sketches, representing a “typical” user of a site or application, represented by various means such as cards, posters and profile sheets with photos.

They are built up around a name, a face (a photo), and include job, lifestyle and behavioural information drawn from user and market research (such as focus groups, interviews and surveys carried out with actual target users).

Foviance also uses market segmentation data to complement this traditional approach: the personas then highlight the different motivations, expectations and goals of the target groups of users/consumers in a way that reconciles marketing data with design.

Their use across the company has many benefits:

• Build a shared understanding of target users
• Keep the team focused on users
• Help prioritise features

The deliverable is a detailed set of personas on a slide or document with supporting documents such as cards, posters and profile sheets.