“Write with a specific person in mind” has always been good advice for authors.
But this doesn’t apply to just writing. It extends to all creative work, whether you’re directing a movie, setting up a business, selling a product, or creating a course.
Having said that, the thing that helps us come closest to creating with a specific person in mind is personas.
I’ve previously talked about borrowing learner personas from marketing, where I argued that the learner personas that we in L&D define need to be two-pronged.
I’ll spare you the lengthy explanation here (you can always refer to the original article for that), but a quick recap should help:
Unlike in marketing, we need to target two goals in L&D:
- The first goal is to get learners to come to the course, and sit themselves down and go through it. Let’s call this the marketing goal.
- The second is to get them to do whatever you’re telling them to do in the course. We will call this the learning or performance goal.
So let us say that you’ve kept these two goals in mind, and defined a learner persona accordingly. For context, let’s say you’re designing a program on how to use data to make people decisions, targeted at those who work in HR. An example of what such a learner persona might look like is below.
| # | Category | Details |
| 1 | Name and designation | Selena Sweeney Executive, HR |
| 2 | Time with the organization | 1.5 years |
| 3 | Goals and objectives | Is ambitious; wants to grow quickly within the organization and start handling a team |
| 4 | Challenges, concerns and pain points | Is extremely time poor; though she’s efficient with her tasks, she barely has time on hand for anything extra |
| 5 | Learning habits | Is a voracious reader, and loves to devour any content that helps her improve at work |
| 6 | Data awareness | Her economics degree gives her a reasonable background in statistics and data awareness; so, when it comes to adopting a more data centric approach than the one that’s currently prevailing, this should help |
| 7 | Interests and favorite pastimes | Loves books and the outdoors; in her free time, you can see her curled up with a book or hiking a trail |
| 8 | Communication channels used | E-mail, slack, the intranet portal, LinkedIn, and a bit of Instagram |
| 9 | Demographics and personal background | Age: 28 Pronouns: She/Her Education: Graduation in economics Personal Information: Single mother to toddler twins – a girl and a boy Other: Identifies as neuro divergent |
Now the question is, how do you use the personas you’ve worked so hard to put together to accomplish your two goals?
Let’s start by looking at your marketing goal first. Here you want to get your learners to log in to the LMS (or wherever your courses reside) and go through the course. To do that:
1. Create a targeted marketing campaign
This, of course, is your primary reason for creating learner personas.
By understanding the characteristics, ambitions, and motivations of your personas, you can tailor your marketing efforts to better target your audience. For our persona above, a concern is that she has no time (refer Point #4, “Challenges, concerns and pain points”). So you’d want to focus on highlighting the flexibility and convenience of your course, and convey that it takes not a minute longer than necessary to get them up to speed on the topic.
Another one of your personas might be disinclined to go through any ‘course’ on the LMS (probably due to prior bad experience with other courses). For this persona, you would want to acknowledge their reluctance, recognizing that some courses probably were bad in the past. But then assure them that this one has been designed carefully, to address their needs in an effective manner.
So, your campaign needs to be speaking to each of the challenges faced by your personas… basically all the things that prevent them from taking up that all important course of yours.
2. Leverage all the communication channels your personas live in
If you’re using only e-mail, or any other channel, for communicating with your learners, you’re wasting a lot of opportunity. Find out where your learners (personas) hang out most of the time, and meet them there. This means that your campaign needs to be designed for multi-channel delivery, with information and assets overlapping between the channels as necessary. In our example, plan for running your marketing campaign on the five channels that Selena spends time on.
3. Use language that resonates with your personas
Different personas may respond to different language and messaging. In your campaign, consider using language and examples that resonate with your personas.
4. Draw upon their goals and objectives, interests and hobbies
Your personas are more than just fictional characters; they’re real people with real needs and preferences. Consider engaging them on as many fronts as possible. Our persona, Selena Sweeney, is a motivated individual (refer Point #3, “Goals and objectives”). In your marketing campaign, explain how the course will help approach her work in a more structured manner, which will improve the quality of her output, and catapult her growth within her department.
5. Have a little fun
Don’t be afraid to inject a little personality and humor into your marketing efforts. This could be through catchy slogans, memes, or even just a friendly and approachable tone. Here again, draw inspiration from your personas to arrive at ideas that work specifically for them.
—————
Let’s say you’ve successfully marketed to your learners, and they are coming to your LMS in droves (wishful thinking, eh?).
Anyways, does this mean that your work with personas is over? Absolutely not! What’s the point of learners taking your course, if their behavior does not change? In our example, the behavior change that we’re after is data-informed decision making. That is, we want our learners to use data available in their day-to-day decision-making functions in HR.
This is what I meant by our goals in L&D being two-pronged. Our first, marketing goal, was achieved (hopefully) by the campaign we put out. For the second, learning or performance goal, we should leverage these personas in the design of our learning solution.
Here are a few ways to make the most of these helpful little (imaginary) people:
1. Consider the challenges faced by your personas
As with your marketing goal, Point #4 “Challenges, concerns and pain points” in your persona definition is an important tool to help realize your learning goal as well. Basically, design your program such that it addresses the specific challenges of your learner personas.
In our example, Selena has a prior background in statistics, so she shouldn’t have any objection to following a data centered approach in her work. For someone like her, it’s a question of quickly getting to the how.
Another persona might be holding the belief that decisions involving people should be made from the gut, and not using data (they are basically against the data-centered approach that you’re advocating for in your course). For such people, you might have to delve into why of this approach, and how it can benefit their work.
Clearly segment and present the why, what and how in your course, so as to enable these different learners to take different paths based on their specific challenges or characteristics.
2. Highlight the benefits of the desired behavior, and draw a path to their goals and objectives where possible
What are the benefits of adopting the necessary behavior for the persona? And, does this benefit link to their goals and objectives?
In our example, the desired behavior is using a data-based approach in day-to-day HR work.
And our persona, Selena, is ambitious and growth focused (Point #3, Goals and objectives), while also being time-poor (Points #4 and #9). Will adopting the necessary behavior help Selena save time? Will it help boost her growth? It absolutely will. Highlight these points in your program.
3. Utilize these mini character profiles within your course
Does your course have a mentor or guide that makes an appearance at various intervals? Use your persona definitions to create their profile.
Does it have one or more characters? Use your persona definitions to outline those characters.
These personas are based on your real audience profiles, and you’ve spent a lot of time piecing together their characteristics and their quirks. So there’s no reason for you to not leverage them within your course. In fact, doing that will make your characters that much more relatable.
4. Adapt your instructional strategy to your personas’ characteristics, and way of working and learning
Are most or all of your personas factory workers or on-the-go salespeople? Adopt a mobile-first approach.
Are some of them neuro divergent or differently abled? Make the course accessible to the entire audience population.
Of course, these decisions should also be informed by good design principles, and not just your learner persona definitions.
5. Evaluate and improve your course regularly
Once the first set of learners complete your program, check in to see if their needs are being met. Are there any areas of your course that are not resonating with them? Are there any additional resources or support that they would find helpful? Use this feedback to make adjustments and improve your course over time.
Finally, keep in mind that your persona definitions are not fixed. So revisit them periodically to check if anything needs to be revised, and make the updates accordingly. This might make all the difference in your next program.
Learner personas can in fact be a valuable tool for creating dynamic and engaging learning experiences. And all other things being equal, they can spell the difference between success and failure of your endeavor.
So, leverage them in the best possible way.
Have I missed anything? What would you add to the list?
Written by Srividya Kumar, Co-Founder @ Learnnovators
