What is a Client Profile?

As noted by Forbes contributor Alan Hall, “knowing and understanding targeted customers is the overarching rule of exceptional companies.”

Surprisingly however, many businesses don’t have a strong, comprehensive grasp of who their customers are – which is the primary reason why many businesses either shut down within a handful of years, or if they stick around, fail to achieve their full profit and growth potential.

The good news is that there are several ways to help businesses get closer to their customers. And the two most important tools are buyer personas and client profiles.

If you’re a frequent visitor to our blog (welcome back!), you know that we regularly focus on buyer personas. However, we haven’t really put much of a spotlight on client profiles. Well, let’s fix that problem right now.

What is a client profile?

Simply put, a client profile is a summary of a specific customer type that is based primarily on available statistical information, such as demographics, income (or company revenue if B2B), gender, age, location, etc. A client profile can also include empirical data captured by a business itself, such as purchase history, previous interactions (e.g. downloading an ebook, watching a video, etc.), referring website or source, and so on.

What’s the Difference Between a Client Profile and Buyer Persona?

A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of an ideal customer based on market research. It focuses on how customers feel, what their pain points and motivations are, what their buying horizon looks like, etc. While there are quantitative aspects to buyer personas, the real value is on the qualitative side. It’s about getting into the heads of ideal customers and seeing the world through their eyes. It’s rooted in psychology and behaviorism.

A client profile, as noted above, is fundamentally based on empirical data, and covers information that can be observed or gleaned through sources like web analytics, industry analyst reports, research studies, white papers, surveys, and sometimes even census data.

The best way to appreciate the difference is that buyer personas are about the WHY and HOW, and client profiles are about the WHO and WHERE. Together, they create a rich and reliable picture of each customer type (as well as groups of customer types).

Learn More

At Leap Clixx, we work with our customers to craft their unique buyer personas and client profiles (respectively), and leverage this valuable insight to develop, calibrate and optimize highly successful inbound marketing campaigns. To learn more, contact us today and schedule your free consultation.

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