How To Create A User Persona (Video Guide)

Summary

In this informative video, Cicely Rose from CareerFoundry introduces user personas as a vital tool in UX design. She explains that personas are realistic portrayals of target users, derived from research, and embodying their needs, behaviors, and pain points. The video outlines a step-by-step process for creating personas, emphasizing their role in guiding design decisions and fostering empathy within multidisciplinary teams. It highlights the importance of focusing on significant user groups and pain points to design products that are truly useful, desirable, and valuable.

Takeaways

• 🧑 User personas are fictional yet realistic portrayals of a target user for a product, representing an entire group or audience of users.
• 🔍 Creating user personas starts with conducting user research and building empathy to understand user needs, goals, behaviors, and pain points.
• 📝 A user persona document includes a fictional name, image, and details that make the persona feel real, like preferences and dislikes relevant to the product.
• 📊 Demographic information in a persona is based on factual data and includes personal background, professional background, user environment, and psychographics.
• 🎯 User personas help in establishing a clear problem statement by understanding the users' needs and are crucial for designing useful, desirable, and valuable products.
• 💡 Personas act as a reference point throughout the design process, ensuring that every feature is designed with the user in mind.
• 👥 They are beneficial for strategizing and making smart design decisions, making real users memorable for the product team and building empathy.
• 📈 Personas help answer key questions about the ideal user, their behavior patterns, needs, goals, and pain points within a given context.
• 📚 The persona defining process involves four steps: adding a header, demographic profile, end goals, and a scenario describing the user's interaction with the product.
• 📝 The scenario is a 'day in the life' narrative written from the persona's perspective, illustrating how they would use the product to achieve their end goal.
• ✂️ When creating user personas, focus on details that influence the design and avoid including irrelevant information.

Q & A

What is a user persona?

A user persona is a fictional but realistic portrayal of a target user for a product, representing an entire group or audience of users.

Why are user personas necessary in UX design?

User personas help to clarify who the product is being designed for, ensuring that every feature and function is created with the user in mind. They help in strategizing, making design decisions, and building empathy with real users.

What are the main components included in a user persona document?

A user persona document includes an image, a fictional name, a summary quote, demographic information, user environment details, psychographics, end goals, and a scenario.

How do you gather information to create a user persona?

Information for creating a user persona is gathered through user research, which includes both quantitative and qualitative data. This data is then organized into persona groups that represent ideal customers.

What should you focus on when dividing data into persona groups?

When dividing data into persona groups, focus on the major needs of the most important user group, and avoid trying to cater to everyone. Concentrate on one specific user group and one significant pain point.

What demographic details are included in a user persona?

Demographic details in a user persona include personal background (such as age, gender, education, persona group, and family status), professional background (occupation, income level, work experience), user environment, and psychographics.

What is the purpose of the user environment section in a user persona?

The user environment section answers questions about the physical, social, and technological context of the user, such as the devices they use, their work environment, and how often they collaborate with others.

What kind of information is included in the psychographic profile of a user persona?

The psychographic profile includes the user's attitudes, interests, motivations, and pain points, helping to understand why the user behaves in a certain way and why they use the product.

What is the end goal in a user persona, and why is it important?

The end goal is the motivating factor that inspires action and focuses on what the users want or need to accomplish when using the product. It is important because it drives the design decisions to meet user needs effectively.

What is a scenario in a user persona, and how is it structured?

A scenario is a day-in-the-life narrative that describes how the persona would interact with the product in a particular context to achieve their end goal. It defines when, where, and how the interaction takes place, written from the persona's perspective.

Outlines

00:00

🎯 Introduction to User Personas

Cicely Rose introduces the concept of user personas in the design process, emphasizing their importance in creating effective UX designs. A user persona is a realistic portrayal of a target user, encapsulating their needs, goals, behaviors, and characteristics based on user research. These personas serve as a reference point throughout the design process, ensuring that every feature is user-centric. They are crucial for problem-solving, strategic decision-making, and fostering empathy within the product team. The video promises to guide viewers through a step-by-step process to define their own user personas.

05:03

📝 The Persona Defining Process

The video script outlines a four-step process for defining user personas. It begins with the need for extensive research to represent real users accurately. The gathered data is organized into persona groups, which are then refined into individual personas. Each persona starts with a header, including a name, image, and a quote that captures their essence. The persona is further detailed with demographic information divided into personal background, professional background, user environment, and psychographics. This information provides a realistic foundation for the persona, allowing the design team to empathize and focus on the user's needs. The process continues with defining the user's end goals and crafting a scenario that illustrates how the persona interacts with the product to achieve these goals.

Keywords

💡User Persona

A user persona is a fictional yet realistic representation of a target user for a product. It embodies all the research findings about user needs, goals, behaviors, and pain points. In the video, user personas are central to the UX design process, serving as a guide for designing products that are useful, desirable, and valuable to the target audience.

💡UX Design

UX design, short for user experience design, focuses on enhancing user satisfaction by improving the usability, accessibility, and pleasure provided in the interaction between the user and a product. The video emphasizes the importance of UX design in solving real user problems and creating meaningful problem statements.

💡Demographic Profile

A demographic profile provides factual data about a persona's age, gender, education, and other personal details. In the script, the demographic profile is used to add realism to the user persona, helping the design team to empathize with and understand the user's context.

💡Persona Group

A persona group represents a collective of users sharing similar characteristics and needs. The script mentions organizing research data into persona groups, which are then used to create individual user personas that focus on specific user needs and behaviors.

💡Empathy

Empathy in the context of UX design refers to the ability to understand and share the feelings of the users. The video script illustrates how building empathy with target users through user personas helps in creating products that are more attuned to their needs and experiences.

💡Problem Statement

A problem statement defines the core issue that a product or service aims to solve. The video explains that understanding user needs through personas is crucial for writing a meaningful problem statement that guides the design process.

💡Multidisciplinary Teams

Multidisciplinary teams consist of professionals from different fields working together towards a common goal. The script points out the importance of user personas in such teams for effective communication and alignment of design decisions.

💡End Goal

An end goal is the desired outcome or objective that a user seeks to achieve when using a product. In the video, defining the user's end goal is a key step in creating a persona, as it helps in understanding what motivates the user's interaction with the product.

💡Scenario

A scenario in the context of user personas is a narrative that describes how the persona would use the product to achieve their end goal. The script uses Savannah's scenario to illustrate how a day in the life of the persona can inform design decisions.

💡Psychographics

Psychographics are the psychological characteristics of a persona, including attitudes, interests, and motivations. The video script explains that creating a psychographic profile helps in understanding the user's behavior and the reasons behind their actions with the product.

💡Northstar

In the video, the term 'Northstar' metaphorically refers to a guiding principle or a fixed point that helps in maintaining direction. For user personas, it symbolizes the guiding influence on design decisions from the beginning to the end of the design process.

Highlights

User personas are a crucial part of the design process, representing a realistic portrayal of a target user for a product.

Personas help in understanding user needs, goals, behavior patterns, and pain points gathered from user research.

A user persona embodies everything learned from the research phase, serving as a guide for UX design decisions.

UX design focuses on solving real user problems, and personas help establish a clear problem statement.

Personas clarify who the design is for and ensure every feature is user-centric.

They aid in strategizing and making smart design decisions by keeping the product team focused on the user.

User personas answer key questions about the ideal user, their behavior, needs, and pain points.

Personas are essential for designing products that are useful, desirable, and valuable to the target audience.

Designers often work in multidisciplinary teams, and personas help communicate user research findings effectively.

The persona defining process involves four simple steps to create a fully-formed persona.

Conducting sufficient research is a prerequisite for defining user personas that represent real human users.

Data from research should be organized into persona groups representing ideal customers.

Focus on one specific user group and one significant pain point when creating personas.

The first step in defining a persona is adding a header with a fictional name, image, and summary quote.

Demographic details are essential for creating a realistic persona profile, divided into personal, professional, user environment, and psychographics.

Psychographic information helps understand user attitudes, interests, motivations, and pain points.

End goals define what users want or need to accomplish when using the product.

A scenario describes how the persona would interact with the product to achieve their end goal.

When creating personas, focus on details that influence the final design and avoid irrelevant information.

Transcripts

Hi I'm Cicely Rose a student advisor here at  CareerFoundry today I'm going to talk you through  

a very important part of the design process user  personas first I'll explain exactly what a user  

persona is then we'll look at why user personas  are necessary and how they help you design awesome  

products I'll then show you how to define your  own user personas following a simple step by  

step process by the end of this video you'll  understand the role that user personas play in  

the UX design process and you'll have a method  you can follow to create your own ready let's  

begin so what exactly is a user persona quite  simply a persona is a fictional but realistic  

portrayal of a target user for your product each  persona represents an entire group or audience of  

users as a UX designer you'll start the design  process by conducting user research building  

empathy with your target users and identifying  exactly what they need from the product you're  

designing a user persona embodies everything you  learn from the research phase user needs and goals  

behavior patterns pain points and any noteworthy  user characteristics you'll present your persona  

in a document like the example shown on the screen  right now you can include an image and a made-up  

name together with fictional details that help to  build up your persona and make them feel real if  

you're designing a holiday booking app for example  you might mention that your persona loves luxury  

spa retreats but hates all-inclusive dining you  will also add demographic information based on  

factual data gathered as part of your use of  research quotes from real users can also help  

to paint a vivid picture of your target user now  we know what our persona is let's consider why  

you need one in the first place UX design is all  about solving a real user problem but you can't  

do that until you've established a clear problem  statement to write a meaningful problem statement  

you first need to understand your use and their  needs whether you're developing an app a website  

or a service it's crucial to understand who will  be using it a user persona clarifies exactly  

who you're designing for it acts as a point of  reference throughout the entire process making  

sure that every single feature or function  you design is done so with the user in mind  

personas help with strategizing and making smart  design decisions they make real users memorable  

for the product team helping to focus efforts  and build empathy a persona helps to answer the  

following questions who is my ideal user or  customer what behavior patterns do my users  

currently exhibit what are the needs and goals  of my users what issues and pain points do they  

currently face within the given context so in a  nutshell user personas are crucial if you want  

to design something that's useful desirable  and valuable to your target audience a solid  

user persona is your Northstar guiding your design  decisions from start to finish not only that most  

designers work in multidisciplinary teams where  it's important to communicate your findings from  

the user research stage personas encompass  all the essential details about your users  

presenting them in a memorable way that everyone  can understand not just designers so you must get  

your personas right and I'm going to show you how  with introductions out of the way let's get stuck  

into the persona defining process we've broken  it down into four simple steps and I'm going to  

talk you through each one you'll have a fully  formed persona in no time before you can start  

defining your user personas you'll need to have  conducted plenty of research your persona needs  

to represent real human users after all so you  need to have gathered sufficient quantitative  

and qualitative data you will organize all this  information into persona groups that represent  

your ideal customers these persona groups will  then be consolidated into single user personas  

and that's what we'll focus on shortly a word of  advice when dividing up your data into persona  

groups remember to focus on the major needs  of the most important user group you can't  

be everything to everyone so don't even try do  one thing and do it well in other words focus on  

one specific user group and one significant pain  point so you've got your user groups and you're  

ready to turn them into user personas open up a  blank word doc and let's get started the first  

step in the process is to add a header to your  persona this includes a fictional name an image  

and a quote that summarizes what matters most to  your persona in relation to your product so the  

foundations of your persona might go something  like this named Savannah Rodriguez image this  

cheerful looking stock lady summary quote take me  to undiscovered holiday destinations away from the  

tourist traps this first step might seem simple  but these features ensure that your persona is  

memorable keeping the design team focused on who  they're designing for now we're going to add some  

factual detail to your persona we're going to  add a demographic profile demographic details  

are based on user research and the demographic  profile of your persona can be divided into four  

main sections personal background professional  background user environment and psychographics  

the personal background section includes details  such as age gender education persona group and  

family status so if Savannah's personal  background might look something like this  

Savannah 52 years old divorced mother of two  has a master's degree in chemistry professional  

background includes details such as professional  occupation income level and work experience here  

we might add that Savannah works full-time at a  pharmaceuticals company and earns around 65,000  

per year next you'll add details regarding the  user environment the user environment represents  

the physical social and technological context of  the user the purpose of this section is to answer  

questions such as what technological devices do  users have access to do they spend most of their  

time in a corporate office or at home how often  do we collaborate with others so Savannah's user  

environment could be in her office mostly on a  laptop but also on her iPad when commuting to  

and from work then we come to the psychographic  section this is where you're linked with details  

such as the users attitudes interests motivations  and pain points creating a psychographic profile  

enables you to better understand why your user  behaves in a certain way including why they use  

your product let's continue to imagine you're  designing a holiday booking app some useful  

psychographic information to include in your  user persona could be Savannah enjoys luxurious  

pirate Ruiz hates tourist traps appreciates an  element of exclusivity enjoys trying open tech  

local cuisine prefers to travel alone or with one  other person tends to favor quality over economy  

can you see how your user persona is starting to  come to life creating a demographic profile adds  

a layer of realism to your persona which makes  it easier to fill that all-important empathy  

when designing for their needs the next step in  the process is to add some information about the  

users end goals the end goal is the motivating  factor that inspires action and focuses on what  

the users want or need to accomplish when using  your product so in Savannah's case her end goal  

when using your holiday booking app is to discover  and book luxurious off-the-beaten-track holiday  

destinations the fourth and final step when  defining a user persona is to add a scenario the  

scenario is the day in the life narrative that  describes how your persona would interact with  

your product in a particular context to achieve  their end goal when writing a scenario define  

when where and how the narrative takes place and  write it from the personas perspective for example  

Savannah's scenario could start off like this at  least once a year I like to go away on a luxury  

holiday I tried to discover places I've never  been to before and to stick to destinations that  

aren't yet overrun with tourists I work full  time so I don't have that much time to browse  

and book each individual element of my holiday  ideally I'll find some kind of package deal that  

comes with local restaurant recommendations  so there you have it your kickstart guide  

to defining a user persona when creating user  personas remember to focus on the context of  

the product you're designing while you do want to  build up a realistic character there's no need to  

include pointless details that won't influence  the final design if you're designing a holiday  

booking app it doesn't make sense to include  information on Savannah's favorite TV programs  

or what football team she supports so only include  details that serve a design purpose if you enjoyed  

this video don't forget to subscribe to our  YouTube channel and remember you'll find loads  

more information over on the CareerFoundry  blog thanks for watching see you next time