Ideal Customer Personas, or ICPs for short, are generalized representations of the types of customers that benefit the most from our products and who have the highest intent to buy and continue paying us.

We create these personas based on a number of touch points throughout the lifecycle of a product:

• Discovery
• Prototyping
• Customer Success interactions
• Sales interactions
• Surveys

For the purposes of this guide, we’re going to focus on surveys as the main data points we can use to build these personas. While we’ll definitely be able to build some fantastic insights from this information, you should remember that ICPs should be continually updated and refined over time as new information from any of the above sources becomes available.

Here’s the format we like to use:

Name and Title

• Give your persona a name. You can make this up or use one of your actual Power User’s names.
• What is your ICP’s job title, role, or industry (or all three!)?

User Goals

• What is your ICP trying (successfully or unsuccessfully) to accomplish with your product?

User Motivations

• What is motivating your ICP toward these goals?
• Make sure to couch this in terms of the goals, not your product.

Primary Benefit

• What is the primary benefit your ICP gets from using your product?

Acquisition