Building an audience profile from interviews: traits, tasks and context

A useful profile explains differences in choice and use

Age or job title can matter, but on their own they rarely explain why someone needs a product or how they choose a solution. Start with context: what triggers the task, what people have already tried and which constraints affect the decision.

The profile shouldn’t appear more precise than the data. If five interviewees work remotely, that’s an observation about the sample, not proof that the whole audience is the same. Record the sample size and how participants were recruited.

Test the interview evidence before defining a segment

1. Collect comparable cases

   Set a common research question and use the same interview fields: situation, task, previous method, constraint, criteria and outcome. Don’t group people solely by demographic fields that are easy to collect.

2. Separate evidence from interpretation

   For each conclusion, keep a quote or brief observation with a timestamp. Add your interpretation and degree of confidence. One mention doesn’t make a trait characteristic of a segment.

3. Find traits that distinguish behaviour

   Look for conditions that change what people do: task frequency, cost of a mistake, available time and involvement of others. A segment is useful when it needs different messages, features or workflows.

4. Check contradictions and how you’ll use the profile

   Find interviews that don’t fit. State what decision the profile is meant to support and when to revisit it. A profile disconnected from a specific team decision is just a document on a shelf.

A fictional segment of people who publish interviews

This is a fictional training example. The names, circumstances and outcomes are included solely to explain the method.

The relevant traits are infrequent publication, the editorial task and the high cost of getting names wrong. The remark tells us nothing about age, income or favourite social network.

Another person may publish daily and value speed more than manual checking. That isn’t a bad fit to discard. It may reveal a boundary between use cases that further interviews should test.

Evidence-based audience profile worksheet

Don’t fill in fields for appearance’s sake. A blank field is more honest than an invented trait.

Working segment name:
Decision this profile supports:
Situation and triggering event:
Person’s task:
Previous method:
Constraints:
Decision criteria:
Behaviour after the choice:
Distinguishing traits:
Quotes and timestamps:
How many interviews support it:
Contradictory cases:
What remains a hypothesis:
Review date:

Check the profile before using it

• The profile supports a specific team decision.
• Each significant trait has a source.
• Hypotheses are clearly separate from observations.
• Contradictory interviews remain in the analysis.