Who are you?
Today I attended a presentation on CBC.ca audience research. The focus on the activities and demographics of site visitors, and how they have changed over the past year. Which is well and good - while I would have prefered a comparative analysis that included our competition, it does help to know who your existing audience is, and isn't.
But the last half of the presentation was a bit of a tough sell. Like everyone else, CBC.ca is now interested in "market segmentation" research: identifying groups of customers with like attitudes and behaviours. It's a useful exercise, if a bit forced: research firms love to fabricate phoney names, backgrounds and even pictures of these imaginary people to help you visualize your real or potential audience. [Today's Globe says that Wal-Mart uses "Linda"]
Which got me thinking: what are the market segments of visitors to this blog? Site Meter gives me a rough idea, based on referrals, keyword searches, locations and so on. Based on that information, here are my imaginary friends as Decima would present them.
![gor[b] audience segmentation graph](http://www.gorbould.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/segmentation_research.jpg)
For the record, my ever-supportive wife wrote her own column there. She's a kindergarten teacher, and dislikes blogs because they are too snarky. I have no response to that. *
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November 8th, 2006 - 09:53
This is hilarious, not to mention eerily accurate.
November 9th, 2006 - 19:52
Damn. SO many choices….. Which one???????????
November 10th, 2006 - 02:52
The phony-names business is better known in the usability business as personas, or of course personæ, and they are reasonably useful.
November 13th, 2006 - 20:16
What? No “sister” category? God forbid that anyone thinks *I* am the alison to whom you refer. Possible child support? ewwww.
November 14th, 2006 - 01:11
Ouimet: Thanks, I thought you’d appreciate it. After all, your picture is there….
Laurence: Well, I made it easier on you by using your name too.
Joe: True enough – the personas are at least as useful as an imaginary “male, 29-34″. But they are an easy target for wrath when meetings take too long. At least we don’t go as far as Wal-Mart, which takes a life-sized cardboard cutout into meetings.
Alison: No, I don’t think anyone would make that mistake. And you are one of the few who get the actual joke with that name/category.
And I have now confirmed that all three of you who have voted as my wife are not in fact my wife. In this, I consider all parties lucky.