Reassessing Ideal Customer Profiles and Buyer Personas with the Stoplight Method

The process of finding your ideal customer profile (ICP) can feel like pulling teeth for some business owners. You can say the same about creating buyer personas to gain a better understanding of your target audience.

It is no surprise that many companies who have already done the work once to develop their ICP and buyer personas never reassess them again despite the ever-evolving buyer’s journey.

However, the practice of reassessing your ICP and buyer personas regularly can help businesses customize conversations and content to serve potential customers better. Research from Demand Gen Report shows that the payoffs include a better response to campaigns (60%), the ability to generate sales-ready leads (57%), and leads moving faster through the pipeline (42%).

Instead of continuing the age-old practice of spray-and-pray demand generation, it is vital to focus on the quality of leads and accounts entering your sales funnel. Companies see better results from their newly enabled sales team instead of clogging their funnel with prospects that could have an incredibly low probability of being closed/won.

The Stoplight Method

To promote positive business growth, you must also be willing and able to adapt to changing markets and assess your ideal customer profiles and personas regularly. At BrainSell, we suggest making it a quarterly habit — at the very least — to determine target accounts and prospects currently in the funnel and map them into three groups:

• Red: This prospect is on lockdown! This could be because the company or industry took a hit due to a recent pandemic or because past financial decisions have precariously positioned the company. BDRs and sales reps should not be putting any effort into these prospects.
• Yellow: This prospect is settled in its market but may not be looking to make a big purchase now. However, they are always willing to educate themselves on better their business when the time is right.
• Green: This prospect is growing like crazy, and they are looking for a solution to their problems now!

This exercise will help guarantee sales teams prioritize prospects and accounts with the highest propensity to buy — the ones in the green zone! Therefore, this gives reps more opportunities to research and understand what makes their potential customers tick.

Want more tips, tricks, and best practices for prospecting and selling in an ever-changing marketplace? Check out this E-book to get our full guide for better sales practices!