Creating personas is a resource used by companies seeking to communicate with their public in a manner consistent with personality, tone and defined characteristics, without confusing the public with different styles with each new message.

1. CREATING PERSONAS FOR
AUDIENCE RESEARCH IN
SOCIAL MEDIA

2. CREATING PERSONAS FOR RESEARCH REPORTS IN
SOCIAL MEDIA
Yuri Amaral
Illustrator and comic artist / co-founder of Coelho Jujube / Master (UNILA))
Tarcízio Silva
Communication Research Director at IBPAD / Master (UFBA) and PhD student
(UMESP)
Personas and Public in Social Media1
Creating personas is a resource used by companies seeking to
communicate with their public in a manner consistent with personality, tone and
defined characteristics, without confusing the public with different styles with
each new message. Characteristics of contemporary internet like plentiful data,
self disclosure and searching capacities created many opportunities to monitor
and analyze people more profoundly, especially in social media. In this new
reality, we can identify multiple attitudinal profiles, in the same public, through
this information
Often personas are part of everyday advertising because they are created
in a campaign-planning environment, from ideation and simplification of
observed behaviours. Here we propose the use of social media data from
monitoring to generate personas that communicate research findings more
efficiently.
The demographic characteristics of the public have always been the most
practical, rapid and standardized framework for understanding a segment or
direct actions of a brand. Age, gender, location and economic class are shortcuts
to understand other types of buying behaviour, attitudes, opinions and public
policies.
1
With previous information published in the article “Segmentação de Público no Monitoramento de Mídias Sociais” (SILVA,
2014a)

3. Most societies still define expectations, specific problems and
opportunities related to ideas of gender roles for men and women. In a specific
cultural context, it comes to the point where there are product lines targeting
specific genres, but it is something increasingly challenged, as shown by
research and trends (JWT, 2015).
As for location, country, state and city, these are largely related to cultural,
economic and behavioural issues. To say that someone is Brazilian, Italian or
Japanese, already brings up an abstract mental persona. The location of the user
tells us things with accuracy variants about their economic condition, patterns
of cultural activities, clothing, eating patterns and the type of product consumed.
In some cases, the location is a unique factor in marketing: a product or service
is only distributed in certain markets, even though it can be nationally well
known.
Social media allows observation of people in diverse and multifaceted
features and differences, even if they have some consumption behaviour in
common. Thus, it is possible to identify different profiles in a certain segment of
the public, in order to understand their behaviour, tracing strategies focused on
these groups and individuals.
How to discover the online public?
To define the public has always been a challenge; however, with social media
monitoring tools it is possible to collect data consistent with what we think is the
public for a particular product or service. Ideally, is to be able to understand the
explicit consumer public (engaged users that mention the brand and products)
and the target public that, supposedly, is not yet a consumer. By monitoring
social media, it is possible to map this public.
There are several ways to collect relevant samples of people online, among
them:
 Select from a known base of engaged users (monitoring keywords): through
keywords that refer to the product / service in question, you can identify users
that mention, interact and talk about the topic, and note the frequency they
do it and which feeling is involved in their speech;

4.  Select by self-description (profession, preferences, fandom, etc.): When in
their profile, the users identify themselves with a certain behaviour / attitude.
For example, when they mention in their Twitter profile being a fan of a band
or following a specific political ideology;
 Select regulars from one location (geolocation): through check-ins and
photos with markup, for example, finding the public that frequents a local
place – shopping mall, cafeteria, district, stadium, festival etc;
 Select by crossing with another database (expensive and not always
available): when the brand develops specific applications and actions using
the user profile data in a social media as basic requirement for access to what
the application offers;
 Proximity by Homophily2
: this is a viable solution to find the target public that
does not consume a particular product / service but relates to those who do,
and therefore, can be considered a potential public. Through frequent and
reciprocal connections, it is possible to discover the consumer networks
previously identified.
Through selected data collection we obtained a series of our own information
monitoring the public on social media – what they say, with what feeling and
frequency they say it, with whom and where they interact, what needs to be
filtered and analyzed, contributing to understanding the public on various levels.
Gather the commonalities of these data helps in building personas,
summarizing them not just in numbers but also in images.
On Attitudes, Interests and Opinions to Insights
Carry out social media monitoring focused on users is possible on some
platforms like Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, blogs and Tumblr. In general, the
following steps can be followed to survey data on the public of a company, brand
or theme in social media:
2
. Principle by which people tend to connect with other similar people in sociodemographic characteristics, behavioral or
intrapersonal

5.  Monitor by Keywords: collecting traditional data on social media allows
monitoring of users engaged in a particular subject or company. Almost all
monitoring tools quantify these terms and offer a list of interacting users;
 Select Users sample: from a sample based on who mentioned the brand,
choose a relevant number of profiles / channels and start analyzing its
components in detail to identify the most recurrent profiles;
 Monitor users: determine a period, to observe users who make up the
sample, in order to observe their behaviour and identify which match a brand
/ topic / research target (see Silva, 2014b);
 Development of analysis categories and establishment of rules for tagging:
from the interest topics list of (Brands, Music, Artists, Influencers, Media
channels, Sports, Activities, Training etc.);
 Define personas: identify commonalities in the analyzed profiles, making
ideal types from possible profiles of the studied public.
 Illustrate personas: translate information and discoveries identified on
drawings that accompany the data, information and insights about the public.
At this point of analysis focused on public profiles, demographic targeting
is complementary, not the focus. With globalization, emergence of niche
cultures and choice range, individuals no longer carry the same categories
throughout their lives (such as religion, region, gender and nationality), but are
in a constant process of change. Other variables must be added to the analysis,
a more individual and behavioural perspective based on Life Styles, adding data
on Activities, Interests and Opinions (PLUMMER, 1974). By analyzing these
data, we can see deeper into the subjects’ behaviour and get better results.
Activities Interests Opinions Demographics
Work Family Themselves Age
Hobbies Home Social issues Education
Social Events Job Politics Income
Vacation Community Business Occupation
Entertainment Recreation Economics Family Size
Club membership Fashion Education Dwelling
Community Food Products Geography
Shopping Media Future City size
Sports Achievements Cultue Stage in life cycle

6. We can use as a reference the amount of Activities which a subject can
devote themselves to, like social causes (feminism, LGBT, ethnic minorities),
cultures (musical niches, gastronomy) and even consumption (fans of a
particular brand) that directly influence their buying decision.
However, Interests can come from thematic, consumer, professional area
or even family relationships. Mothers and fathers may eventually connect more
with child related images. A professional musician will probably pay more
attention to melodies and how they connect to peoples’ reality.
Finally, peoples’ Opinions can reflect several layers of society. A vegan
has a strong ideological position enough to organize boycotts of big brands and
directly influence the cosmetics market, for example.
Any category, including those suggested here, do not serve to close the
subject in unchangeable characteristics, but rather to guide the creative process
and analysis of public profiles. Understanding the patterns and behavioural
consequences not only contributes to persona construction that summarizes
the identified public, but also develop focused strategies and actions in a closer
reality picture.
Next, we will comment on the persona construction process.
Materializing Insights on Personas and Characters
Characters are present in every story told by a hypothetical transmitter,
be it a cinematic epic journey, like in the trilogy Lord of the Rings, where world
salvation depends on a frail and seemingly helpless character, or in a margarine
commercial, where we find a family preparing for another normal day. Even in
a post on a social media site, there is a character, an action to make and a goal
to be achieved. The viewer enters in this gap of "to do” appropriates the journey,
and in an empathic process puts him in the character’s place and lives these
sensations on different levels of intensity.
Understanding public behaviour is, in other words, to understand what
exactly it identifies with and how this is expressed in actions, from the most
complex, such as an opinion on a certain political event to the more mundane,
like a profile photo detail.
The art of storytelling accompanies humanity since its beginning, often
focused on translating the mysteries of life through mythological and
extraordinary characters, far removed from those of ordinary people. To delve
into this subject, we recommend reading The Hero with a Thousand Faces by

7. Joseph Campbell, and Man and His Symbols by Carl Jung. Although the first
focuses on actual mythology and the second on symbolism and its relations with
the psyche, both draw a parallel between stories of the divine and human
behaviour, revealing their qualities and subjective characteristics.
At some point in history, human characters started playing the role of
discoveries and salvation in the most diverse beliefs, reflecting characteristics
and behaviours precisely common, but in a fabulous environment, away from
ordinary routine.
The entertainment industry and advertising constantly resort to social
dynamics and narrative structures originated in mythology. What is common in
all these stories - regardless of background, culture, mythology - are characters
that with their personalities have (moral and ethical) values, together with a well-
constructed image (their aesthetic) and make it possible for the public to identify
with them.
A narrative progresses through the character, which triggers action and
transforms, and affects their environment, translating feelings. This process can
generate empathy in viewers, who can connect to the character and also put
themselves in the character’s skin and when they return to reality, resignify their
own environment.
In a reverse way, creating personas comes from observation of the
trajectory of real people and their common characteristics and add this to the
spirit of the brand. Thus, using the results and insights gathered through
monitoring and analysis it is possible, from the commonalities of public profiles,
to materialize them into personas and later illustrated characters.
Personas: From Data to the Illustrations
In Communication, persona is literally a hybrid of a public representative
sample of a given profile, used both to assist in understanding public profiles
and constructing actions that come from the brand to the people.
To create them we need to observe patterns and contrasts of the targeted
public and / or already established, from ways of dressing to word use, slang
and everyday expressions, chiselling these identified characteristics and
incorporating them into personas that reflect the various established profiles.

8. To make sense, the persona must be built in a multifaceted way, with
complementary resources and skills of a well-constructed team. Without the
sample analyzed by an analyst and the collected references, the illustrator will
not be able to follow a path and his illustration runs the danger of becoming
obsolete. Just like the opposite way, the illustrator must be open to criticism, be
flexible in constructing the persona image and be aware of all the features
raised by the monitoring and analysis team.
Below is an example (adapted and anonymized) of personas Illustration
building process in three different contexts. So let us go systematically:
assuming that three personas, identified by the analyst team, are recognized
just like the following images, how do we turn them into illustration?
Exemple 1 – Providers Guests
Context: hotel chain guest study
One study looked at two years of mention records of six hotel brands
from the same network. Eight audience segments were separated and the Guest
segment was divided into 7 personas, according to behaviours expressed in
social media. One was the persona "Guests Providers":
Example 2 – Traditional
Context: scotch consumer study
The case below, in turn, is a persona in a consumer report on a Scotch
brand. These users, with high purchasing power, but hard to find due to a more
cautious use of social media:

9. Exemple 3 - Influencers Plus Size3
In the example below, the study seeks to represent preferences - of
consumption, musical, artistic, media – from a sample of 100 plus size bloggers on
Facebook. The persona illustration sought to represent this segment of content
producers.
Next, we will show, from the given examples, the process of creating the
persona of the illustration. To build this image we need to carefully observe the
references sent by the team of analysts, gathering preferences, attitudinal and
behavioural traits, with the main common visual elements of the examples
3
Learn more about the Study of Fashion and Beauty Plus Size on Facebook:
<http://blog.ibpad.com.br/index.php/tag/plus-size/>

10. following the illustration style requested (realistic, cartoon, flat, etc.). Thus, we
have the following script:
1) To analyze the images and features raised by the analyst: as well as
textually identifiable themes such as interests, attitudes and opinions, we
should observe colour, hair, clothes, accessories, gestures, looks and poses.
What is most characteristic must be incorporated into the design.
The illustrator’s first contact with information is usually a slide as shown
above, with the data already organized into a named persona. They have to
repair not only the images but also the text and data, as it will reveal the
subjectivities of the persona.
Example 1
The responsibility trait is emphasized by behavioural analysis, based on
data analyzed by the monitoring team. The family as a motivator of imagined
actions and audience is present in the analysis, supported by subject
classification (in other report slides). Key behavioural traits were correlated with
the defining characteristics of the group (travel provider to spouses and family).
In this case, it would be wise to propose the illustration of a smiling woman,
around 30 years old, using sober clothes, namely: jeans, T-shirt or shirt, with

11. colours not very saturated or too strong. Here we recommend pants, not because
of their symbolic force, as wearing pants was once part of their struggle for
equality, today there is still a cultural attachment to the concept of formality and
practicality.
Example 2
Example 2, in turn, brings a very different public from the first example,
beginning with the title, much clearer and specific. Professional ethos dominates
this persona, which relates to the product due to its symbolism linked to specific
conceptions of tradition and power. In the pictures, we see only white men with
serious expressions, mostly wearing a suit. We also identified the low number
of publications in social media, linked to elements and themes of seriousness in
impression management. The represented characteristics could not be
different, but in this case it is designed in a more distant trace of the cartoon,
with fine contours and less saturated colours.

12. Example 3
In the case of Example 3, the predominant features in most plus size
influencers were the marked waist, strong color lipstick, accessories (earrings,
necklaces, rings, bracelets), in white women, hair with lights and in black women,
black power hair. As this persona adds a struggle of political characteristics and
resistance, such as the search for representation in mainstream media and in
fashion, the suggestion of the illustration is a black and empowered woman as
some of the plus size US and Brazilian major bloggers were identified in the
study.
2) Drafting the commonalities and define ways forward: exchange drafts
between the illustrator and the analysis team, monitoring for due consideration,
mainly to see if the design is becoming what the team envisioned: where to look,
how to move the hand, the clothes’ color, the skin color. The pose is also
important: Is he still? Is he walking? Is he accompanied? In addition, and
important to mention, he is always looking at the report reader.

13. In Example 1 - Guest Provider, the most obvious elements were incorporated into
the persona of the design, like the open smile and the relaxed pose. Making notes
next to the draft with arrows to identify these things can assist the monitoring team
to better understand the design intent, so do not economize the annotations and
notes!
In Example 2 – Tradition was needed to draw a picture that evoked all the
seriousness transmitted by a lawyer with more serious and straight lines. In this
case, instead of illustrating the character looking at the viewer, his determined look
is drawn looking the other way helping to convey his strong personality.

14. For Example 3 - Plus Size, marked curves and a smooth pose were chosen to
define the shapes of the body in contrast to the waist.
3) Finalize and implement the design: to define the draft, finalize the
design with colors, shadows and highlights to add volume and a good finish.
Important: saving to file with the best definition and transparent background
helps team members who do not work with editing tools. It also helps with the
background type, where to apply the character and to avoid confused slides and
information overload.

15. Often, the result may seem "simple", but it is not just a design, but rather
an illustration that is the result of extensive research, with a solid background,
mapped and rich in relevant information. The persona of the illustration will help
materialize and fix in the customers' mind monitoring reports, research and
discoveries.
Report screen example with data linked to the persona
Each drawing, with their sharp features, represents a different public
profile in their contexts, accompanied by a fact sheet (mean age, tastes, genres,
activities, interests, among other categories) it can summarize behavior patterns
and help develop strategies for the brand as it is now possible to know with
whom and for whom one is speaking.

16. Report screen example with data linked to the persona
From the references up to the final work, we observed that the developed
persona is a reality, representing a public profile, bringing together the main
characteristics and commonalities in order to maximize results. We cannot see
these personas as absolute and immutable, they are constantly changing and
need to be re-evaluated with a certain frequency.
Report cover example with persona illustration
Monitor and analyze people by social media is an effective way to map the
public. The paths presented here to interpret these data were intended to
narrate the building of personas from public profiles identified for monitoring.
Generally, monitoring takes the findings of the brands’ public, and we have
proposed paths that materialize these findings, but do not necessarily mean
that these discoveries will reach the public. Therefore, we understand that the

17. creation of personas and characters aims to translate public profiles, but they
can also serve as a creative input for strategies and actions for the brand.
Referencies
CAMPBELL, Joseph. O Herói de Mil Faces. São Paulo: Pensamento, 1989.
JUNG, Carl G. et al. O homem e seus símbolos. Rio de Janeiro: Nova fronteira, 1964.
JWT INTELLIGENCE. Gendered products face growing backslah. Disponível em:
https://www.jwtintelligence.com/2015/12/gendered-products-face-growing-backlash/
PLUMMER, Joseph T. The concept and application of life style segmentation. the Journal of
Marketing, p. 33-37, 1974.
SILVA, Tarcízio. Segmentação de Público no Monitoramento de Mídias Sociais: demografia,
psicografia e inovações para entender o público nas mídias sociais. Online, 2014a.
http://pt.slideshare.net/tarushijio/segmentacao-de-publico-no-monitoramento-de-midias-
sociais-45425152
SILVA, Tarcízio. Como Criar categorias e tags no monitoramento de mídias sociais. Online,
2014b. Disponível em http://pt.slideshare.net/tarushijio/como-criar-categorias-e-tags-no-
monitoramento-de-mdias-sociais
How to cite
SILVA, Tarcízio; AMARAL, Yuri. Creating Personas for Research reports in social media
Instituto Brasileiro de Pesquisa e Análise de Dados. Online, 2016. Available in:
http://blog.ibpad.com.br

18. ABOUT IBPAD
The Brazilian Institute of
Research and Data Analysis is a
center of knowledge in the
areas of Research and Public
Opinion, Digital Policy and
Government Relations and
Communication.
The focus of the Institute is the development, application and
teaching techniques and data analysis methodologies with solid
scientific training.
RELATED TEXTS
 What kind of groups can I study
with ethnography in social media?
 Photo in Social Medias as an
etnographic resource
 Capillary Transition and
Empowerment in Social Media
 Monitoring: tracking campaign
performance is just the iceberg top
 Generating More Business with
Monitoring Reports
 The underused potential of social
media monitoring
RELATED COURSES
 Etnography for Social Media
(with professor Débora Zanini)
 Monitoring of Social Media
(with professors Tarcízio Silva and Wesley
Muniz)
 Data analysis and B.I. for Planners
(with professor Daniele Rodrigues and
guests)
 Diversity and Data in Social Media
(with professors Fernanda Alves and
Maíra Berutti)
 Network Analysis for Social Media
(with professors Max Stabile and Tarcízio
Silva)