Case Study: Buyer Personas

Sometimes you need buyer personas. Sometimes you need a lot more. 

The Opportunity

That time we helped a client truly understand their buyers—and build better connections because of it.

The Client

Fire-Dex, a leading fire protection manufacturer looking to refine its sales, marketing and customer engagement strategy across a complex buying ecosystem.

The Scene

The client recognized that its approach to engaging with potential buyers was effective but could be stronger with more strategic insights. They wanted to take a more data-driven approach to identifying how multiple stakeholders evaluate, influence and approve gear decisions. To do this, they partnered with Akhia to develop a comprehensive set of buyer personas that would guide their messaging, content strategy, and sales approach.

The Plot Twist

This wasn’t just about creating generic customer profiles—it was about building a nuanced, research-backed framework that reflected real-world decision-making dynamics across multiple stakeholders.

The Action

Akhia developed an in-depth buyer persona strategy through a mix of qualitative and quantitative research methods. This included:

• SME and Customer Interviews – Engaging key stakeholders, including fire chiefs, procurement officers, and frontline firefighters, to understand their motivations, pain points, and decision-making processes.
• Survey Analysis – Collecting insights from industry professionals on their purchasing habits, product preferences, and vendor expectations.
• Competitive Research – Examining how competitors positioned themselves and identifying gaps in the client’s approach.
• Data-Driven Persona Development – Creating detailed profiles that captured the unique priorities of decision-makers, influencers, and end-users, along with how they interact, influence one another and consume content.
• Audience-Specific Messaging Frameworks – Developing tailored messaging for each key audience that aligned with their unique motivations, pain points and decision criteria. The result was a set of personas that didn’t just describe who the buyers were but provided actionable insights on how to connect with them more effectively.

The Victory Lap

With the new buyer personas in place, the client was able to refine its content strategy, align sales efforts with customer needs, and enhance overall engagement. The personas helped:

• Marketing teams craft more targeted messaging and content that spoke directly to buyers’ concerns.
• Sales teams navigate conversations with a clearer understanding of what different decision-makers valued most.
• Product teams identify potential gaps in offerings based on real-world feedback from users.

By putting customers at the center of their strategy, Fire-Dex gained clearer direction on how to reach each audience with messaging that aligned to their unique motivations and decision drivers.

The Last Word

“This work validated so much of what we were already seeing — and then pushed it further. The level of detail and thought that went into each audience was impressive, and the messaging and content ideas gave us clear direction on how to update our content calendar to effectively reach our audiences. This was exactly what we needed.”

--Jenny Surovey, Vice President of Marketing

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