117. How to Create An Empathy Map

How To Build An Empathy Map

Why bother creating an Empathy Map?

Creating an audience avatar or customer persona is a great step, but building an empathy map takes things to the next level.

I believe that creating an empathy map is probably one of the best things you can do with your time if you're at the beginning of your entrepreneurial journey and are just about to launch a new business and/or product.

Why?

Because the process (and the resulting map) helps you understand your ideal customer. It forces a level of clarity around how you can serve them more effectively at every step along their buyer's journey. 

Seth Godin is known as a marketing philosopher and one of the most innovative thinkers in the world.

He's never shied away from sharing his thoughts on how to build an audience, grow brands or develop authority online.

In my conversation with Seth, I mentioned to him that empathy is one of the most important (and least used) words in marketing. 

He agreed and added another important word to that list. 

Generosity!

Both these words imply a very long-term approach to marketing and business growth. But as far as I'm aware there is no other reliable way to grow your business without annoying your customers and/or short-changing them by stealing their attention. 

Creating an empathy map is valuable to you as a business owner, content creator, or thought leader for several reasons:

• It helps you understand your target audience or your customers better and “walk in their shoes”.
• It helps you create content that emotionally connects with your prospect which is necessary to deliver a transformation.
• By understanding their situation, you are more likely to solve their problem in a way that’s meaningful to them.

So what are empathy maps anyway?

These are visual representations that help marketers get inside their customers’ minds so they know exactly who their target market should be.

The more you understand them, the better able you will be at understanding why people buy certain things; when each type of customer needs something new; where those opportunities exist within your industry etcetera!

If you haven't already created an empathy map, I strongly recommend creating one for your ideal customer avatar.

Do it now!

How to create an empathy map in 5 steps:

• Take a piece of paper and draw a little circle in the middle (representing your prospect or your customer).
• Now, draw four lines from that circle connecting the circle to the top 2 edges of the paper and 2 lines connecting to the 2 sides of the paper about an inch from the edges.
• This will create 4 sections (with a little blank section at the bottom of the paper).
• Imagine your ideal customer and in the first quadrant, write down the following:
  • What is my customer thinking?
  • What is my customer feeling?
  • What is my target audience saying and doing?
  • What is my target audience hearing? 
• In the blank section at the bottom, write down on the left-hand side:
  • What are his/her fears and frustrations? 
  • What are his/her dreams and aspirations? 

Some other questions to ask include: 

You can also do the same thing but this time, do it around the consumption of your product or your service. 

• What do they hear when other people use your product?
• What do they see when they use your product? What's their environment like?
• What do they say or feel when using your product, whether in private or public?
• What are their pain points when using your product?
• Is this a positive or a painful experience for them?
• Do they hear positive feedback about your company from external sources?
• What do they hope to gain from using your product?