How to create a persona GPT for SEO audience research

In a perfect world, you could call up a top customer to pick their brain about a piece of content. But in reality, it can be extremely difficult and time-consuming to conduct audience interviews every time you need to create a new topic or refresh an old piece. 

A few years ago, content marketing was simpler – keyword intent and quality content was enough to rank at the top of Google’s SERP to get clicks. But in the new era of AI, expectations are different.

Audience research has become critical. However, some companies may not have the resources to perform it.

One way to better understand your target audience is to create a custom GPT in ChatGPT, configured with your persona research. These aren’t replacements for audience research or interviews, but they can help you quickly identify what might be missing or wrong in your content. 

Below, I’ll explain how GPTs work so you can use them for audience research.

Perform audience research

Now that the SEO landscape is evolving, audience research is one of your strongest tools to understand the “why” behind search intent. 

Here are several easy-to-use methods and tools to get you started on research. 

• SparkToro: Search by website, interest, or specific URL to segment different audience types. Research can be in-depth or give an overview of your audience. 
• Review mining: Create automations through various tools and scrape reviews of your company or competitors to see what users are saying, and then analyze them. What does your target customer like? Why did they like it? What didn’t they like? Why?
• Listen to calls/review leads: Listen to sales team interactions with customers to hear questions in real time and what led up to a call with a particular client.

Dig deeper: How to do audience research for SEO

Create a customer persona

After completing your research, create a persona – a representation of your target audience. Figma and FigJam are strong tools for building them.

Your persona should include: 

• Name, bio, and trait slider.
• Interests, influences, goals, pain points.
• User stories.
• The emotional journey during and after.
• Content focus, trigger words, and calls to action (CTAs).
• Full customer journey steps.
• Reviews that support data.

Create a custom GPT of your persona

Now that you have all your research and your persona, it’s time to make a GPT. 

First, log in to ChatGPT, then go to Explore GPTs in the sidebar. 

In the upper right corner, click on Create.

Once there, prompt ChatGPT with your audience research data and persona information. You can paste in screenshots of your data to make it easier. 

Once all your data is in and a GPT is created, you can start talking to it. Under the Configure tab, you can use conversation starters to ask it about changes, updates, and copy.

These GPTs, like all AI models, aren’t 100% accurate. They don’t replace a real audience survey or interview, but they can help you quickly identify issues with a piece of content and how it might not connect with your audience. 

Here’s an example of an optimized page. GPT “Hank” helped make sure the section above the fold did what was intended. 

Hank has said what’s working, what isn’t working, and where to improve.

But should you take his advice 100% of the time? Of course not. 

But the GPT helps quickly identify issues you may have missed. That’s where the real benefit of using a GPT comes in. 

Dig deeper: 7 custom GPT ideas to automate SEO workflows

Ensure data from your GPT is accurate

Nothing analyzed or generated by AI is conclusive evidence. If you’re unsure your GPT is giving you accurate information, double-check by prompting it to provide evidence from the sources you gave it. 

The GPT can correct itself if the information sounds off. When it does, again ask for evidence from the persona information you provided to double-check the new information. 

Update your persona-based GPT

You can always add more information to your GPT to make it more robust. 

To do this, go back to Explore GPTs in ChatGPT. 

Instead of Create, go to My GPTs in the top right-hand corner. 

Click on your persona. 

Click on Configure to update, add, or delete your current information.

Remember that a persona is never a one-and-done situation. The more you learn about your audience and the more information you give a GPT, the better, to keep it up to date. 

Leverage persona GPTs for SEO content

Personas aren’t absolute, and AI can hallucinate. 

But both tools can still help you optimize content. 

Once you’re comfortable creating personas, you can build them for your general audience, specific segments, and individual campaigns.

SEO and marketing are always changing, and you can’t just set it and forget it. As you gain audience insights or if audience intent shifts, update information or delete anything no longer relevant in your GPT. 

When leveraged correctly, these tools can work with SEO to drive traffic and gain more conversions.