A Persona is a general representation of one type of user or target user for a system. They should contain relevant characteristics, tasks they need to perform, and goals or needs they are trying to meet. Personas help keep the design and development process user-centered by reminding teams who they are creating the product for. Although researchers can start with hypotheses about target users (Proto-Personas), personas should be based on user research to bring benefit to product teams.

For use in user experience and business, qualitative methods to build personas are recommended with supporting data from quantitative methods. Data driven personas may be more appropriate for scientific studies however.ref

Benefits

• By providing an easily shared vision for each user archetype, personas serve to remind product teams of who they are designing for.
• Personas work well to share key insights gained from performing user research to the rest of the organization.
• Solutions that are proposed can be compared to needs defined in personas to guide the team.
• Personas can help build empathy by reminding teams of real user needs, goals, and interests.