Product Management playbook/Module 2 · Discovery

Day 18 / 100 · Discovery · Personas vs segments

Know who you’re building for.

Personas build empathy. Segments make decisions measurable. Good teams use both, grounded in real behaviour.

Personas

For Empathy

  • A story about a type of user
  • Goals, frustrations, context
  • Great for design conversations
  • Risk: invented in a workshop

Segments

For Decisions

  • Groups defined by shared needs
  • Sizable and measurable
  • Great for strategy and targeting
  • Risk: cold numbers, no story

Segment by need, not by label.