SecondPen.aiTemplates · Research & discovery
Persona template
Origin: Alan Cooper, The Inmates Are Running the Asylum (1999).
Start from this templateFree, no account needed. The blank is written with guidance in each section, ready to fill in.
Sections
- Name & snapshot
- Goals
- Behaviors
- Pain points
- Context
- Quote
- Evidence base
How a tough reader scores it
When you score a draft against this format, the Critic evaluates this persona. The weights add up to 100; the fixes for the weakest criteria arrive as cards in the editor.
| Criterion | Weight |
|---|---|
| Grounded in research with cited evidence | 25 |
| Goals and behaviors are specific enough to guide design decisions | 25 |
| Pain points are ranked and real | 20 |
| Free of demographic fluff that doesn't change decisions | 15 |
| Anti-persona clarifies focus | 15 |
How it works in SecondPen.ai
Open the template and the editor writes the blank once, with a line of guidance under each heading that you delete as you fill it in. Write your abstract and the editor names the format it reads like. Ask for a document with a slash command and it offers to start from the matching format. When the draft is ready, the Critic scores it against the criteria above, the way this format's toughest reader would, and the three highest-leverage fixes become Editor cards.
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- Experiment / A/B test briefOnline controlled experiment practice (Ron Kohavi at Microsoft; Booking.com)
- Customer journey mapService design practice (Nielsen Norman Group, IDEO)