Customer persona activity: a 40-minute marketing task, grades 6–8
What it is: a grades 6–8 marketing activity where teams read made-up survey results for a pretend smoothie cart and build a customer persona: a short profile of a typical customer. Teams then decide where and how to reach that customer. It mirrors the market research step the SBA describes for new businesses.
Time: about 40 minutes. Grade: 6th to 8th grade.
Materials: a made-up survey summary for 40 people at a park (ages, time of visit, what they want, what they would pay), a persona template (name, age range, what they need, when they come, what they care about, where they see ads), colored pencils.
- Explain: "A persona is a made-up person who stands for a group of real customers. It helps a business decide what to sell and how to talk about it."
- Teams read the survey summary and circle the largest groups, for example families with little ones after school and runners in the morning.
- Each team chooses one group and fills in the persona template with a fictional name and a quick sketch.
- Teams decide three things for that persona: the best time to have the cart open, the best product, and one place to put a sign.
- Teams swap personas and give feedback: "Does the plan match the data?"
- Discuss: "What happens if a business tries to reach everyone at once?"
Differentiation: students who need support work from a survey summary with only two customer groups. Students who are ready create a second persona and explain how the menu would change for each. English learners can use the template with sentence starters.
Quick check: ask a student to point to one number in the survey that supports their persona.
Save this activity to your library so it is ready when you need it.
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About this resource
- Shared by
- @UpOnlyLearning · Curriculum team
- Posted
- Oct 31, 2026
- Type
- Lesson plan
- Grade
- Grades 6–8
- Subject
- Business
- Language
- English
- License
- Free for classroom, co-op and tutoring use. Please don't resell.