what animal crossing villager has the most spending power?

Timmy and Tommy’s secret to boosting sales with customer personas

Have you gotten into the game of the Summer, Animal Crossing: New Horizon? At least according to my Instagram feed, it seems to be the quarantine pastime, right after baking bread and puzzles.

I’ve never really been into video games, much to my husband’s (an avid gamer) chagrin. However, recently he got me Animal Crossing on the Nintendo Switch, hoping to change my mind. And it worked – at least for this game. I’m hooked.

I like the idea of heading off to a deserted island to start a village and go exploring. I like knowing the tasks I should do first thing. I like being given responsibilities by Resident Services to help build up the island. I also really like making money so I scour the island for every resource I can possibly fit in my pockets to sell. And I love shopping so I buy as much as I can to upgrade my house, my tools, my outfits, etc. Essentially, I am the ultimate villager and probably the best customer Timmy and Tommy Nook who run the island’s only store have ever had.

It got me thinking. If I am the dream customer, what about the other villagers? Who among the villager personalities has the most spending power (aside from me of course) that Timmy and Tommy would want to spend their marketing dollars on?

start with customer personas

To figure this out, I first want to create a customer persona for each of the villager personalities. Customer personas are a marketing tool that helps a brand really get to know who is shopping with them, using their services or spending time on their social media. Once you know more about your “dream” customer, you can tailor your messaging based on their likes and what influences them.

Developing a persona is all about gathering intel about who your customer is. There are many ways to go about this. You can do a light interview session when you have them in person or over the phone, send a survey out to your email list, or just observe them.

Who is walking into your store? Who is following you on social media? What do their accounts look like?

Use the questions below to capture what you know about your dream customer and voila, you have created your customer persona:

1. What are their demographics? Are they male or female? What’s their age range? How do they spend their day? What type of jobs do they have? Are they a stay-at-home mom or a college student?
2. Who is influencing them? Where do they go for information? Are they the influencer of their friend group or do they wait for others to buy something first? Where do they hang out online? Are they hanging out in certain Facebook groups or scrolling on Instagram?
3. What are their desires? What’s the goal or mission in life? Do they have challenges or pain points that you can help solve?

villager personality types

In New Horizon’s, there are eight different character archetypes or personalities, four male and four female. The 391 different villagers you may come across on the islands all fit into these eight personalities. The personality types dictate how they interact with others, how they spend their day and what they wear. Since we can’t interview the villagers to find out more about what influences them to spend money, we can only go based on our small interactions with them. But as you can see, you can still get a lot of information from spending a short amount of time with them.

male villagers

female villagers

nook brothers’ dream customers

So after looking at the different personalities, who would be the best customer for the Nook brothers? They would want to invest their time and money marketing to customers who are out of the house, so they will be more likely to shop. Customers who take pride in what they wear and have a bit of an inflated ego are also a good bet. Not only will they spend a lot of money in their shop, but they will show off what they have to other villagers, influencing them to purchase as well.

My bet is on smug and snooty. They will spend the most, and while their inflated egos may turn off some of the more laid-back villagers, they will have influence over others like peppy and cranky. That makes them a great customer. If Timmy and Tommy did market their shop, they should adjust their messaging to target them.

What villagers would you want as your dream customer? Have you created customer personas for your business? Try it and then adjust your messaging to reflect the needs and wants of your customer. I promise you’ll see results.