TBF: the real avatars in the survey data

The answer

The current avatars are not real buyer segments.

All 192 responses from the four TBF avatar surveys with data (Cursed 49, Overlooked 118, Sceptic 19, Ageing 6) were pooled, shuffled, stripped of labels, and segmented bottom-up by a sandboxed model with no avatar or product context. It found 8 people-shaped segments plus a 15% residual of too-thin answers.

Then the labels were joined back: which avatar funnel a buyer came through does not predict which segment they belong to (permutation chi-square on the 9×4 table: chi2 = 28.5, p = 0.24, Cramér's V = 0.22). Every avatar cohort is roughly the same mix of the same 8 types.

The other 4 avatar surveys (Impoverished, Helper, Ailing, Faithful) have zero responses, so they are untested.

This page is the sequel to the earlier Cursed-vs-Overlooked comparison, which found those two cohorts psychographically identical.

Caveat: this says the avatars don't separate BUYERS psychographically; whether they still earn their keep as ad angles (different hooks, different CTR/ROAS) is a Meta-performance question this survey cannot answer.

Does the avatar routing predict the segment?

If the avatars were real segments, each column would concentrate in different rows; instead the columns are near-identical mixes, and the shuffle test says a random relabeling produces this much separation 24% of the time. The one eye-catching cell — half the Ageing cohort landing in Spiritually-Framed — is 3 people out of 6.

How bias was kept out

Same blinding discipline as the earlier comparison. Responses were exported from the four surveys.* Supabase tables, deduplicated, product mentions redacted, shuffled into anonymous IDs R1–R192 with the source label held back. The sandboxed model derived segments bottom-up in three passes. Its ID partition was programmatically verified (192 IDs, no duplicates, no omissions) and its quotes checked character-for-character. Only after the segmentation was frozen were the avatar labels joined back for the cross-tab, tested with a 5,000-shuffle permutation chi-square.

How the segments were derived

All 192 responses were read in three passes: (1) a skim to draft candidate clusters, (2) a full forced-assignment pass of every ID to exactly one bucket, (3) a misfit re-read in which borderline cases (mostly "money AND health" and "widow vs caregiver vs elder") were re-checked and boundaries tightened once. The data refused a clean "money vs health vs love" topic split: money appears in a clear majority of answers, but it plays very different roles depending on the person. The natural structure is therefore people-shaped: what ruptured or grinds in this person's life, who they are responsible for, and whether they explain their trouble materially, relationally, bodily, or spiritually. The pool settled into 8 substantive segments + 1 residual thin/off-topic bucket — slightly above the nominal range because the finance majority genuinely splits into four different kinds of people (chronic treadmill, acute catastrophe, fixed-income elder, bereaved survivor), not one.

Assignment audit: the nine segment ID lists were programmatically verified to partition R1–R192 exactly — 192 IDs total, no duplicates, no omissions (details in the Assignment audit card below; the exhaustive ID lists themselves are omitted from this page).

Scope note: this is descriptive only; no targeting, messaging, or product recommendations are made. Where respondents mentioned multiple problem domains, assignment followed the dominant identity (the problem that defines who is speaking), not mere mention-count.

Segment 1 — The Working-Poor Treadmill: “I work, but the math never works”

Portrait. Employed (or recently employed) adults, often parents/providers, whose defining condition is chronic: bills exceed income, paycheck-to-paycheck, nothing saved, effort never converts into advancement. Not a single catastrophe — a permanent headwind. Emotional register: tired frustration and quiet injustice ("no matter how hard I work").

Count: 50 (26.0%)

Psychographics. Desires: stability, a paid-off bill, a house, a buffer, dignity, ability to say yes to kids. Pains: bill triage, grocery money, stagnation. Fears: never getting ahead, failing family, retirement slipping away. Voice: plain, terse, pragmatic, occasionally hopeful. Spirituality: low-to-moderate, incidental ("thank you"). Locus of control: mostly externalized (wages, prices, luck) but still effort-believing.

• "I have more bills than money to pay them" (R65)
• "no matter how hard I work, it seems that money is always an issue" (R110)
• "I have to decide every month what gets paid and what bill is going to have to wait" (R138)
• "I hate to have to tell my kids we can’t cause we don’t have the money" (R46)
• "Always working hard and only getting a fraction of success and abundance" (R92)
• "Money to buy groceries" (R192)

Segment 2 — Relationship & Belonging: lonely hearts, strained marriages, broken families

Portrait. People whose core wound is relational: seeking a soulmate, a cold or gaslighting spouse, adult children who withdrew, estranged daughters/grandchildren, a deported husband, a family that won't get along. Money often appears but is secondary to attachment. Register: longing, sadness, sometimes tearful.

Count: 27 (14.1%)

Psychographics. Desires: reunion, to be chosen/loved, harmony, a "forever" partner, family completeness. Pains: loneliness, rejection by children, marital coldness, mistrust. Fears: dying alone, permanent estrangement, being gaslit. Voice: confessional, intimate, sometimes capital-letter anguish. Spirituality: moderate (blessings, church). Locus of control: mixed — often feels at the mercy of others' hearts.

• "My adult children no longer like being around me." (R122)
• "I have not talked to my daughter in about 25 years." (R101)
• "I feel gaslit by my husband" (R161)
• "I AM SAD AND LONELY. JUST SHARING THIS WITH YOU, MY EYES ARE FULL OF TEARS" (R124)
• "Finding love that is true, forever, honest, genuine and trustworthy" (R127)
• "I wish my kids could have both parents together all the time and my family to be complete again." (R63)

Segment 3 — The Ailing Body: illness and pain stealing function, work, time

Portrait. Chronic conditions and injuries — diabetes, cancer, autoimmune disease, back/leg/femur pain, asthma, weight, memory — that limit daily life and often the ability to work, with money trouble downstream of the body. Register: worn, bodily preoccupied, sometimes facing mortality.

Count: 21 (10.9%)

Psychographics. Desires: pain to stop, strength for kids, independence, to work again, more time. Pains: daily pain, hospitalizations, fatigue, diagnoses. Fears: running out of time, becoming dependent, illness bankrupting them. Voice: clinical list of symptoms; matter-of-fact endurance. Spirituality: low, occasional 🙏. Locus of control: strongly external (the body, insurance).

• "Pain through out my body to stop." (R140)
• "I live with pain all over my body every day." (R119)
• "I have a rare autoimmune disease that has good a lot of hospitalizations which has not allowed me to work consistently" (R145)
• "Health and fear of running out of time" (R115)
• "I am still in excruciating pain. I want to go back to work but can’t" (R158)
• "My health, because I am diabetic" (R1)

Segment 4 — Spiritually-Framed: curses, luck, awakening, and manifested abundance

Portrait. People who explain their problem energetically or cosmically — at one pole, fear of witchcraft/dark clouds/bad luck/dry spells; at the other, serene awakening, third-eye opening, divine alignment, and "abundance" manifestation. Money and love are desired but through a spiritual mechanism. Register: mystical, fate-oriented, from fearful to transcendent.

Count: 21 (10.9%)

Psychographics. Desires: protection, cleared paths, opened third eye, abundance, alignment, peace. Pains: perceived curses, negative energy, misfortune, stagnation of the soul. Fears: evil people, bad luck that "follows," spiritual attack. Voice: incantatory, affirmation-like, emoji (👁️🙏), grateful/humble. Spirituality: the defining axis — very high. Locus of control: cosmic/spiritual; agency via ritual, blessing, vibration.

• "Protection from bad spiritual energy, witchcraft, curses, sent my way." (R13)
• "I have been told I have a dark cloud hovering over me everywhere I go in life." (R53)
• "Recently been spiritual awakened, want 3rd eye open more." (R93)
• "Open the path that has been closed by evil people that do witchcraft on me" (R45)
• "Age has brought me to perceive reality from a universal understanding of the immortality of the Soul." (R23)
• "going thru a dry spell with my life,luck,and luxury's" (R179)

Segment 5 — Debt & Disaster Reset: an acute financial wound, wanting a clean slate

Portrait. Distinct from the treadmill: a specific rupture — bankruptcy, identity theft, a scam, a failed business, a lawsuit, a hurricane, divorce debt, medical debt, layoff cascade. The dream is not incremental stability but a reset/windfall that erases the event. Register: besieged, wronged, hoping for one big break.

Count: 18 (9.4%)

Psychographics. Desires: debt forgiven, fresh start, the lawsuit/settlement to land, the house repaired. Pains: collections, lawsuits, scams, storms, hospital bills. Fears: losing home/job/relationship to the cascade, never escaping the balance. Voice: itemized grievance, named villains (scammers, "Car Sharks," State Farm). Spirituality: low-moderate. Locus of control: external and event-driven; luck/legal outcomes loom large.

• "I filed bankruptcy. I don’t have enough money ." (R106)
• "Filed Bankruptcy due to a victim of identity theft, and Car Sharks loan, ended losing homeowners." (R136)
• "being sued by friends who loaned me money to start a business that failed" (R12)
• "Get out of medical debt and repair my home after hurricane Laura damage" (R97)
• "Seems like the more I try to pay I can’t never end paying my debts" (R113)
• "I’ve lost everything and lm trying to start over" (R27)

Segment 6 — The Sandwiched Caregiver: holding up parents, children, siblings, veterans

Portrait. Identity organized around caring for someone else — a mother with dementia, a disabled combat-veteran husband, a blind son, autistic grandchildren, a sister's children or treatments — often while being unpaid, unhelped, or even accused of financial abuse. Register: exhausted, duty-bound, sometimes resentful at siblings who don't help.

Count: 12 (6.3%)

Psychographics. Desires: the cared-for to be safe/housed/healed; peace; one helpful sibling; their own health to hold out. Pains: dementia care, accusations, Medicaid logistics, no respite, financial drain. Fears: the dependent's future after they're gone, being blamed, collapse of their own health. Voice: detailed, logistical, morally indignant. Spirituality: moderate (prayer/devotion as refuge). Locus of control: internal-duty but externally squeezed.

• "Accusations of me taking my mother’s money after caring for her for the past 6 years" (R66)
• "having a daughter that does not help me out with my mother, her grandmother" (R125)
• "My husband is a disabled combat veteran… led me to be his full time care provider." (R189)
• "my blind son could stay in the house he’s always lived in." (R162)
• "My son has mental health issues is is a huge source of stress and financial strain." (R131)

Segment 7 — Fixed-Income Elders: too old to earn, too poor to stop

Portrait. Seniors on SSI/Social Security/pensions — or still working at 73–78 — stretching a fixed check, unable to retire, or forced back to work. The problem is structural: income ended but expenses didn't. Register: weary dignity, matter-of-fact scarcity.

Count: 9 (4.7%)

Psychographics. Desires: to retire with dignity, cover the mortgage, help children a little, not be a burden. Pains: checks that don't stretch, age discrimination, declining health that blocks re-earning. Fears: outliving money, working until death, losing the home. Voice: plain, resigned, grateful. Spirituality: moderate. Locus of control: external (government check, age, health).

• "I’m retired and no other income except what I get from the government. Every month I have to stretch my money" (R8)
• "Im 76 and tired so hoping to win enough money to pay off my house so I can retire." (R118)
• "I’m 73 years old and still have to work full time as an RN." (R183)
• "I live on a ssi check it's not enough I'm barely surviving" (R49)
• "Now, I am old and poor." (R94)

Segment 8 — Bereaved & Exposed: loss of the anchor, collapse of the floor

Portrait. Mostly older women who lost the household's anchor — a husband dead (one by suicide), or a mother dead and a husband deported (R7) — and with that person the income, home, and emotional footing, now facing mortgages, funerals, and survival alone. Grief is the identity; money is the emergency it created. Register: raw, pleading, blessing-seeking.

Count: 6 (3.1%)

Psychographics. Desires: breathing room, to keep the home / bury with dignity, a blessing, to get back on their feet. Pains: fresh grief, deportation/suicide, sudden poverty, loneliness. Fears: losing the home, an improper burial, hopelessness. Voice: narrative, devastated but "still trying day by day." Spirituality: moderate-high (blessing language). Locus of control: external — lightning struck; agency is survival.

• "I’m 75yrs old , married 43 yrs and my husband committed Suicide. I lost my home and all finances!" (R14)
• "My husband recently died ..money is really tight ..I would just like some financial breathing room" (R42)
• "I am a widow my husband died 6 months ago I am having a bad time with everything!" (R58)
• "I am losing all hope but still trying day by day to get back in my feet." (R7)
• "there’s not enough money to bury my mother and have a funeral properly for her." (R152)

Segment 9 — Residual: thin, list-only, or off-topic answers

Portrait. Not a customer type — responses too terse ("Health and financial"), all-category checklists, product/logistics questions, or gratitude notes that reveal no person. Kept separate so they don't distort the real segments.

Count: 28 (14.6%)

• "Health and financial" (R22)
• "All above I need help in each category listed above" (R109)
• "How long to get the [PRODUCT]s" (R148)
• "My biggest problem is me...not feeling I deserve," (R78)
• "Communication with money" (R171)

How distinct the segments really are

• Sharply separated: Spiritually-Framed vs Ailing Body — almost no overlap; one speaks in curses/third-eyes, the other in symptoms and hospitalizations. Bereaved & Exposed is also crisp (a death is unambiguous), and Residual is cleanly non-people.
• Blurry pairs (expected):
  • Treadmill ↔ Debt/Disaster: both are "not enough money"; the split is chronic grind vs triggering event. R35, R113, R186, R123 sat near this line.
  • Ailing Body ↔ Treadmill: illness that causes money trouble (R145, R150, R119) could be filed either way; assignment followed whether the body or the budget was the dominant identity.
  • Bereaved ↔ Caregiver ↔ Fixed-Income Elder: older women frequently qualify for two at once (R116 widow+caregiver → caregiver; R152 widow+caregiver → bereaved; R185 retired+love → elder).
  • Relationship ↔ Spiritual: several frame love problems as needing "spiritual help" (R82, R102, R190).
• Genuinely ambiguous share: roughly one-fifth to one-quarter (~20–25%) of responses were real toss-ups between exactly two segments — almost always a money answer braided with health, caregiving, or relationship. Very few were three-way ambiguous; the all-category lists were routed to Residual instead.

The single dimension that explains the most variation

Chronic grind vs acute rupture — i.e., is this a permanent condition to endure or an event to recover from? — explains more variance than the surface topic (money/health/love). It is what splits the huge finance mass into Treadmill (chronic), Debt/Disaster (acute), Bereaved (acute relational rupture with financial fallout), and Fixed-Income Elder (chronic, life-stage-locked). A close secondary axis is explanatory frame: material vs bodily vs relational vs spiritual, which is what separates Ailing Body, Relationship, and Spiritual segments from the money majority even when their requests sound identical. Life stage (working-age provider vs senior) and caregiving load are real but tertiary. In short: money is the near-universal vocabulary of this pool, but temporality (grind vs shock) is the grammar.

Assignment audit

Segment counts: 50 + 27 + 21 + 21 + 18 + 12 + 9 + 6 + 28 = 192. The nine ID lists were checked programmatically: 192 IDs total, 192 unique, missing set empty, duplicate set empty — an exact partition of R1–R192. All verbatim quote fragments were checked character-for-character against the source responses (original typos preserved, e.g. "has good a lot of hospitalizations" R145, "is is" R131).

Reading these as avatars

• Working-Poor Treadmill — 26% — employed providers whose bills outrun every paycheck, no matter how hard they work.
• Relationship & Belonging — 14% — people whose core wound is relational: estranged children, cold marriages, the search for a true partner.
• The Ailing Body — 11% — chronic illness and pain stealing function and work, with money trouble downstream of the body.
• Spiritually-Framed — 11% — people who explain their trouble energetically: curses and dark clouds at one pole, awakening and abundance at the other.
• Debt & Disaster Reset — 9% — one acute financial rupture (bankruptcy, scam, storm, lawsuit) and the dream of a clean slate.
• Sandwiched Caregiver — 6% — identity organized around holding up a dependent — parent, spouse, child — unpaid and unhelped.
• Fixed-Income Elders — 5% — too old to earn, too poor to stop; the check ended but the expenses didn't.
• Bereaved & Exposed — 3% — mostly older women who lost the household's anchor and, with him, the income and the floor.

Limits

1. One survey question — "biggest problem" — is a thin basis; desires and voice are inferred from a single answer.
2. Buyers only — this says nothing about who clicks but doesn't buy.
3. The pool is 61% Overlooked-funnel buyers, so segment shares carry that skew.
4. Roughly 20–25% of responses were genuine toss-ups between two segments, mostly money braided with health or family.
5. Segments describe who buyers ARE, not which ad angle converts them — that needs testing.

The dominant structure worth building on is chronic grind vs acute rupture, not the current avatar taxonomy.