Segments give marketers the ability to act on information about contacts, such as demographics, message, site and purchase activity, and even predictive behaviors. These segments can be applied to any cross-channel message. Learn how to build, manage and apply segments to your marketing channels.
📌 This article covers the process of building segments and audiences. Apply the specific criteria for your segmentation goals.
💡 Already familiar with the process? Jump to information on how to apply specific data types, apply multi-criteria segments, or see the segments in action in a short webinar.
Process for Creating a Segment in the Contact Management Page
⚠️ You must create and save a segment on the contact management page before it can be applied to a specific message.
To begin building, navigate to Contacts > Cross-Channel All Contacts.
Click Select Criteria. Learn more about the different types of criteria available.
Select the first criteria level - such as Contact Profile, Contact Behavior, Product Behavior or Predictive*.
💡 The first criteria level displays the various high-level groupings of data.
Select the second criteria level - each primary group will have a unique set of secondary data to choose from.
💡 Use the second level of data to drill further into the high-level grouping to determine the more specific type of data.
Select the third criteria level - each secondary group will have a unique set of tertiary data to choose from.
And in some cases there may be a fourth criteria level.
The third (and forth, if applicable) level of data represent the individual data point being analyzed in the filter criteria.
Select the conditional operator.
Enter the value (if applicable).
💡 The conditional operators differ based on how data is stored for the criteria. Data can be stored as dates, check boxes, text etc.
If you need to to change the criteria, you will need to delete the criteria and start over, click Cancel and click X to delete the filter.
Click Apply to calculate this filter or click Cancel to go back to the dashboard.
Use the Plus Sign or Add Filter button to add additional criteria. Repeat steps 3-7 for any additional criteria.
*Predictive Analytics is an additional solution offered by Listrak. If you are interested in purchasing Predictive Analytics, please contact your Account Manager.
💡 Helpful Tips
The order of operations is from left to right, top to bottom regardless of the operators used. This applies to both Segments and when applying Segments into an Audience.
Time zone for date fields utilizes the UTC time zone.
To target non-purchasers, use the total order count equals zero.
Is Not in the Comma Delimited List (when evaluating text fields) will include contacts where there is no value in the field.
Comma Delimited Lists have a character limits of 1,000 characters.
Process for Managing Criteria in Segments
📌 You can manage criteria added to a segment while you are building it or by editing an existing segment.
Edit the conditional operator of the filter's criteria
Click on the criteria that needs to be edited.
Apply the necessary changes.
Click Apply to recalculate this filter or click outside the criteria popup to go back to the contacts page.
Build onto the filter by adding additional criteria
There are two ways to add additional criteria:
Group criteria together by clicking the + sign NEXT to the previous filter criteria.
💡 Use the same connector (AND or OR) within a single line to make the segment easily understandable. Use option B if you need to change the connector.
Create a new group by clicking the +Filter BELOW the filter(s).
Change the operator by clicking on it. By default it is set to AND.
Delete an individual filter criteria
Click on the criteria that needs to be deleted.
Click Delete. Note there is no confirmation screen, it will be deleted immediately.
Save as a Segment
Click Save Segment to save all filter criteria as a usable Saved Segment.
Give it a unique name.
Click Save to save the Segment or click Cancel to go back to the dashboard.
Once the Segment has been saved it will be viewable on the Segments dashboard.
Click the Segments tab to view all saved Segments.
Clear the filter criteria
Click the X Clear Filter option to clear ALL filter criteria.
💡 This will NOT delete the saved segment.
Process for Managing Saved Segments
Saved Segments are managed on the Segment Management dashboard. Access it by navigating to Contacts > Cross-Channel Segments, or by clicking the Segments tab in the Contact Management page.
💡 Segments are cross-domain and will reflect the same count regardless of which domain is selected if an organization has multiple domains. Each organization will display it's unique segments.
To begin, click the Actions icon in the row of the segment to either Edit, Rename, or Duplicate a segment.
Edit
Apply the necessary updates.
Click Save Segment.
Choose how you would like to save the segment:
Update: This will apply any changes to the existing segment, overriding any criteria that was previously a part of the segment.
⚠️ If an updated segment is applied to an audience, the segment within the audience will also be updated to messages that are saved or scheduled.
Create New: This will ONLY apply any changes made to newly created segment; thus not affecting the original segment.
Rename
This will change the name of the Segment, also changing the Segment name within any audience this has been applied to.
Duplicate
Segments can be duplicated, which helps quickly start with a copy of a segment's filter rules without having to recreate from scratch.
Process for creating an Audience
An audience is created by applying previously saved Segments directly in the message creation experience to target specific groups of contacts. When saved Segments are applied to an individual message, the count will now reflect a reachable audience, which are contacts who are subscribed/opted-in to the that specific messaging channel for the domain selected in the navigation. An audience count will be displayed within the interface when applied. The audience count is dynamic and will be re-calculated at the time of message send.
Navigate to the message authoring experience of the applicable channel.
Scroll to the Filter Recipients section.
Click Build Audience.
The Create an Audience builder allows you to include or exclude all contacts that are a part of a Saved Segment. Within each condition there is also the option to to build more complex groupings with the use of OR/AND conditions.
Click the Segment and drag-and-drop it into either conditional section.
To build more complex logic, do either of the following options:
OR statement: Drag the new Segment in the empty box.
AND statement: Drag the new Segment inside a Segment.
Click Apply to apply to the message or click Cancel to go back to the message creation experience.
💡 Helpful Tips
The segment count (next to the person icon) is an estimate based on when the segment count was last run.
The total Audience Count and percentage of total subscribed contacts to the program (e.g. marketing program) is displayed at the top of builder.
The Audience Count will display the current count of contacts who meet all the include/exclude segment criteria.
Once a Segment has been added, you can do the following:
Click the X (on left): To remove it from the audience.
Click the eye icon: To review the filter criteria of a Segment (this can be done from within the Segment column on the left as well).
Drag to the other section.
Click Remove Audience on the main message creation screen to remove the Audience from the message, if it is no longer wanted or needed.
Segment Criteria Examples
📌 Learn how to set a segment criteria based on the grouping and type of data.
Example 1: Using Dates in Common or Custom profile fields
Example 1A: Contacts who turn 30 in 2024, within a specific month
Contact Profile > Common > Personal Information > Birthday
💡 Check the Include Year to look back at the year 1994 only.
Example 1B: Check if loyalty points expire in the next week
Contact Profile > Custom > Client specific profile field for loyalty expiration date data
💡 Check the Include Year checkbox to look at the dates within the specific year. Leaving the box unchecked will look at the selected day in any year.
Example 1C: Contacts who have a birthday today
Contact Profile > Common > Personal Information > Birthday
💡 Keep the Include Year unchecked to look back on any year.
Example 1D: Contacts who have a birthday in a specific month
Contact Profile > Common > Personal Information > Birthday
💡 Keep the Include Year unchecked to look back on any year.
Example 2: Placed an Order
Example 2A: Placed an order in the month of June
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Order Date > Absolute
💡 Note the calculations for IS BETWEEN identifies purchasers who ordered from June 1 at 00:00:00 and June 30 11:59:59 PM.
Example 2B: Placed an order within the last 90 days
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Order Date > Relative
Example 2C: Placed an order prior to the last 30 days
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Order Date > Relative
💡 Enter the closest value to today first and enter 9999 (the furthest time in the past)
Example 2D: Placed an order between 6 months and a year ago
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Order Date > Relative
💡 Enter the closest value to today first and end of date range second
Example 3: Specific Message Engagement
Contact Behavior > Messages > Clicked > Has Clicked > Message
Add a specific frequency or date range (both optional) to refine the data
Example 4: Specific Channel Engagement
Contact Behavior > Messages > Clicked > Has Clicked > Channel
Example 5: Specific Web Page Engagement
Contact Behavior > Browse > Browse URL > Has Browsed URL
💡 Use a full URL to target a specific page, or a common element (e.g. learn) to target all pages that contain the value in the URL.
Example 6: Abandoned Cart behavior
Utilizing cart behaviors gives marketers the opportunity to send broadcast messages to contact's who haven't moved to the next phase - checkout!
Product Behavior > Cart > Last Updated Cart
Example 7: Contact's Lifetime Value
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Sum of all Order Totals
Example 8: Contacts that have never purchased
Product Behavior > Purchase > All Orders > Total Number of Orders
Example 9: Ordered from a Specific Category
Product Behavior > Purchase > Order Items > Order Item Category*
💡 Please verify category data in the Data Summary
Add a modifier to specify additional criteria
Example 10: Contacts who's preferred channel is email
Predictive > Engagement > AI Channel Affinity
Example 11: Contacts who are subscribed to SMS
Contact Behavior > Subscriptions > Subscription Status
Example 12: Contacts who were sent a specific message, but did not open the message
Contact Behavior > Messages > Sent AND Contact Behavior > Messages > Opened
Multi-Criteria Segment Examples
📌 You can create tailored, targeted segments, by combining the criteria types discussed above.
💡 The order of operations is from left to right, top to bottom, regardless of the operators used. This applies to both Segments and when applying Segments into an Audience.
Adding Multiple Criteria to a Single Filter Row
Each filter, or row, represents a grouping of criteria, often representing an easily describable group of contacts, like recently engaged. You can include multiple criteria in each row to define this grouping of contacts.
When three or more criteria are included in a row, the criteria is processed from left to right with the next criteria added to the total count of all previous criteria in the row. For example, in the segment above, the first two criteria in the row are calculated together as group A and then the last criteria is added into the calculation. In row #1, the criteria finds anyone who meets the criteria in group A OR visited the site in the last 30 days, which results in the row total of group B. Similarly, in row #2, the criteria identifies anyone who meets the criteria in C AND does not have the profile field checkbox checked, which results in the row total group D.
Adding Multiple Filters Rows
Multiple rows of criteria are added in a single segment by clicking +Filter at the bottom of the segment builder. Rows are calculated based on the operator between the new row and the previous group. In the example above, the segment is calculated by identifying those who are members of group A, which represents contacts who meet the criteria in row #1 OR #2. After group A is calculated, the segment then calculates those who are members of group B by finding those who are members of group A or in row #3.
Watch and Learn how to build Segments