Email marketing has been a powerful tool for businesses to reach their audience and promote their products or services. Despite the rise of social media and other digital marketing channels, email remains one of the most effective ways to communicate with customers and prospects. In fact, according to a recent survey by HubSpot, 78% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months.
One of the key advantages of email marketing is its ability to build relationships with customers over time. By delivering targeted and personalized messages, businesses can nurture leads, drive conversions, and retain loyal customers. In addition, email marketing offers a high return on investment (ROI), with an average ROI of $42 for every dollar spent. This makes it a cost-effective way for businesses of all sizes to reach a large audience and achieve their marketing goals.
When it comes to email marketing, the secret to success is to understand the email list segmentation strategies for dividing your audience into segments. By doing this, you can make sure that your messages are tailored to each group’s particular interests and behaviors. This, in turn, makes it more likely that your emails will resonate with your readers and that they will engage with your content. In this article, we will examine these strategies in more depth, offering you practical tips and insights to help you improve your email marketing campaigns and achieve better results.
In addition to exploring segmentation strategies, we will also take a look at three popular email marketing tools – Mailchimp, HubSpot, and Klaviyo – that are known for their strong segmentation capabilities. These tools provide great examples of how segmentation strategies can be applied in real life. They come with unique features that allow marketers to categorize and target their audience based on specific criteria that they set.
Email List Segmentation Strategies
Email list segmentation is a clever technique used in email marketing to categorize subscribers into specific groups. This approach ensures that the content you send is relevant to your readers, which can lead to higher engagement and conversion rates. When done well, segmentation can transform generic email campaigns into targeted, customer-focused communications. In this article, we will look at 12 of the most valuable strategies for email segmentation.
1. Customer Lifecycle Stage
This strategy involves categorizing customers based on their current relationship with your brand. You can categorize customers as new subscribers, engaged customers, and lapsed or inactive customers.
- Use your email marketing tool or CRM to analyze customer interactions, identifying when they subscribed, their purchase history, and recent engagement.
- Then, create distinct email campaigns for each stage.
- For new subscribers, design a welcome series that introduces your brand.
- For engaged customers, consider offering loyalty rewards.
- For inactive customers, develop a re-engagement campaign with incentives.
For example a beauty brand sends a welcome email series with product tutorials to new subscribers, exclusive discount codes to regular buyers, and a “We miss you” offer with a 15% discount to customers who haven’t made a purchase in the last six months.
2. Purchase Behavior
This strategy segments your audience based on their buying behavior, such as frequency of purchases, average spending amount, types of products bought, or buying patterns during certain seasons or events.
- Collect and analyze purchasing data from your e-commerce system. Identify patterns like frequent purchases, high spenders, and customers who prefer specific product categories.
- Then, develop targeted email campaigns for each segment.
- For frequent buyers, create a VIP program with exclusive benefits.
- For customers interested in specific products, send tailored recommendations and updates about those products.
For example, an outdoor gear retailer segments customers who frequently purchase camping equipment and sends them personalized emails about new camping gear arrivals and exclusive invites to outdoor adventure events.
3. Engagement Level
This strategy differentiates subscribers based on their level of interaction with your emails. This includes metrics like email open rates, click-through rates, and how often they respond or engage with the content.
- Utilize your email marketing platform’s analytics to track subscriber engagement.
- Identify which subscribers are highly engaged (regularly open and click through emails) and which are less engaged (rarely open emails).
- Tailor your email content based on these engagement levels.
- For highly engaged subscribers, consider sending more frequent and detailed content.
- For less engaged subscribers, experiment with different subject lines and formats to re-capture their interest.
For example, a gourmet food subscription service sends weekly recipe emails to subscribers who regularly engage, while sending a monthly summary of top recipes to less engaged subscribers to avoid overwhelming them.
4. Survey Responses or Preferences
This involves segmenting your audience based on their interests, preferences, or feedback gathered through surveys or direct communication.
- Conduct surveys via email or embedded forms on your website.
- Ask questions about customer interests, product preferences, or service feedback.
- Analyze the responses and create segments based on common preferences or feedback.
- Customize your email campaigns to align with these interests.
For example a fitness brand sends a survey asking subscribers about their preferred workout styles and then segments the list to send yoga-related content to yoga enthusiasts and high-intensity interval training (HIIT) tips to those interested in more intense workouts.
5. Abandoned Cart Behavior
This strategy targets individuals who added products to their online shopping cart but did not complete the purchase.
- Set up tracking in your e-commerce platform to identify abandoned carts.
- Create an automated email sequence that gets triggered after a cart is abandoned. The first email could be a reminder, followed by perhaps an incentive like a discount or free shipping.
For example an online bookstore detects an abandoned cart and sends an email reminder within 24 hours. If the purchase is still not completed, a second email offers a 5% discount on the books in the cart.
6. Event-based Segmentation
This strategy involves creating segments based on specific customer milestones, events, or dates, such as birthdays, anniversaries, or holidays.
- Collect event-related data from customers, either at the point of sign-up or through subsequent communication.
- Set up automated emails to be sent out on or before these events, personalizing them with relevant offers or messages.
For example a jewelry store sends personalized birthday emails offering a special birthday discount, or a ‘Happy Anniversary’ message with curated gift suggestions.
7. Email Content Interaction
This strategy segments your list based on how subscribers interact with different types of content in your emails, like clicking on specific links or spending time on particular topics.
- Use email analytics to track which parts of your emails get the most interaction
- Create segments based on these interactions. For example, you can group subscribers who frequently click on tech news links into a ‘Tech Enthusiast’ segment.
A digital marketing agency analyzes which subscribers regularly click on SEO-related articles and sends them more in-depth content about the latest SEO strategies.
8. Device or Platform Usage
This strategy segments subscribers based on the device or platform they use to access your emails, such as mobile phones, desktop computers, or tablets.
- Analyze your email campaign analytics to determine which devices or platforms are most commonly used by your subscribers.
- Then, optimize and tailor your email content and design for each device. For example, you can use a responsive design and concise content for mobile users, while incorporating more detailed content and complex layouts for desktop users.
For example an online retailer notices a high percentage of emails are opened on mobile devices and optimizes all their email campaigns for mobile viewing, ensuring better user experience and engagement.
9. Past Email Responses
This strategy creates segments based on subscribers’ reactions to previous emails, such as which emails they opened, which links they clicked, and how they responded to different calls to action.
- Review the history of subscriber interactions with your past emails using your email marketing tool’s analytics
- Segment your list based on these interactions. For example, you can create a segment for subscribers who frequently click on discount links.
For example a travel agency segments subscribers who regularly click on luxury travel deals into a ‘Luxury Travel’ group and sends them exclusive high-end travel offers and content.
10. VIP Segments
This strategy identifies and segments your most valuable customers, often based on factors like purchase frequency, amount spent, or engagement levels.
- Use sales and engagement data to identify your most valuable customers
- Create exclusive VIP segments, and develop special offers, early access to products, or personalized services for these customers.
For example a beauty brand identifies customers who spend over $500 annually and enrolls them in a VIP program where they receive early access to new products and exclusive VIP-only discounts.
11. Segmenting by Geographic Location and Time Zones
This strategy segments your audience based on their geographic location or time zone to send relevant and timely content.
- Collect geographic location data from your subscribers, either during the sign-up process or from their IP addresses
- Tailor your email content to align with local events, weather, or cultural nuances. You can also schedule your emails to be sent at the most suitable time for each time zone.
For example a global event company sends targeted emails about local events, ensuring that the emails are sent during the optimal time of day for each geographic segment.
12. Browsing Behavior on Website
This strategy segments customers based on the pages or products they have viewed or shown interest in on your website.
- Implement web tracking tools to monitor customer activity on your website
- Use this data to create segments. For example, you can send targeted emails about specific product categories to customers who frequently view those categories on your website.
For example an online home decor store tracks users who spend time on the ‘modern furniture’ category and sends them emails featuring new arrivals and trends in modern furniture.
By using these 12 advanced segmentation strategies, email marketing can become a powerful tool for engaging and converting diverse customer groups. The trick is to keep collecting and analyzing data so that you can refine your segments and tailor your content accordingly. This ensures that each subscriber receives relevant, engaging, and personalized emails. Not only does this approach improve your current email campaigns, but it also helps you gain deeper insights into your customers’ preferences and behaviors, which is crucial for your future marketing success.
Email List Segmentation Implementation with Mailchimp, HubSpot, and Klaviyo
Email marketing can be made much easier by using the right tools for segmentation. Here are three tools that are highly recommended:
Mailchimp
It is known for its user-friendly interface and versatility, and it is suitable for businesses of all sizes. It offers a variety of segmentation options that cater to different marketing needs. With its drag-and-drop builders and analytics, Mailchimp makes it easy to create, execute, and track segmented campaigns.
Key Features: This tool offers an automated customer journey builder that allows you to create targeted campaigns for your audience. It also provides detailed analytics for tracking your email engagement and effectiveness. Additionally, it offers e-commerce integration that enables you to target your audience based on their purchase behavior.
HubSpot
It is ideal for businesses that want to align their email marketing with broader sales and customer service efforts. It offers advanced CRM integration, lifecycle stage segmentation, and personalized content triggers. Its strength lies in its ability to use customer data for creating highly targeted email segments.
Key Features: With advanced CRM integration, HubSpot enables you to segment your audience based on customer lifecycle stages. Also, it offers personalized content triggers that allow you to send highly targeted content to your customers.
Klaviyo
It is popular in the e-commerce sector for its detailed customer behavior tracking and granular segmentation. It offers deep e-commerce integration, real-time behavior tracking, and advanced analytics for segmentation based on purchase behavior and customer interactions.
Key Features: Deep e-commerce integration, real-time behavior tracking, and advanced analytics for segmentation based on purchase behavior and customer interactions. Klaviyo excels in delivering personalized content at scale, especially for e-commerce platforms..
