A big mistake that many marketers make is ignoring their subscribers’ digital behaviours.  In fact, a lot of them are still getting distracted by the outdated batch-and-blast method.

There is some fierce competition out there fighting for attention in your subscribers’ inboxes.  You need to make your emails deliver more value so they stand out.  That’s where Email list segmentation comes in.

With the right tools, email list segmentation can be simple, but it’s an extremely powerful email marketing technique.

What is email list segmentation?

Email marketing is about nurturing and building meaningful relationships with your customers.  That means your emails need to be relevant and timely for each person.

Email list segmentation is the division of an email list into smaller segments based on set conditions.  Typically, it’s used to deliver more personalised email campaigns to subscribers.

Email list segmentation can be based on things like a reader’s geographic location, interests, purchase history and more.  An email marketer can modify email campaigns specifically for each segment, rather than sending out one mass email.

Why segmentation is fundamental to the success of your email marketing

Making use of your contacts’ digital activities – or inactivities – and data to segment your list gives you more flexibility and accuracy.  You can target the recipients who’ll be most receptive to your emails.

Those who do make use of email list segmentation might have dozens of segments.  Why?  Because they’ve broken their email list down into meaningful, useful segments.

Treating all of your subscribers the same is ineffective and unproductive.  Every business has at least two segments they can separate their email list into – active users and inactive users.  One is actively interested in your products and the other might hardly even recognise your brand name.    Email list segmentation lets you treat different groups of people differently.

By sending your subscribers more relevant, personalised content, you will see a higher conversion rate.  Goals, desires and pain points can be different depending on a subscriber’s stage in your sales funnel, interests, age, gender – the list goes on.  Segmentation allows you to stay relevant to your ever-changing list and their ever-changing needs and wants.

You can obviously expect to see a rise in your open and click-through rates, but you’ll also see a decrease in your unsubscribe rate, too.  Email list segmentation simply results in higher quality email campaigns.

Without email list segmentation, you’re creating emails for a specific type of person and sending them to everyone, whether they fit that type or not.

How to effectively segment your email list

So, if you already have a big email list, how can you segment it?  Don’t sweat – it’s never too late to get started.

Even sending a quick survey can help you to gauge an interest, want or need of your subscriber.  This can help you determine a better approach to your email content and sending frequency.

Segmenting on basics like demographics may help with delivering the right message, but this is only the start.  By factoring in digital activities like purchase history, engagement levels and content downloads, you can significantly strengthen the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns.

Here are some examples of segments that you could use:

• Opened email campaigns
• Products browsed in the past
• Geographic location
• Age group
• Stage in your sales funnel

A good place to start is to set up a series of automated trigger responses in your email marketing platform.  Test things out, see what works and what doesn’t.  Analyse your results to fine-tune your series, and you’ll quickly be able to see better results.

Use marketing automation for smarter email list segmentation

The better you segment your email list, the better your chances of converting your subscribers are.  Luckily, most of the segmentation process can be done with marketing automation.  It can help you to not just record customer data, but it can also provide actionable insights and enable you to send targeted email campaigns to boost ROI.

Easily filter your email list based on data and behaviours for highly-targeted marketing automation workflows, to send the right message to the right person at the right time.  With marketing campaigns that are this specific, your readers won’t be able to resist.

Want to get started?  Have a chat with us.

The post What is Email List Segmentation and Why is it Important? appeared first on Wired Plus Marketing Hub.