Segmentation in email marketing is the special sauce that allows you to speak directly to your audience’s interests, needs, and pain points. It’s the secret to crafting a relevant message that really resonates with your customers.
In this article, we’ll be looking at how you can use segmentation in your email marketing and why it’s so important for your email marketing success.
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Why segmentation is important for email marketing
First up, let’s be clear about what exactly segmentation means in terms of email marketing. It’s about grouping the people on your email list into meaningful segments. Common customer segments are interest, location, and purchase status. However, any category that’s meaningful to your business, or more importantly your customer, is going to allow you to write more engaging and relevant content.
So, why is segmentation so important for email marketing? Here are 4 reasons why you should start segmenting your email list today.
1. Improve your email deliverability
Avoid sending emails to inactive or uninterested subscribers by segmenting your list by user engagement. This will improve your sender reputation and increase your chances of landing in the inbox of your active and engaged subscribers.
In email marketing, size definitely isn’t everything. Engagement is a much more important measure than the size of your entire list. Avoid hanging on to unengaged subscribers who might mark your emails as spam or unsubscribe from your list.
You can check your email deliverability using MX Toolbox and find out your sender score using Sender Score.
2. Increase your email open and click-through rates
Email list segmentation can also help you to create more compelling and catchy subject lines and preheader texts that match the interests and needs of each group.
There’s no point talking to netball fans about football results. They’re just not interested. So if your list can be segmented by a particular interest, you grab their attention in the all important subject field and see improved open rates in your campaign results.
Similarly, knowing the interests of the group you’re talking to allows you to craft more relevant and valuable email content with a call to action that will motivate your subscribers to open and click on your emails.
3. Boost your email conversions and ROI
Segmentation means you can send more targeted and personalised offers and recommendations that suit the preferences and behaviour of each group.
You can also use segmentation to create email automations, sequences and workflows that guide your subscribers through the customer journey. A well-segmented automation sequence is a great way to nudge customers towards the desired action, such as making a purchase, signing up for a trial, or downloading a resource.
A simple abandoned cart automation email is a great example. This is a segment of your list who have activated a trigger that tells your email tool that they have not completed a purchase. The abandoned cart email is one of the most important and profitable automations you can activate for an ecommerce website. If you haven’t set one up, get on it today!
4. Build trust and loyalty with your audience
Show your subscribers that you care about them and that you understand their needs and wants using sensitive segmentation.
You can use segmentation to send timely and appropriate emails that match the stage and situation of each group. Contextual emails can include welcome emails, birthday emails, re-engagement emails, and more. This will help you build a stronger relationship with your audience and increase their satisfaction and retention.
Using segmentation in email marketing
Know we know the “why” of segmentation, let’s roll up our sleeves and get to work. Here are 3 ways you can use segmentation in your email marketing starting today.
1. Collect and analyse data about your subscribers
First up, you’ll need to have enough data about your subscribers to set meaningful segmentation criteria. You can collect data from various sources, such as your sign-up forms, your website analytics, your email analytics, your CRM system, your social media platforms, and more.
You can also use tools like surveys and quizzes to gather more information from your subscribers. These are especially useful to gather preference data. You should analyse the information you collect and look for patterns and trends that can help you identify different groups of subscribers and their characteristics.
2. Create and define your segments
Based on the data you have, you can then get to work creating and defining your segments. You can use different types of segmentation, such as
Choose the segmentation types that are the most relevant and meaningful for your email marketing goals and your audience. We recommend naming your segments and describing their attributes and needs so that you use the right segment at the right time.
3. Create and send segmented email campaigns
Once you have your segments and your email marketing plan, it’s time to create and send segmented email campaigns! You can use tools like email marketing software and automation to create and send personalised and targeted emails to each segment.
You should also test and optimise your segmented email campaigns and, of course, measure their performance and results.
Conclusion
Regardless of whether you’re using Mailchimp, Constant Contact, Mailerlite, or some other email marketing tool, segmentation is crucial for email marketing success.
By using your marketing EQ to build sensitive segmentation, you can deliver more relevant and personalised emails to your audience. This will improve your email deliverability, engagement, conversions, and ROI. You can also build trust and loyalty with your audience and grow your email list and your business.
We hope this article helped you learn how to use segmentation in email marketing and why it is important.
If you’re still not sure how to implement effective segmentation, or are in need of any help with your email marketing strategy, feel free to book a no obligation call. You’ll get 30 minutes with an email marketing expert who can give you actionable insights to help you create and execute segmented email campaigns that deliver results.
