Divide & Conquer: Segmentation and Your Email Strategy

More and more, consumers expect the marketing they engage with to be tailored to them and their interests. Smart marketers are taking advantage of this shift across their tactics, including within their email marketing. 

We recently shared some Email Marketing Strategies for Success where we talked about if your click-through rate is low, it could indicate that your message isn’t focused enough and it’s time to fine-tune with better segmentation or clearer calls to action. Here, we’ll talk through why and how to implement more personalization into your email campaigns.

Why Segment?

Data segmentation is crucial for enhancing campaign effectiveness by dividing your email list into distinct groups based on specific criteria, allowing for personalized messages that cater to each segment’s unique needs and preferences. It can have a positive impact on your email metrics (and revenue!), reduce unsubscribe rates, and enhance your users’ experience.

Email platforms have reported for years that personalized emails can improve email deliverability, open rates, and click rates. But better yet, according to the American Marketing Association, well-personalized emails can boost revenue by up to 5.7 times! 

Segmentation also improves the customer experience by aligning messages with individual interests and behaviors and reduces unsubscribe rates by ensuring content is relevant. 

With such benefits possible, it’s a smart choice for your email marketing strategy to start segmenting and personalizing your emails. 

Create ​​Email Marketing Lists 

The first step to achieving the benefits of segmentation is to create strong email marketing lists. Review your entire audience and determine how you can group users — perhaps by persona, recent purchasers or subscribers, or industry type. Every audience list is different, but they can all be divided into groupings that could appreciate different messaging. 

Data hygiene is so important for this step. You want to have the correct information to start with. Firstly, ask yourself: should this user even be on my list? do I have the right contact information for them? Then, you can go deeper to fill in more details about the user… What services/products are they interested in? Do I know their birthday/anniversary? Has a sales rep recently talked to them? Etc.

Integrating your email service provider (ESP) with your customer relationship management (CRM) platform allows you to see these patterns more quickly. Connecting your contact properties, marketing interactions, and sales interactions all together will give you a fuller picture of your customers and better inform your segmentation strategy. 

Some common ESPs include Constant Contact, MailChimp, HubSpot, Campaigner, Sendinblue, Drip, and AWeber. When exploring the right fit for you, consider the features you need now and for scaling. Some of these ESPs can easily integrate into your CRM, some can function as a CRM for a time, and some are both a CRM and an ESP.

Take it Beyond “Hi, <First name>”

Some senders will add the recipient’s name in the subject or introductory line and celebrate their email personalization strategy success. And while it’s a good step, there is more to be done.

If you’ve already done the first step to separate your audience lists, you’ll need to spend some time thinking about where each group is in their customer journey. What questions are they likely to have? What resources can you provide that will help them along their journey? Once you have these determined, you can create different emails that address each user type where they are. 

This is also where some email marketing automation can step in to make your process easier. Once you’ve done some testing to determine when the best time to send an email is after a trigger event (like becoming a new contact, making a purchase, etc), you can set up an automated email (or series of emails) to take users through.  

Additionally, some ESPs offer AI tools to include dynamic content within the email body copy. This can range from variable copy fields to featuring products based on their past views or purchase history. Explore what tools you have available as part of your ESP to incorporate into your segmentation strategy. 

Get Started!

It’s never too late to get started with a thoughtful personalization strategy that draws from individual users’ experiences and needs to drive better results for your email strategy and overall business goals. You can also learn more about email marketing services at Sanctuary and reach out if you have any questions. Good luck!