Email Segmentation Strategy: Your Key to Engaged Customers

We write a lot of articles on this blog with practical advice, and one thing we advise consistently is to do email segmentation properly. While it’s a part of email best practices, it’s also a great solution for a vast number of issues you could be facing.

Struggling to increase open rates? Segment your lists.

Want higher email marketing conversion rates? Segment your lists.

Creating a holiday email campaign? Segment your email lists.

But how exactly do you go about segmenting email lists? What’s the best way to do it? What are the most popular email segmentation strategies? Join us today as we explain how to build a segmentation strategy and list a few great examples for inspiration.

What is an Email Marketing Segmentation Strategy?

An email segmentation strategy is a marketing technique that involves dividing your email list into distinct, closely targeted groups of email marketing subscribers based on specific criteria.

Now that we know the email segmentation definition, what is it for?

The primary goal of email marketing audience segmentation is to send more personalized and relevant content to different groups of subscribers, increasing the effectiveness of different types of email campaigns. Segmented email marketing brings you superior results.

Let’s now learn about the importance of email segmentation.

Why Email Segmentation Strategies Are Important

The best feature of email marketing, as compared to channels like social media or PPC ads, is that you can personalize your content for your clients. While you can’t create custom content for each of your subscribers, what you can do is strategically organize your subscribers into groups.

Breaking up your massive email list into sub-groups helps you get a bird’s eye view of things; you can design much better campaigns with detailed information on your customers. Email list building and segmentation go hand-in-hand.

Focusing heavily on email list segmentation strategies right from the beginning gives you an edge over competitors, as you will know more about your audience. Technology and times may have changed, but the oldest rule in sales still remains, “Know your customer.”

And segmentation is how you know your customer.

Create an Email Marketing Funnel Before You Segment

Before you begin segmentation for email marketing, you need to have enough data on your customers to know where they are in your email marketing funnel.

You could keep it simple by categorizing them into ToFu (top-of-funnel), MoFu (middle-of-funnel), and BoFu (bottom-of-funnel), but for high-level segmentation, try using the stages we’ve listed below.

Awareness stage: At the top of the funnel, you should introduce potential customers to your brand, product, or service. They might have signed up for your email list, visited your website, or engaged with your content, but they haven’t made a purchase yet.
Interest stage: For subscribers at this stage, your email marketing efforts should focus on nurturing leads and building their interest. This is where you share valuable content, offer product information, and encourage engagement. Use your convincing powers to get your leads interested in your offerings!
Pre-conversion stage: At this point, your readers are seriously considering making a purchase but may need additional reassurance. Consider sending product comparisons, case studies, special offers, or implementing testimonial advertising.
Conversion stage: The conversion stage is where leads become customers by conducting a transaction with your business. Email marketing can play a pivotal role in pushing prospects to take action through personalized offers, limited-time promotions, and clear email CTAs (calls to action).
Post-purchase stage: This is when your email marketing strategy shifts to post-purchase engagement. You can send confirmation emails, shipping updates, and follow-up emails to ensure a positive customer experience. This stage is more suited for relationship-building, with a few soft sales emails in between.
Re-engagement stage: Existing customers are valuable, and email marketing is used to retain them and encourage additional purchases. You can send loyalty rewards, product recommendations, and email coupons to keep customers coming back for more.
Reactivation stage: This stage is for inactive customers. You can run a re-engagement email campaign or send win-back emails to these customers to remind them of your value.

Throughout the customer journey within the email marketing funnel, you will have to maintain a consistent and relevant email communication strategy. This involves segmenting your email list to apply email personalization.

Email Marketing Segmentation Techniques

IMDB web activity — This email targets a behavioral segment of active users on IMDB

Curious about how to segment email marketing?

There are various email segmentation techniques for your email list; choose from the popular segmentation strategies in the table below.

Segmentation Type	What data can you use?
Demographic segmentation	Age, gender, designation, etc.
Behavioral segmentation	Purchase history, website activity, email open/click history
Psychographic segmentation	Personalities, interests, and social status
Geographic segmentation	The subscriber’s location
Firmographic segmentation	Company details (this is to help target B2B clients)
Engagement-based segmentation	Inactive subscribers, frequent openers, recent subscribers

Types of segmentation

How to Segment and Personalize Your Email List

Personalized email from Doppler — A personalized email from Doppler

Once you decide what criteria you want to use to plan your strategy, here’s a step-by-step guide on how to set up email segmentation:

Collect data: Ensure you have an email list with all the necessary data to segment it efficiently. This might involve gathering information through sign-up forms, email surveys, and tracking user behavior on your website or through email interactions. Ensure you’re segmenting leads for email marketing right from the start.
Select an email platform: If you aren’t already using one, choose an email marketing platform that supports campaign segmentation. At Campaign Refinery, we offer our clients powerful segmentation tools that give them excellent flexibility and control over email lists.
Create segments: The process of segmentation may vary from one platform to another, but it usually involves setting up rules or filters. For example, you can use email campaign segmentation for “Subscribers in New York” or “Inactive Subscribers.”
Segmentation rules: Define the rules for each segment. For example, if you’re segmenting based on location, the rule might be “Location is New York.” If you’re segmenting based on email engagement, it could be “Hasn’t opened an email in the last 1-2 months.” At Campaign Refinery, we built our clients an email tag system, which allows them to easily build specific audiences from their main email lists. Our Audience Groups feature lets them target different segments simultaneously.
Custom content: Personalize the content of your emails to cater to specific customer segments.
Test and optimize: Continuously track critical email campaign metrics. Determine which strategies work best and work toward segmented campaign optimization.
Automate segmentation: For more advanced email segmentation, consider using email marketing automation tools to trigger segment changes based on user behavior or time-based criteria.

Below, we discuss how to segment email lists.

Ways to Segment Email Lists

This email from Strava goes out to its segment of active weekly users

Email marketing segmentation isn’t just about slicing your list; it’s about making your emails more relevant and timely.

Here are 8 effective ways to segment your email list:

Demographics: Age, gender, income level, or education can help tailor messaging for relevance, especially in B2C campaigns.
Geographic Location: Segment by city, region, or time zone to localize offers or time emails perfectly for maximum engagement.
Purchase History: Use past purchases to recommend related products or trigger replenishment emails at the right moment.
Email Engagement: Use engagement segmentation; group subscribers based on opens, clicks, or inactivity. Reward your most active users and re-engage silent ones with special campaigns.
Website Behavior: Segment based on pages viewed, time on site, or content downloaded to follow up with contextually relevant messages.
Lifecycle Stage: Identify whether a contact is a new subscriber, a lead, or a returning customer, and send content that aligns with their current journey.
Industry or Job Role (B2B): For B2B, tailor your content based on professional roles or verticals. A sales manager and an IT director won’t respond to the same messaging.
Survey or Preference Data: If users tell you what they want, use that info. Self-reported preferences are gold for segmentation.

Done right, these segments make your emails feel personal, even at scale.

Now that you know how to segment your email lists, let’s examine a few of the most popular email marketing segmentation strategies used by email marketers.

Email Segmentation Basics: Break It Down By Demographics

Breaking down your email list by demographics is the most basic form of audience segmentation for email campaigns. You can then build campaigns around specific criteria.

Below are examples of data you can collect on your customers:

Age,
Gender,
Location (city, state, country),
Income level,
Job title or industry,
Education level,
Marital status,
Family size,
Interests or hobbies.

Using this data, fine-tune your email campaigns to target specific groups.

Using Demographic Data for Email Campaigns: Examples

Here are 4 ways you can use demographic data for targeted email marketing:

If you have a segment of young subscribers, your content and imagery might be more modern and trend-focused. For example, a gaming or fashion-themed campaign will work better with youth as compared to older subscribers.
Modify content for subscribers in different geographic regions to address local interests or events — aka local email marketing. For example, suppose you want to promote a partnership with a local business that sells male grooming products. In that case, you can easily create a relevant email campaign targeting young male subscribers.
Gender-specific product recommendations or messaging can be used to resonate with male and female subscribers.
Personalize email subject lines and CTAs to appeal to different email marketing list segments. For example, you can use a specific email tone or send offers that align with their interests and needs.

Always keep your demographic data up to date. Encourage your subscribers to update their information periodically and use email validation to remove outdated or inaccurate information.

Use an Onboarding Email Sequence to Collect Data for Segmentation

Onboarding email sequences are an excellent opportunity to collect valuable data on your email subscribers while also introducing them to your brand and nurturing the relationship.

Here’s a 6-step guide on how to use an onboarding email sequence to collect data effectively.

1. Send Welcome Emails

Fireflies new users segment — This welcome email from Fireflies is perfect for its segment of new signups

Start with a warm welcome email campaign. In this initial email, thank subscribers for joining your list and provide a brief introduction to your brand.

Encourage subscribers to update their preferences or profile information. Make it clear that by updating this information, they’ll receive more relevant content from you. Collect data on their interests, location, and communication preferences (frequency and type of content).

2. Utilize Progressive Profiling

Instead of asking for too much information at once, gradually collect data as you execute your email sequence. For example, in the first email, ask for their name and email preferences, and in the second email, request information like location and interests.

3. Encourage Engagement

Use onboarding emails to encourage subscribers to engage with your content or take specific actions.

For instance, ask them to click on links related to product categories, download a resource, or sign up for an email marketing newsletter. These interactions can provide behavioral data for engagement-based segmentation, helping you understand their interests.

4. Collect Feedback

Miro email survey — Email surveys like this one can help collect more information for segmentation plus let users set preferences

Send an email with a survey or feedback request. Ask subscribers about their preferences, interests, and what they’d like to receive from your emails. You can also inquire about their pain points or challenges related to your products or services.

5. Incentivize data collection

Offer rewards to your subscribers in exchange for data. For example, provide a discount, access to exclusive content, or a chance to enter a giveaway for completing a survey or updating their preferences.

6. Personalization

Campaign Refinery Personalization Options — Personalizing an email for a customer segment on Campaign Refinery

Now that you have collected data, send mass personalized emails. Share content that aligns with the information subscribers have provided, showcasing the value of updating their information.

By strategically integrating data collection into your onboarding email sequences, you can build a more detailed subscriber profile. With more data, you can segment better; this allows you to improve your email performance.

Abandoned Carts Are a Conversion Goldmine

Abandoned cart email — An abandoned cart email from Epic Deals

Segmenting your email list based on abandoned carts is a valuable strategy for recovering potentially lost sales and re-engaging with interested customers. Here’s how you can effectively achieve conversions from this segment.

Firstly, use a tool that helps you identify subscribers who have added items to their shopping carts but have not completed the purchase. You can track this as an “abandoned cart” event. Now, create a segment for these subscribers and set up specific rules or filters to automatically categorize such subscribers.

The next step is to create compelling abandoned cart emails. Ensure these are highly personalized.

These emails should include:

Details about the abandoned items,
A reminder of the value they offer,
A compelling abandoned email subject line,
A clear CTA to complete the purchase.

And you don’t have to stop at one reminder — here is a short series of emails you can use:

Number	Strategy	Description
Email #1	Reminder	Send an initial email within a few hours to remind them about the items left in their cart.
Email #2	Incentive	Follow up with a second email, offering an incentive like a discount or free shipping to encourage them to complete the purchase.
Email #3	Urgency	Send a third email with a sense of urgency, letting them know the items may be gone soon or the offer is expiring.
Email #4	Feedback	If they still haven’t converted, send a final email asking for feedback on why they didn’t complete the purchase. This information can be valuable to improve your checkout process.

Caption: Email sequence for abandoned cart su

Additional Suggestions

New York Magazine follow up email — A follow-up email from New York Magazine

Segmenting your email list by abandoned carts and implementing a well-structured email recovery strategy can help you recapture potentially lost revenue and reestablish connections with interested customers.

You can suggest related product recommendations in your follow-up emails. Remember that the timing of your abandoned cart emails matters — the best time to send emails is immediately after abandonment; subsequent emails can be scheduled strategically.

Test different intervals to find the best timing for your audience. Also, A/B-test your follow-up emails to see which ones are the most effective.

You can also create sub-segments within your abandoned cart segment based on the value of items left in the cart. You can offer bigger discounts or use different follow-up strategies for higher-value cart abandonments.

What is an Engaged Segment?

Campaign Refinery feature Audience Groups Audience Group Preview — Campaign Refinery’s Audience Groups feature lets you combine different segments to target simultaneously

Engaged users are those who regularly interact with your emails, which can include opening, clicking, and taking other desired actions. Segmenting your email list by engagement is a powerful strategy to ensure you’re targeting the right people.

Break up the list by their engagement levels; create separate segments for subscribers who have:

Opened an email in the last 30 or 60 days.
Clicked on links in your emails.
Made a purchase in the last three months.

You can then tailor specific campaigns to rekindle the interest of users based on engagement. For instance, if you send an email about an upcoming sale and someone clicks through, you can add them to your “interested” list and subsequently run a targeted campaign to encourage them to purchase the sale.

Engaged users are also the best group of people to let you know if your new campaign is hitting the sweet spot. Sending test emails to your engaged users is a great way of learning what works and what doesn’t.

Engaged customers are also useful for your email sender reputation. If you want better engagement numbers or if you want to warm up an email domain, send emails to your most engaged users. The high engagement rates from such campaigns signal to ESPs that you’re a worthy sender.

Create Segments Using Location Data

Zillow portland — This Zillow email is targeting a segment of users based in Portland

Using the geographic location of your subscribers to segment users is a good idea. You can use it when you want to send targeted content that’s relevant to your area — in short, email marketing segmentation of local business is necessary.

Step 1 would be to collect geographic data from your subscribers. You can do this by different means — through the sign-up process, preference centers, or by analyzing location data from past interactions (for example, IP addresses). Once you have this data, you can organize your lists using the geographic location.

These are 4 common methods:

By country: Segment your list by the subscriber’s country. This is useful for tailoring content to different regions.
By state or province: If your business serves different states or provinces, segment subscribers based on their specific location.
By city or metro area: Segment by city or metro area to cater to localized promotions or events.
By zip code: In some cases, segmenting by zip code or postal code can be useful for hyper-local targeting.

Here are a few ways to use email lists segmented by location:

Promote events or sales in a particular city or region.
Mention local news, weather, or community events.
Include references to regional holidays or cultural factors.
Offer location-specific discounts or promotions to subscribers in a particular area. You can offer free shipping for specific zip codes.
If you’re running promos at your stores in their area, you can inform readers based on their location data.

You can also customize email subject lines to reference a subscriber’s region, making the email feel more personalized and relevant. Another great way to use location data is to segment it into different time zones; this way, you can send emails at the most convenient times for recipients.

Study Browsing Patterns to Know What Your Customers Want

Browsing abandonment — A browsing abandonment email from Sometimes Always

How many times have you seen an ad for a product that you checked on an e-commerce site a short while after you browsed it? This happens because many e-commerce sites track your browsing patterns.

You, too, should consider using an email audience segmentation strategy to re-engage with subscribers who are interested in your products. This strategy is categorized as behavioral segmentation.

But how can you tell they’re interested? The best way to do this is to track your customers’ browsing patterns on your website. This allows you to create a more targeted and personalized strategy. By understanding what pages they visit, the products they view, and their behavior on your site, you can send emails that match their needs.

You can use website tracking tools, such as Google Analytics, to monitor and record visitor behavior on your website. This includes tracking page views, product views, time spent on specific pages, and other interactions. Once you identify key browsing patterns, look for trends such as product categories that visitors frequently explore, the content they engage with, and the frequency of their visits.

How Does Behavioral Segmentation Work?

Ford behavioral segmentation — Ford sends this message to entice customers to continue shopping, based on past activity

You now have enough data to create your segmentation strategy. Below are three simple criteria to organize it, but you can make it much more complex if you like.

Criteria	Description
Product interest	Segment visitors based on the product categories or specific products subscribers view.
Content engagement	Segment based on the type of content subscribers engage with, such as blog posts, videos, or guides.
Frequency of visits	Segment based on the frequency of visits, distinguishing between occasional visitors and frequent users.

Caption: How to segment subscribers by their web browsing patterns

You can now produce email content that suits the interests and behaviors of each segment. For example, If a segment shows a strong interest in a specific product category, feature-related products, or offer discounts. To the subscribers who engage with educational content on your website, send informative articles or resources.

As for those highly engaged visitors who frequently return to your site, share product-specific information or customer testimonials to push them toward conversion. Additionally, you can set up trigger emails; a good example would be a follow-up email when a visitor views a particular product but doesn’t make a purchase.

Using browsing patterns to inform your email marketing list segmentation strategy allows you to deliver content that is highly relevant to each subscriber’s interests and actions.

B2B Email Segmentation Strategy

Screenpress B2B — Smartpress sent this message to its segment of customers in Virginia

B2B email segmentation focuses on grouping business contacts based on factors like industry, company size, job role, and stage in the buying cycle.

Unlike B2C segmentation, which often revolves around personal interests or consumer behavior, B2B segmentation must consider the dynamics of decision-making units, longer sales cycles, and the professional objectives of recipients. An effective B2B strategy aims to deliver highly relevant content to the right stakeholders at the right moment.

Below are 6 strategies to segment your email list for B2B email marketing.

1. Segment by Buyer Persona

Go beyond job titles — build segments based on personas that reflect specific pain points, goals, and buying triggers. For example, a CFO cares about ROI and risk, while a Marketing Director may be more interested in lead generation and brand visibility.

2. Use Firmographics Intelligently

Segment based on company attributes such as size, revenue, industry, or location. Tailor your messaging to address the unique challenges of a 10-person startup versus a Fortune 500 enterprise.

3. Layer in Buyer Journey Stage

Separate prospects by where they are in the funnel—awareness, consideration, or decision. Top-of-funnel leads need education; bottom-of-funnel leads need case studies, demos, or pricing information.

4. Identify Decision-Makers vs. Influencers

Not everyone in your list has buying power. Segment contacts by role in the decision-making process and personalize messaging to reflect their level of influence.

5. Trigger Segments Based on Engagement

Group recipients by their email behavior — opens, clicks, inactivity — and tailor follow-ups accordingly. A high-click user may be ready for a sales touchpoint, while an inactive lead might benefit from a re-engagement series.

6. Incorporate CRM and Sales Feedback

Collaborate with your sales team to enrich segmentation. Use insights from calls and CRM notes to refine your segments and personalize emails based on real-world interactions.

Inactive Subscribers Are Potential Prospects

My Mind Re-engagement email — This re-engagement email from My Mind demonstrates how to use good copywriting to target your segment of inactive users

Re-engaging inactive subscribers is a valuable strategy to revitalize your email list and potentially convert leads into active customers.

Identifying inactive subscribers is the first thing you have to do, so decide on a time frame to classify a subscriber as inactive. Typically, six months is a safe range to mark someone as inactive. This can vary from industry to industry, as it depends on the brand and type of product. Once you decide on a range, create a segment for inactive subscribers, and add rules or filters to categorize them into this segment.

The next step is to make contact with inactive subs. Send a reactivation email in which you acknowledge their inactivity, express your interest in re-engaging with them, and remind them of the value of your emails. Include a clear CTA to confirm their interest in staying subscribed.

If subscribers respond positively to the re-introduction email, encourage them to update their preferences on your site. This could include choosing the types of content they are interested in or the frequency of emails they prefer. You can also follow up with an email that provides exclusive offers or incentives to re-engage with your brand. You can use discounts, free resources, or access to limited-time promotions to reel them back into the fold.

Based on the interactions with the re-introduction mails, continue to segment your list. Subdivide the inactive segment by categorizing subscribers who open, click, or take action as “partially re-engaged.”

You can also use this opportunity to collect feedback from inactive subs. This data can help improve your email strategy.

Email Segmentation Tools

While many email platforms offer built-in segmentation, some standalone tools specialize in gathering, organizing, and enriching data to power smarter email targeting. These tools integrate seamlessly with your existing martech stack to enhance segmentation capabilities.

1. Clearbit

Clearbit enriches your contact database with firmographic and demographic data, helping you create segments based on company size, job role, industry, and more.

2. ZoomInfo

This tool provides B2B contact and company data with advanced filters. ZoomInfo is ideal for segmenting large audiences based on intent signals and business attributes.

3. Segment

Segment collects and unifies customer data across multiple platforms, enabling dynamic segmentation based on real-time behaviors and interactions.

4. Kissmetrics

This tool tracks user behavior across your website and funnels, offering deep analytics. Kissmetrics allows you to segment audiences based on actions, revenue attribution, and lifecycle stage.

5. LeadGenius

LeadGenius combines machine learning and human researchers to build highly targeted B2B segments tailored to your ideal customer profiles.

Email Segmentation Best Practices

Campaign Refinery Email Tag System — Using email tags on Campaign Refinery helps with segmentation

To get the most out of your segmentation strategy, follow these 8 email list segmentation best practices that go beyond the basics and drive meaningful results.

Start with clean data: Segmentation is only as strong as your data. Regularly clean your list and enrich it with firmographics or behavioral insights for better targeting.
Limit segment overlap: Avoid creating segments that compete with each other. Overlapping criteria can lead to redundant emails or audience fatigue.
Use dynamic segmentation: Build segments that update in real time based on user behavior, so your emails stay relevant without constant manual updates.
Pair segmentation with personalization: A segmented list is powerful, but adding personalization, such as name, company, or content recommendations, can take it further.
Test segment performance regularly: Analyze which segments respond best and continuously optimize. Your highest-performing group last quarter might not be the same today.
Include a segment for inactives: Don’t ignore cold leads. Create a re-engagement segment with tailored content to win them back—or clean them off your list.
Tag contacts at the source: Use form fills, ad clicks, or referral paths to tag users immediately. This makes future segmentation more accurate and intentional.
Coordinate with sales and support teams: These teams often hold goldmine insights. Sync with them to refine segmentation based on real customer interactions.

Campaign Refinery Offers Powerful Email Segmentation Features

At Campaign Refinery, our segmentation tools allow you to precisely tailor your lists to the unique preferences and behaviors of your subscribers.

With our advanced tagging system, you can effortlessly categorize your audience based on a variety of criteria — this includes demographics, engagement, and browsing patterns, among others.

Our platform offers all the flexibility you would need to send highly personalized and relevant content to different segments, resulting in increased open rates, click-through rates, and ultimately, improved conversions.

Click here to apply to be a Campaign Refinery user!

And as we wrap up our topic, we have one final segmentation strategy to recommend. It is to build a list of subscribers who are interested in your lead magnets.

An excellent lead magnet can create extraordinary engagement; it can attract a very interested group of people to your brand, and this segment is a rich pool of prospects you can pitch to.

And if you want to learn the art of sending lead magnets, that’s where our Lead Magnet Multiplier course comes in. Before you protest, it’s 100% free. Our only condition is that you finish the 4 mini-courses in 7 days if you want to retain access.

This course will teach you how to use lead magnets to see engagement rates like you’ve only dreamed of. We’re talking 8x the number of opens and clicks as compared to any lead magnet you’ve sent before.

Go ahead and unlock the secrets of the Lead Magnet Multiplier program today!

FAQ

What is the Main Goal of Email Segmentation in Email Marketing?

The main goal of email segmentation is to deliver more relevant, personalized content to specific groups within your audience to increase engagement and conversions.

Why is Segmenting an Effective Email Marketing Strategy?

Segmenting is effective because it allows marketers to tailor messages to different audience needs and behaviors, resulting in higher open rates, click-throughs, and ROI.