Why You Should Segment Your Audience For Email Marketing

Email marketing can be a powerful tool for organisations of all sizes to increase, but it’s important to make sure you’re targeting the right audience with the right message. One of the most effective ways to do this is by segmenting your audience.

Let’s face it, nobody likes receiving irrelevant emails. It’s like going to a party where you don’t know anyone and getting stuck in a corner with the person who won’t stop talking about their cat. Fine if you’re a prolific cat lover, but not so fresh if you’re still not over the time one coughed up a hairball on your favourite pair of trousers. That’s where segmentation comes in.

By creating targeted messages in your email marketing campaign that address your audience’s specific pain points and needs, you can avoid being the annoying cat person in the corner and instead become the life and soul of the party.

After all, when a potential customer becomes a subscriber, they do intend to receive content about your products and services. But they want your email marketing to be relevant to them. By dividing your email list subscribers into smaller groups based on certain characteristics, such as interests, location, stage of the sale process and behaviour, you can create more personalised, relevant, and effective email campaigns that generate leads and sales.

Here are four reasons why your brand should segment your audience:

1. Personalisation

Segmentation allows you to tailor your messages to each group and create a more personalised experience for your subscribers. This can help increase engagement and build stronger relationships with your audience. It’s like giving each person at the party their favourite drink or snack. Your customers will appreciate emails that feel tailored specifically to them.

2. Relevance

Segmentation allows you to send targeted messages that speak directly to your audience’s specific needs and pain points from the email body to the subject line. This can increase the relevance of your emails and make them more likely to be opened and therefore acted upon. By sending relevant emails, you can also avoid the dreaded “unsubscribe” button. You want to make sure you’re targeting customers who would actually be interested in what you offer instead of fighting an uphill battle with those who are unlikely to convert.

3. Improved ROI

Segmentation can lead to higher email open rates, click-through rates, and conversions, which can ultimately improve your return on investment (ROI). By sending targeted messages to a smaller, more engaged audience, you can make the most of your email marketing efforts. Once people in your target audience see your brand as a helpful guide and get to reap the benefits of the useful marketing emails you send them, you’ll see the conversion of many of those readers into valuable paying customers.

4. Avoiding Spam Filters

Sending irrelevant messages to your subscribers can lead to them marking your emails as spam, which can harm your reputation and email deliverability. By segmenting your audience and sending messages that are relevant, you can reduce the likelihood of your emails ending up in the spam folder – a place no one wants to find themselves!

How To Segment Your Audience

So, how do you get started with segmenting your audience? If you’ve not done this before the thought may feel overwhelming. But if you follow these steps, you can’t go wrong.

• Start by understanding who your audience actually is and what their specific needs and pain points are. This can help you create segments based on location, demographics, interests, and behaviour.
• Once you’ve identified your audience, you can start creating segments based on the characteristics that matter most to your business. For example, you might create segments based on past purchases, engagement level, or location.
• With your segments in place, you can start creating targeted messages that speak to each group’s pain points and specific needs. Use visuals and language that resonate with each segment, and make sure your messages provide relevance and value.
• As with any marketing strategy, it’s important to test and optimise your email campaigns to see what works best for each segment. Use email marketing tools and analytics data to track your performance and adjust as needed to improve your results.

Email with purpose

Segmenting your audience is a powerful way to improve the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns. By sending relevant, targeted messages to a smaller, more engaged audience, you can increase engagement, avoid spam filters, and improve ROI. Emails with purpose ensure both consumers and companies make the most of the advantages of an email campaign.

Ultimately, email addresses are the golden ticket of access to new customers, allowing your email marketing strategy to maintain strong customer relationships as well as improved user experience through useful content and newsletters.

If you want people to opt-in, your emails should provide information and value worthy of their attention. So, before your audience starts filling your inbox with complaints (or worse, marking you as spam), take the time to segment your audience and create strategic email campaigns that speak to their specific needs. To reference our earlier metaphor – segmenting your audience really does transform you from the annoying person in the corner, to the life of the party. And the life of the party always gets invited back!

Need help segmenting your audience?

Understanding and targeting your audience is no easy task. At STORY22, their StoryBrand Certified Copywriters know exactly how to help your business connect with the right audience, improve customer loyalty, and build brand awareness. To find out more, click here.