Do you want to increase your sales, build better customer rapport, and improve your engagement? If so, you’re not alone. Business owners and marketers around the globe are constantly working to connect with their target audience and personalize experiences for their users.
Today we are going to talk about segmenting your leads and how this marketing strategy can help you exponentially grow your business. Segmentation involves using actionable data to divide your customer base into smaller groups. Each group, or segment, has specific interests, pain points, and needs.
It’s your job to take this information and create custom marketing campaigns that appeal to each group. We are going to explore several ways you can segment your list and give you some actionable and practical advice you can use once you’ve divided your audience.
Let’s dive in!
Gather Information When Customers Sign Up
Email marketing is one of the best tools you have at your disposal. There are plenty of reasons why you should keep in contact with your leads through email. The most important reason is that email marketing has a staggering 4,400% return on investment, making it an excellent way to grow your brand and increase sales.
You can use your email sign up form as an opportunity to segment your lead list. When a customer lands on your page and decides they want to subscribe, add an extra question or two to your contact form so you can send personalized content in the future. If possible, avoid adding more than 5 fields to your contact form to reduce abandonment.
For instance, if you’re the owner of an online pet store, you should consider asking new subscribers what kind of animals they own when they sign up. Once you start sending out emails, you can personalize the content in each email based on individual responses. Dog owners are likely not interested in hearing about upcoming products for cat owners, and vice versa.
Use Purchase and Viewing History
Once you know what kind of topics interest your individual lead lists, you can start crafting custom campaigns that use both purchase and blog viewing history to make personalized suggestions.
Consumers expect brands to know and understand their needs. Personalization marketing is the act of taking what you know about your audience and creating content and offers that match their needs. You’re more likely to get sales and see engagement if you resonate with your customers. Small changes, such as adding a customer’s name to the email subject line, can increase your open rate by 21.2%!
Let’s go back to the online pet store example we mentioned earlier. If you’re in that situation, your goal would be to make offers to customers based on the products they’ve purchased in the past, or content they read on your blog.
A customer that has bought nothing but dog products probably wouldn’t want to enter your contest that features a prize package for cat owners. Understanding the personality and behavior of your customers can help you make smart marketing decisions when segmenting your list.
Capture the Attention of Inactive Subscribers
Another great way to segment your leads is by looking at their activity. You can analyze your list and look for users that haven’t made a purchase on your site or opened an email in a certain amount of time for more opportunities.
If a customer signed up for your email list after their initial purchase but hasn’t opened an email in 6 months, you can get those people to come back and become repeat customers through your messages.
A simple campaign with a catchy headline like, “We Miss You,” or “Is It Something We Said?” is bound to get the attention of inactive users. You have to make sure your offer inside the email is enough to convince them to come back. You could offer a limited time 40% coupon on their next order, a free gift with their next purchase, or early access to new products and services.
Inactive subscribers are people that were at one time committed to your brand. Through segmentation marketing, you can get those same people excited about your brand long after they became a customer.
Create Lead Magnets
Lead magnets are another excellent way to segment and personalize your campaigns. Essentially, lead magnets are pieces of content that provide information, entertain, or show special offers. You’ve likely encountered lead magnets on eCommerce sites where the business will offer a massive discount to first-time subscribers.
You can use this tactic on your website to segment your list. The key is to create different types of lead magnets that present specific offers or content for your users based on their preferences.
If someone subscribes based on a lead magnet that talks about one category on your website, it’s a safe bet they are interested in future content around that topic. Segmenting your audience based on the offers that catch their attention will help you learn more about your customer personas, and help you deliver personalized marketing to your followers.
Don’t worry about creating content for all of your different segments when you start out. Instead, focus on one piece of content at a time and analyze the sign-ups as they come in.
Back to You
These tips will help you make the most of your email and on-site marketing campaign. After you’ve generated enough leads, you may want to consider sending out customer feedback forms so you can gather more actionable data on your target audience.
The more time you spend analyzing your leads and creating personalized content, the more ways you can segment your list. It’s important to note that your customers can fall into multiple groups at once. For example, a customer that buys a specific product, signed up for a lead magnet, and has been inactive for 6 months might find themselves on three different segments.
There’s nothing wrong with having subscribers on multiple lists, as long as you’re not sending out duplicate content or flooding their inbox with marketing emails. Start slow and get to know the people visiting your website and expand as you gather more data from user behavior and read customer feedback. Before long, you’ll have a list of dedicated subscribers eagerly awaiting your next email.
sales leads strategy concept -DepositPhotos
