Learn how to create customer segments with the help of your Shopify customer account page data.
One of the best ways to collect information and insights about customers is through the customer account page.
Here, you’ll find information about customers’ purchase history, addresses, personal details, wishlist, etc. This page is a goldmine of data.
And one of the simplest ways in which you can use this data is to create customer segments.
What are customer segments? Why should you create customer segments? And how can you use a customer account to create customer segments?
In this blog, we’ll take you through all this so you can create customer segments from your Shopify store, as well as use those segments effectively.
What are customer segments?
Customer segments are created by segregating customers in different categories. There are many ways to segment customers. For example, you can segregate customers into different segments based on their age, gender, location, their interests, the channels they use to shop, their behavior, etc.
- Demographic: basic personal information, age, gender, income, education, etc.
- Geographic: location, climate, language, culture, etc.
- Behavioral: browsing history, purchase patterns, spend during sales, purchase from categories, etc.
- Lifestyle: hobbies, preferences, etc.
The above are just a few themes or categories. You can choose themes based on your business and marketing goals to create customer segments.
For example, say you want to create a marketing campaign for customers who have added a particular product in their wishlist. In this case, all the customers who’ve added that product in their wishlist would be part of the segment. You can target only these customers through a marketing campaign specially designed for them.
Why is customer segmentation important?
Makes marketing efficient
When you break down your entire customer base into segments, it makes managing your marketing campaigns easy. You can identify the customer segments you want to target for specific campaigns.
Helps discover new market opportunities
It’s possible that during the process of segmenting customers into different categories, you identify a new opportunity to market to a new segment.
Improves your overall brand strategy
When you identify the key motivators for your customers through segmentation – for example, price, products, etc. – you can create a better brand strategy accordingly.
Improves customer retention
When you segment customers, you have a better idea of the customers with the highest potential as well as customers who’d require extra attention. This helps you create targeted strategies to capture the attention of each segment.
How to use the customer account page for segmentation
Create customer segments based on demographics
The basic information customers share in their customer accounts, such as age, gender, income, marital status, education, profession, etc., can be used to create segments based on demographics.
These segments can help immensely in creating targeted marketing campaigns. For example, you might have products that cater to different age groups. A 20-year-old might not respond to a message that’s more relevant to a 50-year-old.
Such segmentation helps and is necessary when you have a customer base that covers a wide demographic.
Some reasons why you should absolutely not ignore demographic segmentation:
- This information is easily available on your customer account
- It’s a simple and straightforward way to segment customers and doesn’t involve analysis
- It is a cost-effective way to offer personalization
- It helps you identify potential markets and opportunities
Segment customers based on location
You can segment customers geographically in many ways – location, country, city, climate, culture, urban, rural, language, etc.
There are many ways to get insights into customers’ location. You could either follow information from their delivery address or you could have a special field where they could update information regarding their location.
So, how does geographic segmentation help you?
- You could run localized campaigns targeted at customers in a specific location
- It can help you in curbside pickup strategies
- It can help drop shipping businesses
- You can improve your campaigns’ relevance
- You can combine online and offline marketing strategies
Here’s an example of location-based social media marketing campaigns:
Create customer segments based on purchase pattern
When you understand not just who your customers are but also what they do on your website, you can collect insightful behavioral data.
Behavioral segmentation is defined as a form of segmentation based on patterns of behavior displayed by customers when they interact with brands or make purchase decisions.
This kind of segmentation can help you:
- Address customers specific needs
- Discover opportunities to optimize their customer journey
- Create different offers for different segments of customers
- Use past behavior patterns to predict future patterns and run marketing campaigns accordingly
- Monitor changes purchase patterns over time
Segment customers based on their purchase power
Purchase power refers to the value of purchases that customers make from your store. You can get this information from the order history section on the customer account page.
So how does it help to segment customers based on their purchase power?
- You can identify customers with high purchase power to run targeted marketing campaigns
- You can run campaigns for high purchase power segments to offer higher value products to improve your revenue
- You can identify customers with lower purchase power and offer them special discounts to improve sales
- Such segmentation helps you market new products to the right segments based on the price of the products
Segment customers based on purchase motivation
Purchase motivation is a set of factors that influence customers’ purchase decisions.
For example, when customers become aware of their needs and requirements. Thereafter, customers start considering products that would fulfill those needs. Another factor is the decision of whether or not they’re ready to buy a product.
You can segment customers based on their purchase motivation by tracking their behavior and actions from the customer account page.
But what do you do with this kind of segmentation?
Most customers’ shopping behavior depends on three factors:
- Motivation
- Ability
- Triggers
Once you segment customers based on purchase motivation, you can run campaigns to enhance their ability to make purchases through relevant offers and information.
Final words – Should you create customer segments?
Customers are the most important part of any business. Understanding them deeper is key to offering them better experiences on your site.
For the same, customer segmentation is a must.
A study by a Harvard Business School professor reveals how 95% of product launches fail due to improper segmentation. In order to improve customer experiences and increase sales, you’ll have to start segmentation.
And you can do so easily with the data available in your customer account page. To make it easy to collect data, install an efficient tool such as Flits customer account page on your Shopify store.
