Segments

Overview

Segments are groups of consumers that share common characteristics, such as demographics or patterns in interaction history. In the Loyalty platform, Segments are used for targeting promotions, offers, and communications, as well as to manage eligibility to be contacted. Segments may be used in rule conditions as well.

The Segmentation Engine can query consumer data based on any information in the consumer interaction profile, then create a Segment that selects the desired group of individuals. The Segmentation Engine is completely dynamic: consumers may enter or exit Segments in real-time based on their profile changes or most recent interactions.

Segment Computation

Loyalty uses two broad categories of Segment computation:

  • For One Member: All Segments are computed for a Member on demand whenever the Member’s eligibility needs to be determined. For example, when the Member accesses Offers or Challenges from a client interface, their Segment memberships are calculated. This process ensures that a Member’s Segment definition is dynamic and up-to-date. As soon as a Member performs an activity, they may enter or exit Segments.

  • For All Members: While the previous computation keeps a single active Member’s Segments up-to-date, certain batch scenarios (such as sending emails) require the refresh of Segment membership for all Members. A Segment may be manually computed by using the "Refresh Members" action within the Results tab of the Segment Details screen.

In addition to the two computation modes, the platform also supports the concepts of Dynamic and Static Segments.

A Dynamic Segment will immediately add or remove individuals in real-time, whenever their attributes or activity history changes. Every API call will cause the platform to re-evaluate the individual referenced in the API, and determine their inclusion in Dynamic Segments.

A Static Segment is evaluated only when the marketer manually refreshes the Segment, or when the system performs batch processing, such as a message deployment or a Batch Job.

Execution Types

When you're creating a new Segment, you'll be prompted to select an Execution Type. The options available are as follows.

  • EDP (Engagement Data Platform): This Execution Type uses aggregated data, and does not support dynamically-calculated Segments. The EDP Execution Type is primarily intended for use cases where you need to calculate all the individuals that belong in a particular Segment. A common use case for EDP Segments would be email sends, where you're using a Segment to identify the audience of email recipients. EDP is the default Execution Type when you create a new Segment. 

  • Golden Record: This Execution Type uses a "wide row" design, meaning that everything about an individual is available within a single row. This method is primarily intended for use cases where you need to calculate the Segments to which a single individual belongs. The Golden Record Execution Type supports dynamic Segments that are computed as needed, such as for website personalization. The Golden Record Execution Type also supports the use of custom Groovy code if you need to define more sophisticated logic.

Access

To access the Segments screen, select Members from the Main Navigation Menu, then select Segments from the Sub-Category menu.

Features

Managing Segments

The Segments screen provides the following features related to managing your Segments:

Searching and Sorting

Search

The search feature allows you to search for a specified text string anywhere within the following Segment fields: Display Name, Internal Name, Status, Tag, Category label, or Category name.

  1. Optionally, in the search field near the top of Segments screen, enter the desired text string.

  2. Optionally, from the "Status" drop-down menu, select a Segment status (or "Any status").  

  3. Optionally, from the "Effectivity" drop-down menu, select a Segment effectivity (or "Any effectivity").  

  4. Press Enter, or click the search button (magnifying glass icon).

  5. The Segments screen is refreshed to show only the Segments that meet your search criteria. Please note that if you enter multiple search criteria, the platform displays only the Segments that meet ALL criteria.

  6. To remove all search criteria, click the remove button ("X" icon).

Sort

The "Sort" drop-down menu allows you to sort the Segments on a variety of different fields. To sort the list of Segments, select the desired sort option from this menu.

  • Segment ID (default)

  • Name

  • Created Date

  • Updated Date

Navigation

Once you've found the desired Segment, you can navigate to the following other screens:

  • Click the Segment record to navigate to the Segment Details screen for that Segment.

Create a New Segment

To create a new Segment with an Execution Type of "EDP:"

  1. In the "Enter Display Name" field, enter the Display Name value for the new Segment.

  2. Click create. The Segment Details screen is displayed, with the Rules tab selected.

Note: By default, a new Segment will have an Execution Type of EDP.  If you want to make a Golden Record type Segment, you'll need to create a new Segment, then edit the Segment properties to switch it to Golden Record. See Segment Details for more information. 

View or Edit a Segment

To view or edit the details of a Segment:

  1. Search, sort, or filter the Segment screen as described above.

  2. Click on the desired Segment record.

  3. The Segment Details screen is displayed and populated with all of the information about this Segment. See Segment Details for more information.

Deploy Segment Metadata

After you've created a Segment and defined its rules for selecting Members, you must deploy the Segment metadata.

If you have changed Segments in your account that haven't yet bee deployed, a warning message is displayed at the top of the Segments screen. When you deploy the segment metadata to the server, the process automatically deploys the metadata for ALL modified Segments, so you should always verify what Segments will be deployed before you run the deployment process.  

  1. Within the warning message for undeployed Segments, click the "Show diff" link.

  2. The platform displays a pop-up window, showing the difference between the deployed and undeployed Segments, so that you can see all the changes that will go into effect when you deploy metadata. When finished reviewing the differences, click ok.

  3. From the "Actions" menu in the top-right corner, select "Validate Segments Metadata."

Note: You can deploy metadata immediately, but the best practice is to validate the Segment logic before deploying metadata to ensure no incorrect expression code gets deployed to the server that could cause issues.

  1. If the validation step passes, you'll see a message that says, "Segments metadata is valid." If the validation step fails, you'll receive an error message; review and correct your Segment expressions, then retry the validation step.

  2. Click deploy segments metadata.

  3.  A confirmation dialog box is displayed; click confirm.

  4. If the deployment was successful, you'll see a message that says, "Segments metadata has been deployed." 

Note: You can also deploy segment metadata by selecting "Deploy Segments Metadata" from the "Actions" drop-down menu.

View Deployed Segment Metadata

To see the details of what Segment metadata has been deployed:

  1. From the "Actions" menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "View Deployed Segments." The "View Snapshot" pop-up window is displayed.

  2. Click the plus-sign to expand the message to view additional details, such as the total number of deployed Segments. You can also drill in deeper, to see details of each deployed Segment (Segment name, logic, included Members, etc.).

  3. When finished, click the "X" icon to close the pop-up window.

 Holdout Groups

Holdout Groups offer a way to measure the performance of campaigns and understand their effectiveness. Creating a holdout group involves a process of reviewing your email marketing program to quantify if the campaigns being sent are generating increased engagement metrics/conversions. This can help clients decide if campaigns are actually giving an incremental increase in engagement metrics, conversions, and an increase in revenue that would otherwise not be realized. Holdout groups may be created for either the EDP or Static Golden Record types of segments and will be supported in refreshing and non-refreshing segments.

Holdout groups can be created with an absolute count or as a percentage of the segment which was created via the current segmentation UI. Once the holdout group is generated, you can choose to export the segment to an Engage+ campaign with holdout group information within the segment, download a segment with holdout group information, or download the holdout group members only. Any member in the holdout group will be excluded from actions on the segment.

Note: Holdout groups and sub-segments are not supported on the same segment. You can choose to configure a holdout group, or a sub-segment, but not both.

Exporting Segment Data

The Segments screen provides the following features related to exporting Segments.

Export Segments to Engage+

 Schedule Segments for Export to Engage+

This option allows you to set the segment at a particular cadence via the Scheduled Segments UI. The segment will then refresh and automatically send a segment file to the configured destination. This can be found by navigating to Members > Segments > Schedule.

Note: You must create a connection profile and set up the integration with Engage+ first before you can schedule segments for export. Please see this user guide for information on how to complete those steps.

Enabled: The toggle allows you to enable or disable a schedule for segment refresh and export.

Recurrence: 

     Repeat- repeat the scheduler at a set cadence as configured in           the Schedule Composer.

     Once- The segment will only run once in its lifetime at the                     scheduled time. Once selected, the Execute Once option will               come up with a calendar object that allows you to pick the date,           time, and time zone if desired.

Schedule composer: Enables you to specify how often a segment should refresh and be exported to Engage+.

From and To: Specifies the dates between which the scheduler should run.

Time Zone: Allows you to specify the time zone for segment refresh.

Make sure to click Save after you have set up your scheduled segment.

Manually Export Segments to Engage+

This options allows you to manually export segments to Engage+ by refreshing and exporting members. This can be found by navigating to Members > Segments > Results.

Note: You must create a connection profile and set up the integration with Engage+ first before you can schedule segments for export. Please see this user guide for information on how to complete those steps.

The Results screen displays the results of a segment, including the Member ID, the name, and the email.

Click on the Export Members button. This will enable a manual export to Engage+ or enable you to download the segment file.

   Export Definitions 

 Create Export Definition

Export definitions can optionally be saved and reused, when you need to download Segments from Loyalty. 

From the "Actions" drop-down menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "Export Segments." The "Create New Export - Segments" pop-up window is displayed.

  1. Select when you want to execute the export:

  • Asynchronous -- check this option if you want to execute the export manually on an ad hoc basis.

  • Execute now -- check this option if you want to execute the export immediately.

  • Create schedule -- check this option if you want to define a schedule (either a one-off execution, or a recurring schedule).

  1. If you checked "Create schedule" above, the schedule options are displayed.

Define export schedule

To define the export schedule:

  1. From the "Recurrence" drop-down menu, select an option:

  • Repeat-- Execute the export based on the defined schedule; see below for more details.

  • Once-- Execute the export once. In the "Execute once on" field, enter the date and time. Select the time zone from the "Time Zone" drop-down menu.

  • On demand-- Execute the export when specified by a user. In the "Execute once on" field, enter the date and time. From the "Time Zone" drop-down menu, select the time zone to use.

Define a repeating schedule

  1. From the "Schedule Composer" drop-down menu, select a unit of time -- every minute, hour, day, week, month, or year.

  2. Optionally, check "Advanced" to enable the "CRON expression" text field, and enter a custom CRON expression.

  3. In the "From" and "To" field, enter the start date and time, and the end date and time, for the repeating schedule.

  4. From the "Time Zone" drop-down menu, select the time zone to use.

If you checked "Asynchronous" above, this section is displayed.

  1. To send email notifications when the import process is successful, enter one or more email addresses in the "Success Email Recipients" text field. 

  2. To send email notifications if the import encounters an error, enter one or more email addresses in the "Error Email Recipients" text field. 

This section allows you to optionally include (or exclude) specific columns in the export file.

  1. From the "Inclusion" drop-down menu, select an option:

  • All -- include all columns in the export file.

  • Only Included -- in the "Fields" field, select one or more columns you want to include in the export file.

  • Except selected -- in the "Fields" field, select one or more columns you want to exclude from the export file.

This section allows you to create custom business rules to define which Segments are included in the export file.

  1. Click the Add icon, then select Add Rule. The platform adds a new blank row for defining the Rule Condition. 

  2. From the first drop-down menu, select the desired Attributes. This menu is populated with all of the different Attributes for building a condition.

  3. Select a mathematical operator. The available operators will vary based on the data type of the selected Attribute. 

  4. Enter or select a value. 

  5. Some attribute types allow you to define additional criteria, such as a date range, or a channel type, for example. Select or enter the additional criteria. 

  6. Repeat the above steps as needed to define more Rule Conditions. If you need to delete a Rule Condition, click the Delete icon to it. 

  7. Once you define more than one Rule Condition, select the logical operator. From the "Include customers that meet" drop-down menu, select either: 

  • All of the following: The conditions are processed with a logical 'AND' operator such that all conditions must be true for an individual to be selected by this Segment. 

  • Some of the following: The conditions are processed with a logical 'OR' operator such that at least one of the conditions must be true for an individual to be selected by this Segment. 

You can also group rules by selecting Add Rule Group from the Add icon. Rule Groups have their own internal logical operator.

To export child records joined to the main record:

  1. Click add. A new row is displayed.

  2. Check "Enabled."

  3. From the "Child" drop-down menu, select a child record type.

  4. From the "Inclusion" drop-down menu, select an option:

  • All-- include all columns in the export file.

  • Only Included-- in the "Fields" field, select one or more columns you want to include in the export file.

  • Except selected-- in the "Fields" field, select one or more columns you want to exclude from the export file.

  1. Repeat the above steps needed to include more associated records. To remove an association, click the delete icon next to it.

When finished creating the Export Definition, click save.

View or Edit an Export Definition

To view or edit a Segment Export Definition:

  1. From the "Actions" drop-down menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "Segments Exports." The "Segment Export Definitions" pop-up window is displayed and populated with a list of all Segment Export Definitions.

  2. From the "Action" column of the desired Export Definition, click the Edit icon. The "Edit Export" pop-up window is displayed.

  3. Make any necessary changes to the Export Definition properties.

  4. When finished, click save.

Manually Execute an Export Definition

To manually execute a Segment Export Definition:

  1. From the "Actions" drop-down menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "Segments Exports." The "Segment Export Definitions" pop-up window is displayed and populated with a list of all Segment Export Definitions.

  2. From the "Action" column of the desired Export Definition, click the Enqueue this Export icon. A confirmation dialog box is displayed.

  3. Click confirm.

 Download an Export Definition

To download the last execution of an Export Definition:

  1. From the "Actions" drop-down menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "Segments Exports." The "Segment Export Definitions" pop-up window is displayed and populated with a list of all Segment Export Definitions.

  2. In the "Action" column of the desired Export Definition, click the Download File icon. The platform downloads the file to your PC.

Delete an Export Definition

To delete a Segment Export Definition:

  1. From the "Actions" drop-down menu in the top-right corner of the screen, select "Segments Exports." The "Segment Export Definitions" pop-up window is displayed and populated with a list of all Segment Export Definitions.

  2. From the "Action" column of the desired Export Definition, click the Delete icon. A confirmation dialog box is displayed.

  3. Click confirm.