Building a Segment

Select Create Segment on the Contacts page. The builder runs in three steps, and the segment is not created until the last one is saved.

Step 1: Name the Segment

Enter a Segment Name. Names are how a segment is picked out on the Contacts page and in a campaign audience, so a name that says who the segment holds, such as ACME customers in Victoria, saves work later.

Step 2: Which Contacts Do You Want To Segment?

Choose the set the conditions are evaluated against. All Contacts is the available option, so every segment is built from the whole store. Existing List is shown alongside it, disabled and marked as coming soon.

Step 3: Who Are You Targeting?

This step holds the conditions. It is arranged in two levels and no more, because groups do not nest inside other groups.

At the top sits Contacts match All or Any of the following groups, which decides how the groups combine. Each group then carries its own Match All or Any of these conditions, which decides how the conditions inside that group combine. The divider between two groups shows AND or OR to reflect the top level choice, so the logic can be read down the page.

• Add Condition sits inside a group and adds a condition to that group.
• Add Group sits below the groups and starts a new one.
• Drag handles reorder conditions within a group, and groups within the segment.

Two levels are enough for most targeting. To express something more involved, split it across two segments and run two campaigns.

Conditions

A condition is made of a field, an operator and a value. Any reserved field or custom field can be used, and the operators offered depend on the type of the field chosen.

Text fields

is, is not, is blank, is not blank, contains, does not contain, starts with, does not start with, ends with, does not end with.

Number fields

is, is not, is blank, is not blank, greater than, less than, equal or greater than, equal or less than, between, not between.

Date fields

is, is not, is blank, is not blank, is after, is at or after, is before, is at or before, between, not between, is within the last, is not within the last, on, not on.

Values

The value control changes to suit the field type and the operator:

Condition	Value control
A text field	A single text value.
A number field with a single value operator	One number.
A number field with between or not between	A lower and an upper number.
A date field with a single date operator	One date.
A date field with between, not between or another operator that takes more than one date	Two or more dates.
A date field with is within the last or is not within the last	A number and a unit of days, months or years.
Any field with is blank or is not blank	No value control at all.

Saving the last step creates the segment and returns to the Contacts page, where the new segment appears with its count. That count is worked out on a schedule rather than the instant the segment is saved, so see Refreshing a Segment if the number is not what was expected straight away.