EP #3 Email Masterclass Series | How to Segment your Email Data like a Pro

Dennis Dayman (00:41):

Well welcome. Welcome. Welcome back to another podcast in the Email Masterclass Series, The Email Unplugged Podcast from Netcore, some of you guys know we’ve been working on this podcast now for a couple of months, again, starting early on this year with the COVID and understanding sort of impacts on COVID when it comes to email marketing. And over the last a couple of weeks, we’ve been continuing now on this new master class series on a couple of different topics. We’ve had guests like Chad white from Oracle come in, uh, and we’ve had other folks as well. Um, you know, and again, the short series is focusing on, on these one areas. You know, these, you know, these different areas that, that marketers obviously get challenged on every day. And, and the hope is, is that we’re going to be able to go deeper about those challenges and then give you actionable items or insights towards the end of it. So, um, you know, today, um, we actually have another guest of ours. A lot of folks know who he is, but we have, you know, Matthew Vernhout, who was a very good friend of mine. He is also at validity. Uh, he’s also the founder of emailkarma publishing. Welcome. Matt, can you say hi to everybody and tell us a bit about yourself?

Matthew Vernhout (01:54):

Yeah, thanks, Dennis. Um, so yeah, I’ve been around for about 20 years in the email industry, 18 of those sort of in the deliverability privacy compliance space. And, uh, yeah, I think I’ve talked quite a bit about that Data use over the years, um, because that’s Where you want to start focusing on your deliverability issues is how the data’s being used. So hopefully I can add to the conversation.

Dennis Dayman (02:14):

That’s awesome. Cool. Well, cool. And then we also have our good friend from that Netcore Chaitanya. Hey Chaitanya, it’s good to hear you back. I know you were here last time, you know, with us on a couple of days and why don’t you introduce yourself to everybody as well?

Chaitanya Chinta:

Glad to be here Dennis, as always, uh, and I, I think I’ve been doing my introductions every week now. I think so I have new listeners to keep it short and sweet. I know I’ve been around, uh, with email for almost like 15 years now. Uh, I’ve been, I’ve been an underspend programmer for quite some time and then moved on to go to the other side of the story, uh, to, to handle the Liberty global and then to Medco, I also cofounder a product called Pepipost, uh, which is, uh, which is now of course, uh, core email engine. Uh, so yeah, and now I Head, email business, Globally for Netcore. Yeah. That’s about me.

Dennis Dayman (03:08):

Cool. Cool. Well, yeah. Well thank you for being a part of this again. Well, you know, I think as people know, right. Uh, you know, we’ve been talking about data segmentation and our last podcast, and we’re going to kind of set the context, but I think we’re going to be going back down this route a little bit, because I think this will be another interesting aspect as, as Matt had said, you know, he’s been in this industry for a number of years, uh, both on, you know, the, the, the, the deliverability and sort of industry relations side. But, you know, as the founder of email karma publishing, he’s written a lot of articles, not just on deliverability, but you know, about marketing and email in general. Um, and, uh, some of you may or may not know he lives up in Canada and, uh, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Matt on several different organizations, like the cause, which was the coalition against unsolicited commercial email. Um, he and I have had some wonderful times being able to also, uh, testify together, uh, when the Canadian anti-spam legislation was being put together. Um, but you know, as we discussed last time, you know, segmentation, as we all know, can be used to improve your email campaigns, ROI and marketers in most parts of the world have realized that importance of segmentation in those email programs, you know, again, if you’re not slicing and dicing, as they say that data, right, to sort of think about, you know, things and, and, and, and, and not even thinking about what you’re doing to create the right customer experience, you know, what we’ve been talking about is for you. And so again, we’ve been attempting to break down those complexities and discuss those details in general, about segmentation. And then again, at the very end of this, hopefully, you know, you have some actionable insights that you can then take back and implement in your email programs. So, Matt, you know, I know that we had talked a bit about this last week. You will not a part of that. So I kind of want to start with you and, you know, sort of ask the real basic question, just from your perspective, why does data segmentation matter to people?

Matthew Vernhout  (04:58):

Well, I think data segmentation matters for a few reasons, but I think some of the, the big ones, you know, obviously looking at, you know, who are your most engaged users, how do you treat them, um, maybe differently than your new users and how do you treat them differently than sort of the at risk user set. And I think talking to people differently at different stages in regards to how they’re engaging with your program, or depending on what your, your email program is, even life stages, um, for those individuals. So obviously, you know, talking to somebody in their early twenties, maybe just graduating college is different than you want to be talking to forties. And they’re at a different stage in life with, you know, maybe mortgage payments and children or college students. And you’re, you know, as you get into your sort of later forties, if you will, um, you know, people are different in regards to life stages and where they’re at.

(06:01):

So, um, you know, you want to have that different context, different content, um, you know, and I even more recently started, I know this is long winded, but even more recently, you know, you want to talk to people, um, differently in regards to, you know, it’s pride month. So maybe there’s content that is more focused on education around that for people also with the black lives matter movement, you may want to talk differently to groups of people, um, that way as well to, you know, really make sure you’re getting the right message to the right audience,

Dennis Dayman (06:38):

Right? Yeah. It’s the attitudes, you know, the right message to the right person at the right time. And it’s interesting that, you know, while I don’t want to sort of separate email out of the discussion as, as Matt knows, you know, as, as my son’s grown up, it’s been interesting to watch them sort of, I guess, move through the different communication channels when they were younger. They really didn’t use email. They had an email address, obviously as somebody who, whose father, it was an email industry, but they primarily had used other channels like social media, but now as they’re growing up, you know what I’m saying now, the last year or two is the typical batch and blast sort of model into their own email boxes, but then as they continue to interact with brands, they’re now seeing the more structured sort of segmentation I know of Matt, you’re a gamer, you know, just as much as my sons are. (07:23):Um, and that’s, you know, where they’re seeing a difference in their communications from the, from the companies that they’re using to buy games from, whether it’s EA or Microsoft or others as well. Um, so, you know, I do have a, more of a question for you, Matt, and I’m going to ask, and then I get over to titanium on this one, but I’m curious now, you know, you have been in the industry again, you know, doing a couple of different things. I’m curious whether or not, you know, data segmentation depends on upon the platform. I’m asking you that question because you’ve been around for a while and you’ve seen different platforms that are out there. You’ve seen people using things for the wrong reasons or the wrong platforms for, you know, for the right reasons. And it’s just kind of been all over the place, but, you know, does it really matter in terms of what platform that they’re using?

Matthew Vernhout (08:07):

Um, I don’t, I don’t think so. I think there’s obviously different ways that each platform enables segmentation, um, or enables people to use the data that you, you want to look at, um, building your segments on, but you can do that offline as well. Right? Lots of, um, CRM solutions allow you to do that, um, in the CRM solution and then export the list and then upload it to your email platform. Some email platforms are directly integrated, so it’s pushing a button and the lists get sent over. Um, and then some people, you know, for smaller lists, maybe they’re just doing segmentation in outlook or sorry, Excel. Um, right. Yeah. Um, you know, maybe they’re just doing a segmentation Excel and (08:56): Targeting people that way. Um, so I think you can pretty much do it anywhere. Um, it comes down to what works best for you, uh, and what your platform enables, uh, you know, if it enables you to do the types of segmentation you want. Um, but I think a lot of segmentation really focuses on the data you have and how you want to use that data to build your segments and your models.

Dennis Dayman:

I’ll touch on it. I’m going to kind of, you know, the same question to you. It’s obviously loaded right. As, as somebody with net core, but I’m curious again, you know, for the new listeners here, you know, what does that mean for you in terms of that? Like, you know, again, does it depend on the platform and sort of, what are some of the features that you think people should be looking for in a platform when it comes to segmentation using them?

Chaitanya Chinta (09:41):

In my opinion, Dennis, I think it’s, it’s more to do with the level of segmentation that the marketer wants to do. Uh, let’s say, you know, as Matt rightly said, if I can simply put my data into an Excel, I can do some segmentation and then put it back on the platform and do it. So, but, but, uh, but again, uh, it depends on, it depends on what, what data that is available in the market. Uh, you know, uh, in fact, the data points have to be relevant in terms of creating those segments. And then, uh, and then what is the, uh, what is the capability of the platform that is, that has been used in terms of creating those segments? Is it really like, you know, you create seven rules and create a segment, or let’s say you, you can do just like, like, like, you know, um, users have been just signed, signed up in the last 30 days, or is it like, you know, what are the, then you go one level deeper saying that, you know, shown here and XYZ activity, or you go one more level deeper in saying that you pull the lookalikes for these kinds of segments where you, where you enter into the realm of, you know, machine learning models and stuff like that.

Speaker 3 (10:45):

Right. It depends on the level of segmentation that you want to get into. And there are platforms today at different levels of segments, and again, depending on the type of business and, uh, you know, type of, and type of the business and, uh, you know, type of the data set and data that’s available to segment, uh, different kinds of platform, you know, should be, uh, I, you know, are relevant for different kinds of marketers. Uh, but again, uh, in my opinion, it, it, it, um, so it’s, uh, it is dependent. It is definitely dependent on the, uh, on the platform and the level of complexity that you’re going to create segments on.

Dennis Dayman (11:28):

So it’s a, it almost sounds like, I mean, you know, there’s so many different platforms that are out there, right? I mean, and again, I worked for one, you know, many years ago, um, uh, Eloqua, which defined and created, you know, marketing automation. Um, and we always talk about the funnel and the funnel was always about marketing, qualified leads to sales, qualified leads and things like that. But, you know, am I hearing you guys sort of say that, you know, you really don’t have to go completely advanced, like, and again, I’m not trying to, you know, to say anything negative about, you know, the big enterprise platforms that are out there, but you don’t necessarily have to be some sort of major expert in this, right. Or that you have to go out and spend tons and tons of money on these larger platforms to be able to do segmentation. Is that what I’m hearing you guys talk about?

Matthey Vernhout (12:10):

Yeah. I w I would say that’s fair. Um, you know, you can do basic segmentation just around, um, you know, even, even a welcome program is a form of segmentation. And so anyone who’s been on your list less than a week or two weeks is a very simple form of segmentation. Um, and then you can build from there, right there, there really is no minimum, if you will. And, and really sky’s the limit on how complex you want to get and how you can build that into your program.

Chaitanya Chinta (12:49):

And in fact, you know, just to add to that point, man, I think, you know, adding more complex to do segmentation does not always translate into ROI, right? I mean, you, you, you, you can add any level of complexity maybe at, at some point it’s, it’s all, you know, the, the written sort of flattened flattens out. Uh, so, uh, a brand has to explicitly decide on, you know, what is the level of complexity that, that is comfortably sits within, uh, then, uh, they’ve, uh, available data and the kind of ROI is that they’re getting from email program and applying it that’s, that’s the, that’s basically the function of, you know, at what, at what level of complexity that you want to, uh, when you get the maximum ROI from the email program. I think that should be, that should be the first point. I think the marketer has to look at rather than actually just, you know, you know, there’s, there, there are definitely platforms where you can actually go into any level of complexity and say that I’ll, you know, they’ll, that’ll enable you to create that segment of one and create those personalized, personalized campaigns, but end of day, is it really translating into the ROI? (13:50): I think that’s, that’s the fundamental question that any Mark they had today has to answer it. Right.

Dennis Dayman (13:56):

Alright. Now that’s actually a good point because yeah. You know, it’s something that I think marketers tend to forget about, or that they think that segmentation is only used for. Right. And that’s always about selling something. Right. But as we all know, not everybody’s selling something, right. Sometimes it’s just informative. Right. And it’s just trying to get information, you know, you know, to users and whatnot and that information to help them out. Right. So I think that’s a great point that marketers need to remember that segmentation works on all sorts of levels. Right. Um, and, you know, and, and can move them through whatever the process is or whatever the end goal is. And I think that’s important right. Is, is that people have to also take a look at sort of building these, the, the segmentation, uh, programs backwards. Right. I, at least in my opinion, I don’t know what you guys would think, but, you know, it’s like, what is the end goal for this thing? Right. You know, why, what I want to go down the segmentation route, what’s my end goal, and then go backwards from there to determine what they may have to be asking. Right. Yeah.

Matthew Vernhout (14:49):

I think that’s understanding the net result you’re looking for, um, is, is absolutely something to focus on. Whether it’s, I want people to download a white paper, or I want people to, uh, download a specific white paper, even if you have multiple lines of business. Um, and then, you know, is my, is my challenge sales, or is my challenge, um, you know, driving awareness, all those different types of things exist in that life cycle for your consumer and how you want to target them. And as people move through the life cycle, that’s where you look at the different segments and how you manage them.

Dennis Dayman (15:28):

You know, so Matt, you know, uh, Chaitanya just said something, uh, that we had talked about last week. Um, he just used the term segment of one. I had an opportunity to talk to him a little bit about that. Um, I’m curious, I mean, you, you’ve obviously heard the idea around segment of one, but, you know, for our audience here, what is your sort of definition of segment of one light light? Like, what’s that about from your perspective?

Matthew Vernhout (15:51):

You know, ideally we’d be able to send each individual consumer, um, a hundred percent tailored message to their exact needs at that exact moment. Um, and I think the idea of segment of one, or, or trying to get to segment of one, um, really is that, you know, it’s like inbox zero is, is it ever actually going to happen? Um, but I think the idea being, can you specifically choose that one message that’s right for that consumer as a, which, you know, could be a one to end sort of ratio, but it’s the, the right message of one for that specific consumer or segment of consumers that are in that same stage. Um, so you’re, you’re, you know, you have a hundred different pieces of segment. It’s picking that one that’s right for that one consumer or one consumer, um, you know, archetype that, that is in your, uh, in your target audience. So cause cause there are going to be people that, that meet that similar need at that same time. So really it’s not ever going to be one to one. It’s still going to be one to N but N could be a small segment of one, two, three, four people, um, that are in that same, that same stage

Dennis Dayman (17:15):

Is that, so I’m actually kind of curious as I’m sort of thinking about, you know, the startups that I advise, who do, you know, very small sort of, you know, campaigns, because they may only have thousand or 10,000, is the idea around segment of one, or maybe even Matt, like you just mentioned, doesn’t have to be about the segment of one and Titanic. You also mentioned this last week or on the last podcast was doesn’t always have to be about one. It can be five, it can be tending to be 20. Is that sort of possible when you’re talking to the brands who are sending millions upon millions of messages that are out there? I mean, is that really possible? You think,

Chaitanya (17:47):

Yes, let’s say this, this, this Breaks down into specific use cases that we are trying to address, right. Let’s say as Matt, I live a little, you know, the Matt matchbook board welcome program, right? So welcome program is for the users we’re just coming into the system. But you know, the thought of having a welcome program is to nurture the user, make them acquainted with the product or offering that you have and make them do that first transaction and nudge them to do that first transaction. Right. So that that’s, that’s the whole, uh, concept of driving for any brand, any B2C plan, as a matter of fact, back in when a B2B brand to some extent, drive that, uh, to drive that welcome program, right? So that’s, that’s, that’s one kind of segment. And then, and then you break it down into every use case. You’ll find, you’ll find those minute segments where these are like high value segments that market can create like, like, you know, kind of nudges, they turn into high ROI driven standards for them. (18:42):

But, uh, again, do doing it on a millions of millions of data that, that usually has, let’s say, you know, I have, you know, we work with bands with, well, more than let’s say, you know, probably about a hundred million of data, right. A hundred million users users actively using the platform. I mean that, in that context, I think doing that one to one segment of one and then targeting those users specifically, it becomes really, it becomes really impossible at least with the kind of, you know, uh, computational power that we have right now to get to that, to get to that level. But, uh, I think, I think in my opinion, you know, segment of one is, is as a concept is, is sort of a journey. It’s not, it’s not like, uh, it’s not like, uh, you know, you have, uh, you, we are there to do that segment of one B uh, so the latest technologies that we do, or the latest, you know, uh, uh, advancement that, that, that the, uh, marketing automation platforms or the email marketing platforms for a big event, you know, they, uh, they’re doing in terms of personalization and, you know, getting those kind of niche segments for niche, niche segment for marketers to understand better about the data and create those segments as they create those segments and then target them specifically with those messages, customers, Facebook, what platforms are today enabling to do it.

(20:03): But again, as a concept, it’s sort of a journey to me. We have, we are just moving towards it. We are not there yet.

Matthew Vernhout (20:10):

I think that’s fair. But I also think, you know, like, like I said, you could be looking at the specific, um, type of individual group and having one message for that individual group as well. Um, and I think that could be a, you know, a view of one-to-one. So it’s one message for one group of individuals, um, that when you start to look at, you know, data segments of millions of users, you can sort of group people into, um, similar interest groups or similar categories, like gaming, like gaming or a trip or life cycle stages as people, you know, grow and mature and change roles and things like that. So, um, you know, one-to-one, doesn’t have to be an individual. It could be one group of individuals as well.

Dennis Dayman (21:05):

Right. You know, that’s actually a good segue actually, you know, we’ve been able to so far touch on last week. And, uh, and then again, here, now we just talked about, you know, a very basic, simple, welcome message, right. Can get you to the basic level of segmentation. Right. Um, you know, a, you know, I, you know, just by just sending that out and just sort of seeing what they’re looking at, what they’re clicking on, what they’re converting into, what we didn’t get to into too much detail last week, but I’d like to maybe see if we can expound on and, you know, especially, you know, Matt and you’ve had some experience on non some of this data science stuff as well, you know, over the years, you know, let’s kind of get into what those advanced ones are. And, and Matt, you just started saying, you know, like gaming is a level of it, but then you get into age and you get into other sorts of things.

(21:51): What are some of those real sort of unknown examples that, that people should be maybe taking a look at? You know, because I think about, you know, especially in a, and I know this isn’t about privacy, right. But we always talk about, you know, that you should all obviously know where everybody lives now because of whether they’re, you know, related to GDPR protections or now with CCPA coming in California, you know, we always talk about demographics and that sort of sense, but what are some of the other advanced ones that people should be really looking at that they’re probably not doing today?

Matthew Vernhout (22:19):

Examples. I like that I’ve seen very few people doing, uh, or things like anniversary, um, type segmentation. So, you know, you’ve been a subscriber to our list for five years now. Congratulations, here’s a role, you know, for, uh, um, you know, you’ve been to Switzerland,

Dennis Dayman (22:39):

She just had actually didn’t, you guys just actually had an anniversary in your house, by the way, happy anniversary to the two of you, I think is what it was. It wasn’t her birthday. I’ve forgotten now. Which one was it?

Matthew Vernhout (22:46):

Our, my anniversary is in a few weeks, but, uh, yeah, my wife’s birthday wasn’t too long ago, so, but I’m even talking like subscriber anniversary, right. Like, right. You’ve been, um, you know, you’ve been, uh, on, on the list, you’ve been a member of our loyalty program. You’ve, um, dumb things like that in regards to, you know, something unique birthdays, right. Let’s even let your segment that people could look at is his birthday reminders. Um, you know, and I think you could even get into things like anniversaries, uh, you know, like, uh, someone like a flower delivery company, you could be segmenting and saying, you know, your anniversary is in two weeks, maybe you should buy flowers for your spouse or your significant other. Right. Um, those are just examples, more advanced examples, you know, I’d have to think a little bit, but even, yeah,

Dennis Dayman (23:38):

Well, Matt, actually, I have one for you and I’m kind of maybe a primmer one with you because it also can be used in the privacy of arena. And I think about you all the time. Right. You know, living up in Canada and then I’m obviously living in Texas, what’s, it’s brutal heat right now here. And it’s much cooler probably up in Canada right now. But, you know, geolocation, I think would be one that we sometimes see from, from brands when they realize that, you know, maybe that it’s getting hot here in Texas. So we might start getting something around clothing and it’s like, Hey, shorts are on sales, flip flops are on sales where, you know, maybe you guys could be dealing like in, you know, March, April timeframe, sometimes, maybe last minute snowstorm that’s coming through. And it’s like, Hey, don’t buy, you know, foot flops just yet. Right. You know, get, get whatever it is to keep yourself warm. Right.

Matthew Vernhout (24:23):

I actually, yeah, that’s it, that’s a great reminder because there are programs that I’ve seen and they’re more done manually. Um, but around the idea of like a natural disaster, like it was the last, uh, last year or the year before we had all those fires in Colorado area, um, you know, maybe you don’t want to be sending, you know, buy our shorts right now. Um, because there are obviously bigger concerns that people have going on in their lives. So you could segment those people out, um, and, and send them, you know, how, how you’re dealing or how you’re helping with whatever the natural disaster happens to be at that moment. Um, there, there are very specific things like that you can do. Um, and I know that some other brands, you know, if there’s been a snow storm, um, you know, sending relevant, you know, there are people in your area that will help you plow your driveway. Uh, specifically if you’re an elderly person and you can’t do it yourself. So contact us here. Uh, those types of programs, they tend to be more manual. Cause they’re driven by events outside of something that can really be automated. Um, but those are definitely segments that can be targeted, especially if, you know, geo if, you know, zip code or postal code or whatever it happens to be, um, that you can target to a specific audience. Um, it just has to be sort of outside your normal automation, definitely more of an advanced, um, flatline there.

Dennis Dayman (25:56):

What about you Chaitanya? I’m kind of curious, you know, again, I keep bringing all these sort of, you know, different areas, again, I’m in the United States and mats and in Canada and you’re in India and whatnot. Does, does, you know, data segmentation look any sort of different from an advanced perspective from what you guys see on the other side of the world, you know, or is it the same, right? Because you know, cultures are different the way that people work are different. Does that, does that change anything in terms of segmentation at all

Chaitanya Chinta (26:21):

In terms of segmentation, uh, you know, from a geolocation perspective, uh, maybe the maximum that we, that we typically look at is, is, uh, you know, people coming from a tier one town or a tier two town or village, or, you know, that’s the kind of segmentation that my case typically do. This is something that we see a good number of marketers do when they, when they try to reach out and location specific, uh, you know, based on the previous order history or based on, you know, website activity and stuff like that. I think we have good number of, uh, you know, uh, geolocation based, uh, segmentation techniques that are, that are being used by the marketers here, but what also w but, but, uh, you know, if I, if I look at it, trend of marketeers movement, right. I think the, the shift that I see, uh, in a primarily is from, uh, primarily is from, you know, uh, um, users who are typically using, uh, demographics as a, as a segmentation to primarily primarily on the behavioral side of it, where, uh, where, you know, Mark DSR, typically looking at, you know, bringing in the, uh, who are your best customers, how do you segment those best customers and, you know, uh, correlating, let’s say email activity and website activity, and stitch that data together to form a sort of a unified view and then, and then make segments out of the events that happen on the website. (27:43): So, you know, the segmentation segmentation for the marketers here, here is moving towards, you know, those kinds of aspects and that, uh, that we see that that means he is giving, uh, you know, uh, uh, phenomenally better results, uh, when it comes to, when it comes to performance of the,

Dennis Dayman (28:03):

Yeah, no, that’s actually, that’s actually a good point. I’m, uh, I’m, I’m also sitting here thinking about data segmentation also from the like time zone, right. Perspective as well. Right. We’ve talked about again, sending the right message at the right time to the right person and date, you know, and data segmentation can also be used in a sense to also manage how much email that you might be sending out of your own, you know, internal systems where if you’re using a provider like Netcore, right. I mean, you know, it can also help with sort of that load. It also could potentially even help the customer support side, right. Or the customer ordering side of things too, that, you know, that not, everyone’s going to be ordering at the exact same time, but, you know, if you’ve got different teams around the world to sort of help manage and maintain and support your infrastructure, you could also use that data segmentation to say, Hey, you know, we know that Chaitanya is asleep, so yet we’re going to send a message to Matt, because now he’s awake at 10 30 at night, or sorry, 10 30 in the morning. Dennis Dayman (28:56): And, and, and vice versa. I mean, it’s 10 30 now here in Texas, uh, in the morning, but, you know, it’s still kind of early in California, so maybe people may not be up and, and reading and, and, and that sort of helps in those areas, right?

Chaitanya Chinta (29:07):

Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Dennis Dayman (29:09):

Awesome. Well, yeah, I kind of want to turn the conversation now, just a tad bit here, uh, because you know, the, both of you have been sort of in that sort of, excuse me, you guys have been in, of been in the compliance arena as well for a number of years, right around abuse and, and privacy. Um, you know, when we start taking a look at sort of w again, we talked about segment of one and things like that, as you guys are talking to customers who are just sort of like patching and blasting, and then all of a sudden they get this 50%, you know, unknown user rate or a you 10%, you know, complaint rate can things like segmentation and segment and segment of one help with the idea around list management, or, you know, we always talk about, you know, years ago, I use this example all the time, but here in the United States, when cans ban came around in 2003, we all freaked out and said, Oh, my gosh, email marketing is dead because we’re just going to lose everything. And yet what we found is canned spam actually kind of got our homes in order, if you will, when it came to that, but does segmentation help with that mentality of going from quantity over quality to quality over quantity? You know, does that help people in terms of managing those lists and, and potentially even to be honest, keeping their costs down, because it does cost money to send email and to store those sorts of things.

Matthew Vernhout (30:23):

I don’t know if it’s so much about the cost sometimes, but I think you can definitely drive our own, um, against segmentation. Um, you know, going back to looking at, you know, past shopping behavior, even Cart abandonment kind of stuff, and sending those followup messages, sending those past recommendations, have you bought something like this? Um, maybe you’ll be interested in this other product that’s related. Those types of segments can really drive a lot of our alumni. Um, and you know, I think privacy legislation certainly helps get people get their house in order and their data, right. You know, fixed or corrected or things like that. You know, we saw that with CAN-SPAM a long, long, long time ago. We saw with castle when that came out, we saw it with GDPR. We’ll see it again, if we haven’t already seen sort of the second wave of CCPA stuff, as we approach, uh, implementation of that. So, you know, Brazil will have the same thing happened next year. I’m sure. Um, so yes, as we get more privacy legislation, we get the house in order, but I think from the point of view of segmentation, as opposed to looking at it as a cost, you really have to look at how do I use my segmentation to drive ROI?

Dennis Dayman (31:43):

What about your Terranea on that, on that? Because, because you’re, you know, you are that person you’re, you know, you’re the expert, you know, you know, for net core and in that scenario.

Chaitanya Chinta (31:51):

Yeah. So, uh, so, uh, in India, in India, I think we don’t really, we still don’t have a law like GDPR or, you know, CAN-SPAM and, uh, we still don’t have it. Um, but I think there is, there is definitely one in works, uh, which is, uh, you could say heavily, heavily inspired from GDPR if I must say, but it’s so close to GDPR. And, uh, I think that’s, that’s, uh, it’s sort of that sort of in works with, uh, in India and I’m sure there’ll be, there’ll be a lot of corrections, uh, you know, are going to happen after, after this is of course, uh, public, uh, at the same time, at the same time, there’s one area that I see, you know, where data segmentation is, uh, you know, you used to, uh, you know, at least in terms of the abuse discussions that we do, right. (32:42): Uh, let’s say, uh, there’s a, there’s a high unsubscribe rate or an abuse rate that we, that we plot for a certain customer. So let it at least helps us to praise back as to, you know, from rich, uh, data source that these users have come in. So this actually gives us a perspective that, you know, if there’s a data source that is going bad and, you know, giving some sorts of bad leads or, you know, some wrong data sets that have been uploaded, this is sort of a, so we have an abused desk within, within Netcore, which, which closely monitors it, you know, uh, all the complaints issues that, that, that go up, uh, that if there’s any, if there’s any Senator, who’s actually, you know, doing some bit of mischief through, through the platform and suddenly we see some spike that’s happening, but, uh, it goes through that. It goes through the check, uh, and then we try to identify where the issue is. And definitely, I think in that perspective, I think in, in, in tracing back to the actual cause of the problem, I think the, uh, uh, adding we, uh, uh, data segmentation definitely helps in that context.

Dennis Dayman (33:41):

That’s actually an interesting point from the obese know perspective. It’s been a number of years since I’ve been on that side of the house, but as you guys in your experiences on, from the abuse perspective, right. Um, you know, as you are seeing some oddities and, and, and, and the platform, you know, from complaints and whatnot, do you guys ever then maybe take a look at the campaigns to begin with? I mean, I know we always talk about, Oh, you know, we’re looking at the listening or the list size of when the list was important, right. To kind of help us point out issues that might be related to list management as you’re investigating sort of these abuse issues. Do you have the ability to look at not only just list management, but do you kind of go through and go, all right, let me go take a look at sort of their, their campaign templates, right. You know, are we seeing real basic, you know, uh, tags, like first name, but then are we seeing more advanced segmentation tags within that to say, Hey, you bought product, whatever. Right. And it was on this date and you pay this much. Does that help you sort of understand, you know, how you should be approaching people in these conversations and if they don’t have those sorts of things, you know, does that help you at all in that, in that positioning?

Chaitanya Chinta (34:50):

Yes. Yes, absolutely. Actually, that’s an interesting point, Dennis, in fact, uh, you know, uh, most of the, most of the people who would try to play around with the platform in our, let’s say, you know, Titus, uh, slip through slip, slip through these filters and, uh, do some bit of mischief on the platform. Right. I think, uh, you know, they, uh, you know, they, they usually have a list of email addresses and they’ll upload, and then try to do some, you know, batch and blast kind of campaign. Um, uh, you know, at the moment we find more personalized tags, which are associated with the campaign, the kind of lists that have been segmented and the kind of segmentation rules that have been applied on the data. Uh, and also the kind of attributes that I’ve used in the email, I would definitely give, gives a, uh, they give, they give a certain confidence that, you know, these, the, the, uh, the, that they have sort of, you know, pushed into the platform is certainly certainly organic and not, not some, you know, which has data or, you know, uh, some, some other, some of the data sets.

Matthew vernhout (35:50):

Yeah. And I think looking at things like lists name, um, have been helpful in the past, you know, there’s been several times over the years where I’ve worked with someone, uh, where it’s very clear that it’s it’s courage, or it is a list purchase, or, um, something along that line simply because of the way that they name the list that’s been uploaded. Um, you know, they might have a certain vendor name in the list, um, or they might even call it something like, you know, bought CD CD number them

Chaitanya Chinta (36:33):

That really happened with one of our customers. They really named it, you know, uh, bought data from xyz.com. And that was the list name actually.

Matthew Vernhout (36:44):

Right. So, you know, I, I, I love when clients self-identify that they do wrong things cause it makes it easy to address the concern is, um, you know, and, and sort of educate them directly as well as you can also identify what lists they’re never allowed to use again on your platform. Um, so there are, there are lots of things that people do in that regards also, you know, depending on your platform. I think it’s very important to really consider what you name your, your list that you’re uploading, because some platforms will say, you know, you click the unsubscribe link and it will actually show you, like, do you want to unsubscribe from 20 2001 Oh five event name list. Right. Right. And we’ll show you exactly the name of the list as opposed to, you know, something like, um, warm leads or, well, even that’s a bad name, um, January subscribers, you know, again, that’s not a great name, but it’s better than, you know, event purchase list or someone like that because consumers are gonna look at that and say, well, now I know where you got my address and that’s terrible and I’m angry, but yeah, I’ve honestly seen them all over the years and will never surprise, right.

Dennis Dayman (38:05):

Because I mean, you know, we’re always seeing new people come into the space, you know, from college and whatnot from university, I should say. Right. So they’re also just learning. It’s funny. Cause everyone always says, I can’t believe people are still doing this. And it’s like, it’s not the same people, right? These are the new people that are coming in, you know, in our space like everybody else, they have to sort of learn their way up. Um, you know, without trying to, you know, keep this podcast too long. The last one we had with Della was what was quite long when I wanted to try to do was maybe how some closing thoughts here from you. But as we close this out and we’ll start with you, Matt, what is the, what is the one thing, or maybe a thought that you want marketers to walk away from this particular podcast when it comes to data segmentation?

Matthew Vernhout (38:49):

Um, you know, I think segmentation can be as complicated as you want it to be. Um, but I think if you start simple segment, one thing, segment your welcome program, don’t just drop people into your regular marketing, uh, on day one build sort of that introduction to your brand introduction to your program. It doesn’t have to be an entire journey. It could even be one message, um, but start small and then start to look at the data you currently have and where you can build those segments and increment, you know, iterate increment test, move on. You know, Dennis, I think one of the examples you gave earlier around time zoning, that that’s an incredibly simple piece of segmentation you can do. If you have that data, you don’t have that data very hard. Um, but look at what you have and segment and I think tailor your messages to the individuals that you’re messaging, um, and where they are in your program.

Speaker 1 (39:51):

And then from there grow and get more complex and identify your VIP, your potential, VIP your at risk segment, your new segment, and maybe even have a control segment that doesn’t get treated in a, in a special way. So you can see any incremental lift. Um, again, a lot of this depends on the data, the time and the effort you want to put forward, but those are simple examples of where you can get into segmentation and have that one message to a group, to a one-to-one group type messaging. Um, and I think chasing the dream of one message to one individual, it’s, it’s a nice dream, but I don’t think anyone’s there at this point, even with the most advanced most complicated AI, simply because most businesses can’t produce that much content.

Chaitanya Chinta (40:42):

Uh, let me, uh, let me just cover just one additional context there, uh, where, uh, you know, I believe, uh, you know, a marketer should not just jump into segmentation just because the technology is available in whichever levels of complexity, depending on the platform. There’s a bunch of technology that is available to segment the data, but it’s not, it’s not about, it’s not about the technology. It’s about marketers understanding of the users that are there on the system, or let’s say understanding of the customers spend more time with and understanding the customers before actually jumping into kind of, you know, Berlingo segments or, you know, where this, where, and in which part of the life cycle that customers are in, or let’s say what kind of messages that, that need to go out, which can nudge them to become the best customer. How do you, how do you identify that you know, best genome, right? So that, that becomes, that becomes a key to, I ideally, you know, create the segments, create the relevant segments and then build, build those marketing campaigns. So start with understanding the customers and actually jumping straight away, jumping into the, uh, you know, uh, into data segmentation.

Dennis Dayman (41:51):

Okay. Well, that’s awesome. That’s actually really good, thank you very much for that. Well, listen, I want to thank you both for being a part of this, uh, you know, part of the net core, you know, Email Masterclass Series of the Email Unplugged Podcast on, on, on, on data segmentation. And I will also want to thank our speakers for being a part of this as well. You know, I think it’s a, it goes unsaid that we hope that you guys listening here have learned how you can break down the complexities of email segmentation and have heard about the details, uh, that again will give you those actionable insights that you can now take back and implement in your email program to acquire more customers and to make your customers, you know, more happier. Um, and if you don’t know what you’re doing on this, we don’t have a platform on this.

(42:31): And if you need help, you know, you really should check out Netcore, right? Netcore is a global email engagement leader, uh, with their AI-powered email, delivering campaign solutions. Um, and they’ve been delivering, you know, you know, a big, you know, or top-line ROI for more than two decades to its customers across the globe. So, you know, check them out. I think they could be a real big help for you. Um, but here’s also a really cool offer. And you’ve heard us talk about this as well. Um, you know, Netcore is still continuing their COVID email relief program. If you remember from the other podcasts, we’ve talked about it is going on until September of 2020, where you get basically, you know, as many emails as you want and you get to use all the different features within the Netcore, uh, platform.

(43:15): Um, and again, you know, it’s at a zero cost until 2020, and you’ll also get access to things like their AI-powered, uh, stuff as well. So again, if you don’t have a platform check out net core, they are giving you some, some free access to, you know, to it right now. Um, they can help you come on board and onboard all your systems on there. And let me try it out. And hopefully, you guys will fall in love with it. I also want to remind you as well, don’t forget to subscribe to net course weekly podcasts. You can do it on Spotify, iTunes, Google, play Stitcher, and just start [email protected]. Um, but if you’re just now joining us in the middle of this, we have plenty of more content for you, and you can also find all the original episodes prior to this on Netcore.com every week. Um, and we’ll be doing this every Thursday on a release. So again, gentlemen, thank you so much, uh, for being a part of this, I appreciate all the information that you’ve given out and folks we’ll be back again here producing with our next podcast. So stick around and thank you for being a part of it. Take care.