Set up Segments to work for you
You've heard of Segments in ConvertKit before, but you might not be sure what all the settings mean, or how to set up a Segment for your specific needs.
In Segments and Broadcast filters, there are Filter Groups for defining what Subscribers will show up. Within a Filter Group, you'll see that you can select Subscribers "Matching [ __ ] of the following:"
Any
All
None
[Any] means "either", while [All] looks for Subscribers who meet "both" requirements. And [None] means to EXCLUDE certain Subscribers.
Let's say, for example, that you wanted to see how many Subscribers you have that both signed up to a Form and also have a certain Tag. You would create a Segment that includes both that Form, as well as that Tag.
Note that we are matching [All] for this example, because we want to see a list of people who match BOTH of these requirements.
As you can see, there are a lot of options for this! Feel free to get in there and test different options with your Segments.
Excluding Subscribers within a Segment
A common use for Segments is to find some group of subscribers UNLESS they meet some criteria. For instance, maybe you want to send a pitch only to your subscribers who have not yet purchased your product or service. Segments are perfect for this, because the [None] option allows you to exclude subscriber that match your chosen criteria (for instance, those who already purchased from you). To make it easy, we've included it here: Excluding Within A Segment.
Segmenting Quick Tips
Don't create a Tag called "Newsletter" (as an example). Instead, use Segments to group all the appropriate Forms, Tags, and Sequences into a single Segment for your newsletter.
To run multiple sites through a single ConvertKit account, you can create a Segment for each site. More on running multiple domains here.
Avoid creating a ton of Rules that subscribe and unsubscribe people from different Forms, Tags, and Sequences. If you are trying to group Subscribers, it is probably best to use a Segment.
Example Use Case
On your blog or website, you may write about more than one subject of interest. Sometimes, you'll send this content to everyone, but more often than not, you will want to send to people who are interested in one or the other. Now what?
An example account might look like this:
Forms
Newsletter
Mastering Product Launches
Designing Web Apps sample chapter
Book Prelaunch List
A Brief Guide to Selling Digital Products
Design
Tags
Purchase: Designing Web Applications
Purchase: The App Design Handbook
Purchase: Book
About half of these are design related, and about half are marketing related. Instead of choosing all the Forms and Tags each time, you can organize them into two Segments:
Segment: Design
Form: Designing Web Apps sample chapter
Form: Design
Tag: Purchase: Designing Web Applications
Tag: Purchase: The App Design Handbook
Segment: Marketing
Form: Newsletter
Form: Mastering Product Launches
Form: Book Prelaunch List
Form: A Brief Guide to Selling Digital Products
Tag: Purchase: Book
Out of the total Subscribers, (let's say 20,000), you might have 12,000 on the marketing Segment, and 10,000 on the design Segment. Obviously these add up to more than 20,000, which means that someone can opt-in to multiple things and appear in multiple Segments. That's what we want!
In this case, someone who buys the book, and downloads the sample chapter of Designing Web Applications, would be in both the marketing Segment, and the design Segment. This is perfect because they've expressed interest in both topics through their activity.
NOTE: Segments auto de-duplicate so you'll still never send to the same person twice. If someone had opted-in to a few things that make up a Segment, they will still only appear once in the Segment. Also, if you were to send a Broadcast to two Segments at the same time, those will de-duplicate against each other as well, and just send to the unique Subscribers. Pretty nifty, eh?