Email Marketing by the Numbers: How to Use the World’s Greatest Marketing Tool to Take Any Organization to the Next Level

Recommended Segment: The “Best”

When segmenting for the first time, you should look no further than what you’ve already collected in your database. I’m guessing you can use this data to identify your best constituents and look for patterns among them. “Best” will depend on your business. It may be the biggest donors or most likely to volunteer. It might be the biggest spenders or the most frequent online purchasers. You must look at your database and ask yourself this question: “Which constituents are growing my business?” Then you must try your hardest to develop more of them.

Some very interesting findings can emerge from identifying the “best” population. Oftentimes, they are at the max of what they are willing to give to your organization. That means you should stop asking them to do more.

In a previous life, I was in the coupon business. One of the biggest problems with that business was the fact that it’s usually your best customers who take advantage of the token discount coupon. The reality is that they’re the customers who need the least incentive.

So for the best constituents, you might want to adjust your goal from increasing wallet share to simply retaining them. You want to keep a good thing going. This is where relationship marketing really becomes retention marketing. With this population, it’s critical to make contact on a highly personal level. These are the folks you want to be close friends with. These are the people you want to love you. The constituents in ...