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Build and Activate Your Segments

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

  • Build a simple filter to create a segment.
  • Publish and activate a segment.
  • Use a segment in Journey Builder.

Build and Activate

In this unit, we use the Trailhead Simulator to walk through the steps to build and activate your segments. Before starting, there are a few things you should know about the Trailhead Simulator.

For the best experience, view the Trailhead Simulator on a computer, not a mobile device. Unlike a Trailhead Playground, the Trailhead Simulator provides a simulated user experience that does not store your progress. If you close the simulation and relaunch it, the simulation starts from the beginning. To get back to where you left off, use the simulator navigation controls. 

Also, the Trailhead Simulator is designed to highlight the correct click area if you click the wrong area first. Simply click the highlighted area to continue. Here’s an example of this functionality.

Orange highlighted area.

Create a Segment Filter

Let’s follow along in the Trailhead Simulator as Isabelle, digital marketer for Northern Trail Outfitters (NTO), creates a basic segment. Isabelle wants to email gold-status loyalty customers (in other words, customers with over 50 loyalty points) who have opened an email within the past 60 days. 

  1. Launch the Trailhead Simulator.
  2. Click Exercise 1: Create a Segment Filter and then Begin.
  3. From the Segments tab click New.
  4. From the Segment On dropdown, select Unified Individual.
  5. Next, name your segment NTO Use Case and click Enter.
  6. We’ll skip the next fields for now, so confirm Don’t refresh is selected and click Save.
Note

The publish schedule determines when and how often your segment publishes to activation targets. You can edit this later under a segment’s Edit Properties.

Let’s go ahead and build the filter for NTO’s use case.

  1. Type (or copy/paste) Loyalty Points Balance into the search attribute field and click Enter.
  2. Drag the Loyalty Points Balance attribute to the canvas.
  3. For the Loyalty Points Balance attribute:
    1. Select the Operator Is Greater than from the dropdown.
    2. Type the Value 50 and click Enter. 
  4. Click Done.

Great! Now let’s further filter the segment for email engagement.

  1. If your previous search shows in the attributes search box, click the x to clear it.
  2. Next search attributes for Engagement Channel Action and click Enter.
  3. From the first Email Engagement section drag the Engagement Channel Action attribute to the canvas.
  4. After the aggregation of Count and the Operator of At Least, type the Value: 1 and click Enter.
  5. For the Engagement Channel Action attribute:
    1. Select the Operator Contains from the dropdown.
    2. Type the Value Open and click Enter
  6. Clear the current attributes search by clicking in the search box.
  7. Search attributes for Engagement Date Time.
  8. Drag the Engagement Date Time attribute to the same container as engagement channel action.
  9. For the Engagement Date Time attribute:
    1. Select the Operator Last Number of Days.
    2. Type 60 in the Number of Days field and click Enter.
  10. Click Done.
  11. Click Save.

After you have created a new segment, the segment population is updated. Time for the next exercise.

Activate Your Segment

Let’s get our new segment published, so we can activate it in Marketing Cloud Engagement.

  1. Click Next Exercise from the previous screen or click Exercise 2: Activate Your Segment from the Trailhead Simulator home page.
  2. Click Begin.
  3. From your NTO Use Case segment page, click Publish Now.
  4. Next, click the Activations tab.
  5. Click New.
  6. Select your segment, NTO Use Case from the dropdown.
  7. Click Next.
  8. Select Marketing Cloud Engagement Bundle as your activation target.
  9. Select activate on Unified Individual.
  10. Click Next.
  11. Notice the “Include an email address in this segment” checkbox is selected, and then Click the Scrollbar to scroll down.

To help with personalization, you can also add additional attributes to your published segment in your activation channel. Let’s add first name and loyalty points balance so NTO can use these data points in their emails. 

  1. Search for First Name and click Enter.
  2. Drag the attribute to the canvas.
  3. If your previous search shows in the attributes search box, click the x to clear it.
  4. Search for Loyalty Points Balance and click Enter.
  5. Drag the Loyalty Points Balance attribute next to First Name.
  6. Click Next.
  7. Name your activation NTO Use Case and click Enter.
  8. Click Save.

Great job! Isabelle can now find her activated NTO Use Case segment in the Shared Data Extensions folder created automatically in Marketing Cloud Engagement. 

Note

Data extensions are available in Marketing Cloud Engagement within 12 hours or less.

Data Cloud Segments in Journey Builder

Another great feature is that NTO can use this newly created segment in Journey Builder. When creating a journey, the team can simply select the Data Cloud segment in the Data Extension Entry Source in Journey Builder. 

Note

Need more guidance in Journey Builder? Check out the help page, Use a Data Cloud Segment in Journey Builder.

And that’s it. You are ready to create your own segments. Happy filtering! 

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