Create and Activate a Segment in Data Cloud

Learning Objectives

In this project, you’ll:

Review Data Cloud segmentation functionality.
Create a segment.
Activate a segment to a DMO.

Configure Your Environment

This badge is part of a series covering Data Cloud concepts. In this project, you continue building out those concepts by focusing on how data can be filtered and used for various business use cases using Data Cloud Segmentation and Activation.

In order to do that you first need to complete the Create a Data Stream in Data Cloud, and Quick Start: Create an Identity Resolution Ruleset, and Quick Start: Enhance Data with Insights projects. These projects established the data and processes needed for the segments you’re going to create. You use the same Developer Edition org from those projects to complete this one. These Developer Editions are only available for a limited 14-day period—be sure to complete this project before your org expires.

This Developer Edition is designed to work with the challenges in this badge, and may not work for other badges. Always check that you’re using the Trailhead Playground or special Developer Edition org that we recommend.

Also note that your developer org has a custom permission set that doesn't have access to Data Cloud Setup. It’s intended to be used only for specified Trailhead challenges.

About Segmentation and Activation

Before you get started, review the benefits of acting on data using Segmentation and Activation. When you're surrounded by a wealth of data, how do you narrow your focus to a specific group? This project guides you through the process of crafting a segment filter within Data Cloud, enabling you to comprehend, target, and engage your customer base with precision.

While this org includes Segmentation and Activation, Segmentation and Activation features are only available to Data Cloud customers with an add-on license. Contact your account executive for more information.

Review Terminology

Data Cloud uses some terms that are helpful to know during segmentation. Time to review.

Segment: Filter your data to create useful segments to understand, target, and analyze your customers.
Segment on: Within segmentation, segment on defines the target object used to build your segment.
Publish: Publish is the process of searching and building a segment based on the filter criteria. You can publish your segments on a chosen schedule or as needed.
Activation: Activation is the process of moving audience segments to an activation target.
Direct attributes: Attributes that have a one-to-one relationship with the segment target. Meaning each segmented entity has only one data point for a profile attribute. So for customer data, they would only have one entry for postal code or for first name.
Related attributes: Attributes that can have multiple data points.

Want to learn more about segmentation and activation concepts before you start? Visit the Segmentation and Activation module before you begin.

Create a Segment

Segments can be used for multiple purposes. In this example, you create a segment to help identify missing zip code data. This can be used to trigger a notification to a sales rep, prompting them to fill in missing data, or to email a customer directly and ask them to complete a customer profile on their website. Let’s get started.

From your Developer org, search for Data Cloud in the App Launcher.
From Data Cloud, go to the Segments tab and click New.
Leave Visual Builder and Standard Segment selected and click Next.

visual builder and standard segment selected.

The default Data Space should be auto-selected. Then from the Segment On dropdown, select Unified Individual.
Next, name your segment No Zip Code. Add an optional description to describe your segment.
Click Next.

Create a new segment.

Select Standard Publish.

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.

From the Publish Schedule dropdown, select Don’t refresh and click Save.

Standard publish and schedule set to don’t refresh.

Now you’re ready to select attributes and define a filter for your new segment.

This may take a few moments to load, please be patient.

Add Filters

The goal of this segment is to narrow down the list of US Based leads who haven’t provided their zip code. Follow these steps to add filters to obtain this result.

With the Attributes pane selected, expand Related Attributes.
Select Lead or search for Is US Based.

Related attributes with Is US Based from the Lead datastream selected.

Select the first option and then drag the Is US Based attribute to the canvas.
Within the Lead container:

From the Measurement dropdown, select Count.
From the Operator dropdown, select At Least.
For Value, type 1.

For the Is US Based attribute:

From the Operator dropdown, select Is Equal To.
For Value, type true (and select from available options).

Click Done.

Lead container path with operator set to Is Equal to and value set to true.

Next, search for Postal Code under Leads and then drag the Postal Code attribute to the canvas.
For the Postal Code attribute:

From the Measurement dropdown, select Count.
From the Operator dropdown, select At Least.
For Value, type 1.

From the next Operator dropdown, select Has No Value.
Click Done.

The logical operator AND has been added to the two attributes. You don’t need to change this, as you want both attributes to be true.

Click Save.

When you save, the Segment Population (the number of items that match your filter criteria) is automatically refreshed.

Segment population 17 with cursor clicking the Save button.

When the number is refreshed, click Done.

Great! You’ve created a filtered segment for a group of US-based leads who don’t have a zip code. Now you can create tasks for sales reps to obtain this missing data.

Activate a Segment

After you create a segment in Data Cloud, you publish a segment to an activation target. Activation is the process that publishes a segment to activation platforms. An activation target is used to store authentication and authorization information for a given activation platform. Targets include Marketing Cloud, Data Cloud, B2C Commerce, Amazon Ads, Google Audience Insights, and many more.

Create a New Activation Target

Next, create an activation target to store that data back in Data Cloud. This is useful if you don't have a target system with which to activate Data Cloud segments, but you still want to use the activated data.

Go to the Activation Targets tab.
Click New.
Select Data Cloud and click Next.

New Activation Target.

Name your Activation Target Data Cloud Segments. Add an optional description.
Select default for your Data Space.
Click Save.

Activate Your Segment

Now that you have a target established (the where), you can activate your segment (the what). In this case, you want to add data about US-based customers who don’t have a zip code back into a Data Cloud object.

To see the content of your segment in Data Cloud, you need to activate it to the target selected.

Go to the Activations tab.
Click New.
For Segment, select the newly created No Zip Code segment.
Select Data Cloud Segments as your Activation Target.
For Activation Membership, select Unified Individual.

New activation to DMO.

Click Continue.
Next to Email, click + Select (displays as Selected) and then Next.

New Activation with email selected.

Click Add Attributes.
From Direct Attributes under Unified Individual, drag Last Name under the Unified Individual section on the right, next to the existing Unified Individual Id.

New Activation with last name added as an attribute.

Click Save.
Review the summary and then click Next.

New activation summary.

Name the activation No Zip Code.
Confirm the Incremental Refresh is selected and then click Save.

When a segment is published to the Data Cloud activation target, the Audience DMO is updated with the activated records. While it can take some time to process, to view these records, go to the Data Explorer tab and select the corresponding Audience DMO. It’s also good to know that segments activated to Data Cloud can be retrieved using Query API.

Verify Your Work

Now that you have your segment created, check your work and click Verify. For this exercise, we’re just checking that the segment and activation were set up correctly–you don’t have to wait for the activation to verify your work.

Hands-On Journey

Congrats on finishing this four-part hands-on journey about Data Cloud! While these projects focus on steps over concepts, they have taken you through some key features of Data Cloud.

Connect:

Bring in data into Data Cloud using data streams

Harmonize:

Transform data using formulas
Map object fields to connect them to the canonical Customer 360 Data Model
Create identity resolution rulesets to create unified profiles

Act:

Query your data and create actionable insights to identify a customer’s case count
Segment your unified profile data to learn more about missing data
Activate your segment back to Data Cloud to take action based on that missing data

What’s Next

So what’s next in your journey?

Learn More. Visit Data Cloud Resources in Help documentation to find Data Cloud videos, Trailhead modules, blogs, and more.
Explore Data Cloud. Use the Developer org to explore the Data Cloud interface and product functionality.
Provide Feedback. We’d appreciate feedback on your experience with this project (including the content, org, and more). Please fill out this linked survey. Your feedback will help us create future content for Data Cloud.

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