Dynamic (Smart) Groups

Having talking about segmentation previously, we now turn our attention to how we can put it into practice. One of the most important reasons we segment data is to produce mailing lists so we can send relevant messages to specific groups of contacts. You’ll likely already be familiar with static lists. These are lists that you create against a criteria at some point in time and then must be manually updated every time circumstances change or as new contacts get added to your database.

This can be very time consuming and the likelihood is that you will schedule a regular time to update the list rather than updating them every time a record is created or updated. This can lead to newer contacts missing communications or other such issues.

Unless you are running a very specific campaign targeted at a set list of people, you should be looking to use dynamic lists. These automatically add (and remove!) contacts from your list based on pre-determined criteria.

If for instance, you have a dynamic group for London based contacts, then it would automatically add anyone who had their address entered as London with no extra effort on your part.

This saves you significant time, reduces the risk of errors and lets you spend more time writing the best possible content for your readers.