How to split customers into segments based on purchase behavior or location to target them more precisely.
While customer groups are a fixed, manually assigned classification, segmentation goes a step further: customers are automatically sorted into dynamic groups based on criteria like order history, total spend, location, newsletter status, or recently viewed products – groups that update themselves with every new order.
What this looks like in practice
- Magento Open Source (Community Edition, as used on this project) has no native segmentation feature – extensions or external marketing tools are typically used for this instead.
- Adobe Commerce (Enterprise) includes "Customer Segments" as a native feature under Customers > Customer Segments, directly combinable with cart price rules and email campaigns – e.g. automatically offering 10% off to customers who haven't ordered in 90 days.
- A simple starting point with no extra software: use the reports under Reports > Customers (e.g. "Order Total" or "Order Count", see the "Customer Reports" chapter) to manually identify target groups, then export those for e.g. a targeted newsletter campaign.
Typical segmentation criteria
Even without a native segment feature, it's worth keeping the following questions in mind – usually answerable manually via reports or a connected CRM/email tool: who hasn't ordered in the last X days (re-engagement)? Who has the highest total spend (VIP outreach)? Who signed up for the newsletter but never ordered (first-purchase incentive)? Who regularly reorders the same product (reorder reminder)?
For most small and mid-size stores, a combination of customer groups (for fixed pricing/tax logic) plus an external email marketing tool with its own, usually far more comfortable segmentation is the most practical approach, rather than switching to Adobe Commerce.
Custom customer attributes as a filter criterion
Under Stores > Attributes > Customer you can create your own customer attributes (e.g. "Industry" or "Customer Type" as a dropdown). If you enable the Add to Customer Grid option when creating it, the attribute appears as an additional, filterable and sortable column in Customers > All Customers – a simple way to narrow down customers by your own criteria even without a native segmentation feature.
Advanced filtering and export in the customer grid
The Filters button in the customer grid lets you narrow down by, among others, customer group, country, ZIP code, website (in multi-website setups), and sign-up date (Signed Up From/Signed Up To). Export the filtered result via the Export button as CSV or XML – the resulting list can be imported straight into an external email marketing or CRM tool for finer segmentation there.
Newsletter subscribers as a simple segment
Under Customers > Newsletter Subscribers you'll find a separate list of all newsletter subscribers with a status (Subscribed, Unsubscribed, Not Active), independent of whether a customer account also exists. Practical tip: this list is already a simple, immediately usable "interested but not necessarily a customer yet" segment, and makes a good starting point for first-purchase campaigns.