Segment an audience by industry, size, title and country
A segment is a group of people you will treat differently: a different message, a different offer, a different sender. Segments worth building are large enough to measure (MarqIQ asks for 20 people), built on fields that are actually filled, and defined by one or two traits, not five. This article gives the four cuts most B2B teams use, the size rules, how to build them in your tool, and how MarqIQ proposes them from your own records. Ask “which audience segments should we target” for your list.
The four cuts, in the order they pay off
| Cut | Use it for | Needs |
|---|---|---|
| Industry | The proof and the language in every email and page | An industry field filled on the company, or on the contact |
| Job title / seniority | What the email asks for: a CMO gets a strategy conversation, a manager gets a how-to | A job title field with values you can group (VP, Director, Manager) |
| Company size | Which offer and which sales motion | An employee-count or revenue-band field, usually from enrichment |
| Country / region | Sender, time of send, language, legal footer | A country field — geo-IP fields are a fallback, not a source of truth |
The rules
- A segment needs at least 20 people to be worth a different message, and at least 100 to read a click rate.
- The field behind the cut must be filled on at least 30% of your records, or the segment is really “people with the field filled”.
- Two traits at most. Industry × seniority is a segment; industry × seniority × size × country is a person.
- Name it by the trait, not the campaign: “Healthcare — Director+”, not “Q4 push”.
- For ABM, build the account list first (named companies), then the personas inside it. The segment is the intersection.
Build them in your tool
Check the fill of the field before you build on it.
Ask “what percentage of contacts have an industry” or open Field intelligence. A segment on a 12%-filled field is a mistake you will only see in the results.
Normalise the values first.
Fifteen spellings of “United States” make fifteen segments. Standardise countries, states and job titles before you segment.
Create the segment as a live list.
HubSpot: an active list. Marketo: a smart list. Salesforce: a report or a campaign with a rule. Pipedrive: a filter saved on people.
Give each segment one message and one sender.
If two segments get the same email, they are one segment.
Review sizes monthly.
A segment that shrinks below 20 is folded into its neighbour.
How MarqIQ helps
Ask “which audience segments should we target” and MarqIQ lists the segments your own records support — by industry, country, job title, source and stage — with the count behind each and a note where a field is too thin to use. Companies’ industry and size are read through the company link when contacts do not carry them.
Next steps
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