The goal of segmentation is to meet your customers where they’re at.

In practice, this means providing a tailored end-to-end ecommerce shopping experience at every touchpoint. By undergoing segmentation, brands can uncover new opportunities to strengthen their relationship with consumers - and help them stand out from the rest. Demographic segmentation however, won’t cut it. Though simple to define, it’s almost impossible to change or influence behaviors through advertising based on demographic segmentation alone. Consumers are simply much more complex than their age, income or location. Neither will behavioral segmentation. It’s possible to change or influence behaviors through advertising based on behavioral segmentation, but only to a certain extent. Rather than just observe their actions, ecommerce marketers need to know why consumers do things, as this is key to reaching them on an emotional level. This is where attitudinal segmentation comes in. In this instance, segmenting attitudinally will help marketers uncover in detail what customers value most in an online shopping experience. Consequently, these insights:

• Show which ecommerce personalization features are priority for each audience segment (personalizing the homepage and navigation, or re-targeting consumers before or after they’ve left your ecommerce website, for example).
• Will inspire your approach to messaging and advertising to be as tailored as possible.

As an example of how this theory works in action, our coronavirus research tells us 10% of consumers cite shopping online more during the outbreak to ‘treat’ themselves. Though this audience can be further segmented by attitudinal, behavioral and demographic traits, marketers already know that reinforcing the sentiment of ‘rewarding or treating yourself’ at key touchpoints in the path to purchase is likely to appeal.

Online retailers need to adapt with their audience, not trail behind.

Despite increased competition and an overly saturated market, profiting in the online retail space ultimately boils down to being in tune with your audience. Segmenting attitudinally allows you to tap into the things your customers care about and amplify these exact factors through the functionality of your website and in your messaging.