Overview
Segments are used throughout Pendo to filter users for analytics and target users for guides. If a visitor meets all rules of a segment, they will be included whether that segment is applied over data or used for targeting a guide.
Create a Segment
You can create a segment on any of the Pages, Features, Visitors, Accounts, Funnels, and Paths page by clicking the Segment dropdown, then "+ Create New Segment."
Within the guide designer, each guide has a segment tab where existing segments can be used to target users or a custom segment can be created.
Segment Rules
Segment rules utilize Product Usage data, Visitor, or Account metadata to dictate which users are targeted. This includes any metadata passed through your snippet (e.g. Visitor ID, email, isTrial, title, etc.) or any of the following rules provided by Pendo:
Product Usage (Feature, Page, or Guide usage and/or Poll Responses)
- "Page ‘Dashboard’ Seen at least 10 times"
- "Poll ‘Q1 NPS Survey’ response less than or equal to 8"
Visitor or Account Level Metadata
- First Visit
- Last Visit
- Number of Days Active
- Number of Events
- Time on Site
Account Level Metadata
- Account ID
- Number of Visitors
Visitor Level Metadata
- Account ID’s (All accounts visitor is associated with)
- Visitor ID
- Most Recent Browser Name
- Most Recent Browser Version
- Most Recent Operating System
- Most Recent Server Name
- Sample Group
Mobile Specific Data
- App Version
- SDK Version
Create Segments with a CSV file
Additionally, Pendo allows you to upload a .csv file with a list of visitors or accounts that you would like to include/exclude from the segment. When adding a segment rule, select either the "Account ID" or "Visitor ID" attribute and then either "contained within list" or "not contained within list." You will then be prompted to upload the .csv file.
File Format
In order for the file to upload correctly, it must be formatted in a way that Pendo can read. Visitor or Account IDs must be in a single, line-delimited column in the file. No other columns, punctuation, or special characters are supported in the file. So for example, you would want a file that looks like the following:
Visitor/Account ID Errors
After you upload the file, Pendo will run a quick check on a sample subset of the IDs that are contained within the file. If there is a mismatch between the supplied IDs and those stored within your Pendo account, you will see a warning on the completion dialog:
This error can occur for several reasons. Account and Visitor IDs are passed directly to the client-side Pendo snippet when it is installed within your application. For more information on this, please see our installation articles. You can double-check the format of the IDs in your file by comparing them to the results you see in either the Visitor or Account reports in Pendo.
If the IDs are formatted correctly, then the issue may be due to the fact that Pendo simply hasn’t tracked any events for some of the visitors or accounts on the list. You may be pulling the IDs from another system (like Salesforce), and Pendo may not have a record of them yet. This is especially likely with a new installation. Once those users are tracked within Pendo, they will be added (or excluded) from the segment you have defined.
Segment New Users
Utilize the Pendo provided field "First Visit" to segment new visitors to your application. "First Visit" is the date and time Pendo first received an event for the Visitor. If you want new users to see a welcome guide or tour, you can structure a rule like the following:
- First Visit within last 1 Day
- First Visit since "Date"
Copy Segment
If you have a segment you want to reuse and modify, you can copy or duplicate it. To do this, just navigate to the existing segment and click the copy icon next to it in the dropdown menu. Then, you can give the copy a new name and tweak as you need. Once you save, the new segment will be selected automatically for your current view.
Sample Groups
It is possible to randomly sample a visitor population with Pendo’s automatically assigned Visitor Data field "Sample Group." Common uses for this include NPS Surveys or other types of user polling where you don’t typically want to survey your entire user base at once, or A/B testing of guide content where you may want to serve two different guide designs to different user samples to see which has a higher response or engagement rate.
A Sample Group value is assigned to every new user when they first visit your application. When a user is first captured by Pendo (based on unique Visitor ID), they are randomly assigned a Sample Group between 0 and 99 (inclusive). Visitors are automatically distributed evenly across these groups, so each group represents close to 1/100 of your total user base.
Create a User Sample
Use the Sample Group Visitor Data field to create a rule (or multiple rules) that specify a subset of sample groups that you would like to target.
Ex. Using multiple rules to target 50 - 74 sample groups (25% of your user base):
To push an NPS Survey to 25% of your user base, you could also create a segment of sample groups 0 through 24. Or, if you wanted to A/B Test two different guide designs, you could target one at a segment of sample groups 0 through 49, and the second at 50 through 99.
You can see the sample group assignment for any user by looking drilling into the “Visitor Details” report for that user.
Ineligible Segments for Guide Targeting
When segmenting guides, you may run into the below tooltip as you set up your guide segmentation. Segments with "Only Me" visibility will be greyed out. Certain segment rules are also not available for segmentation of guides.
Ineligible rules include:
- Time on Site
- Number of Days Active
- Last Visit
- Number of Events
- Account ID’s (All accounts visitor is associated with - found under Visitor Metadata)
- Number of Page Views
- Number of Feature Clicks
- Click or Track Event Properties
Guide targeting rules using Page Views are limited to "Seen" or "Not Seen" with the following conditions:
- "Seen" options include ever, since, within last, at least, or at most
- "Not Seen" - ever, since, or within last
Guide targeting rules using Feature Clicks are limited to "Used" or "Not Used" with the following conditions:
- "Used" options include: ever, since, within last, at least or at most
- "Not Used" options include: ever, since, or within last
As you deploy Pendo Guides, you might have a scenario where you want to target a Guide to users who have or have not seen a different or previously deployed Pendo Guide. In this scenario, you will have the options for "Viewed" or "Not Viewed" ever.
Troubleshooting Segments
Using multiple "does not contain" with "OR"
You may want to show a guide to most users except those from specific Accounts. If the guide segment is created with OR:
Visitor ID does not contain Apples
This statement is saying to display the guide to everyone other than Apples, including Oranges
OR
Visitor ID does not contain Oranges
This statement is saying to display the guide to everyone other than Oranges, including Apples
The above parameters will not segment out Apples or Oranges. This is because even if the Visitor ID contains Apples, it will be allowed through because it does not contain Oranges and vice versa.
To exclude both Visitor ID’s containing Apples and Oranges, we will use "AND":
Visitor ID does not contain Apples
AND
Visitor ID does not contain Oranges
Account vs. Visitor Data Attributes
When creating segments, make sure you are aware of the difference between an Account and Visitor. Segments allow you to develop groups based on product usage, account attributes, and visitor attributes.
There are parallel fields, like First Visit and Last Visit, that exist as both an Account and Visitor Field. When creating a segment confirm that you are selecting a field under the desired data (Account Data or Visitor Data).
Managing Segments
Navigate to the Segments Management Page from the "People" section in the left nav.
From this page, you can see all segments that were created by you or another user on this page.
