There are six standard personas generated by Dotdigital's RFM model which can be used in contact segments.
The RFM personas generated by Dotdigital are specific to your business. Each score that powers the persona is relative to the behaviour of your entire customer base. A customer identified as Loyal for you may not be categorised in the same persona for another business.
Standard personas
There are six standard personas. Each standard persona is underpinned by a core purchase life cycle model, ranging from Active, Lapsing, and Inactive. This is visualised on the customer dashboard:
Champions persona explained
These are the biggest spenders who buy frequently.
How we score them
Recency is equal to 3, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 8 and 10.
Insights and actions
Some insights into Champions and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
Active shoppers, have made a recent purchase. | Think beyond marketing: engage with them directly and reward them for their time. |
These are your best customers and need to be rewarded. | Engage with surveys. Seek feedback on your products, service, and even future ideas. |
Potential brand advocates and promoters who are worth more than their orders. | They have great taste and deep strong knowledge. Include them in customer focus groups, send them sample products to try. |
Their opinions and knowledge can be incredibly valuable. |
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Loyal persona explained
High spending frequent purchasers, potential champions
How we score them
Recency is equal to 3, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 4 and 7
Insights and actions
Some insights into Loyal personas and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
Active shoppers, have made a recent purchase. | They love your products, engage them for reviews. |
Your brand, products, and marketing are already resonating with them. | Amplify their loyalty and make it viral: create referral programs that reward them and their friends. |
Current behaviour indicates they could become Champions if treated appropriately. | Promote secret sales, give them early access to your newest products, let them know they are special. |
Recent persona explained
Recently acquired customers.
How we score them
Recency is equal to 3, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 2 and 3
Insights and actions
Some insights into Recent personas and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
Active shoppers, have made a recent purchase. | Ensure post-purchase emails include big-hitting product recommendations like best sellers. |
It’s cheaper to retain than acquire, make sure you understand the value of these new customers. | Use progressive profiling tactics to collect their marketing preferences, mobile number, etc. |
Encouraging repeat purchases is your biggest challenge. | Build omnichannel nurturing programs: if they don’t open emails, try re-marketing through Facebook and Google Ads. |
Time is a key dimension in winning this segment. Their current engagement could wane quickly if you don’t act. | They are fresh eyes and new information. Engage with surveys: find out where else they shop, and whether you met their needs and expectations. |
High potential persona explained
Big and frequent spenders who need attention.
How we score them
Recency is equal to 2, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 6 and 10.
Insights and actions
Some insights into High potential personas and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
Above average loyalty and spending behavior; they could become some of your best customers. | Predictive product recommendations can unlock their next purchase. Their multiple purchases provide excellent profiling data for machine learning. |
Showing the first signs of lapsing, they should have made another purchase by now. | Loyalty and reward schemes may help reduce the churn. If you use points, coupons, private sales, etc, this persona is perfect to target. |
High risk persona, needs special attention. |
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Need nurturing persona explained
Low to medium recency, frequency, and monetary spend.
How we score them
Recency is equal to 2, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 2 and 5
Insights and actions
Some insights into Need nurturing personas and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
It has been a while since a purchase was made. This persona should be considered a lapse risk. | Focus on incentivisation. |
On the lower end of Frequency and Monetary behaviours. This persona needs work to build loyalty. | Consider reducing send volumes when you are outside of sale season. |
These customers often seek value, but it could be difficult to ween them off of coupons. | Build your brand. Share valuable content and resources with them, such as blog posts, videos, guides, etc. |
| Segment on email opens, email clicks, web sessions, etc. Whilst they are lapsing, recent engagement may be buy signals. |
Inactive persona explained
Customers who have stopped purchasing.
How we score them
Recency is equal to 1, and the combined Frequency and Monetary score is between 2 and 10
Insights and actions
Some insights into Inactive personas and the type of actions you can take to keep them as customers.
Insights | Actions |
Frequency and monetary values are varied, but there have been no recent purchases. | Exclude from regularly marketing campaigns, hit them only with your big promotion events. |
These are your least active customers; they have gone away. | Consider using mixed channels when re-engaging. If they aren’t engaging with emails, remarket through Facebook and Google Ads. |
| Automation programs should trigger on contacts entering this persona and use a strong discount-led offer. |
Create a custom persona
In Dotdigital, go to Audience > Segments, and select NEW SEGMENT. Alternatively, you can edit an existing segment.
Choose a template to create a segment from.
Drag an RFM score block onto the segment builder canvas.
Select Click here to choose an RFM persona, this opens the Choose RFM persona panel.
For Persona type, select Custom.
To set the custom scoring system –that's any value, that is is any, an exact value, that is is equal to X, or a range, that is in between X and X– expand the Recency, Frequency, and Monetary drop-down menus and enter your rules.
Each dimension is scored between one and five, apart from Recency, as this field is scored between one and three, reflecting a purchase life cycle model.
You can use your RFM segment to filter your Ecommerce report. Learn more in Ecommerce report.
Important
Please note that we cannot guarantee that custom personas will be unique sets of customers, meaning you run the risk of having a contact in more than one custom persona. To avoid this, we recommend using a standard persona, which can be found by switching the Persona type toggle to Standard.