Marketing & Media:"The families, the couples, the best agers"
CRM & E-Commerce:"Everyone with revenue over €1,000"
Data Science:"Cluster 7 from K-Means"
Strategy:"The new customers"
Market Research:"The RFM segments"
Everyone is right – but we speak different languages.
The Answer
Not one definition for all – but a shared vocabulary across different levels.
What can help with this?!
🔍 The Segmentation Lens
Creating manageable order from overwhelming variety
🎯
Strategic
The Business Logic
📚
Theoretical-Model-Based
The Scientific Foundation
🔬
Statistical-Analytical
The Data Intelligence
📊
Attribute-Based
The Rule Logic
💬
Intuitive-Linguistic
The Everyday Understanding
"What business logic is behind it?"
New customers, Existing customers, Reactivation
Directly actionable, understood company-wide
Definitions vary depending on context
Strategy defines: "New customer = has only booked with us once"
"Which proven frameworks fit?"
Sinus Milieus, RFM Model
Validated, transferable, well-founded
Generic, adaptation needed
Research shows: These clusters correspond to known travel types from customer lifetime value literature.
"Which groups actually exist in the data?"
K-Means Clustering, Latent Class
Finds hidden patterns
Complex, "black box" risk
The algorithm finds: 7 distinct customer types with similar booking behavior.
"By which criterion do I divide?"
Age > 60, Revenue > €1,000
Clearly defined, reproducible
Simplifying, ignores complexity
In CRM: "Customers with booking value over €5,000 = Premium segment"
"Who do I actually mean?"
"Families", "Couples", "Retirees"
Quick, intuitively understandable
Subjective, not validated
On the ship we see: "Those are the best agers"
The Key Insight
Segmentation is not a method – it is a spectrum of structuring.
The art is not in choosing one level, but in knowing when which lens delivers the greatest value.
In Practice
Who uses which levels most frequently?
Marketing & Media
IntuitiveAttribute
CRM & E-Commerce
AttributeStatistical
Sales
IntuitiveAttributeStrategic
Revenue Management
AttributeStatistical
Product
IntuitiveStatisticalStrategic
Market Research
StatisticalTheoretical
Strategy
IntuitiveAttributeStatisticalStrategicTheoretical
What We Achieve With This
🏢
Internal
A shared language about the HOW of group classification – leverage synergies, avoid poor decisions.
🎯
External
Reach the right people with the right content at the right time.
🚢
The Starting Point
3,999 people want to board your cruise ship. Ask 5 departments who these people are – you'll get 5 answers.
The Key Insight
Segmentation is not a method – it is a spectrum of structuring.
The art is not in choosing one level, but in knowing when which lens delivers the greatest value.
🔍 Resolving Vocabulary Conflicts
Same word, different meanings — made visible
When Marketing reports 12,000 prospects, Sales reports 3,200, and CRM reports 8,500 — the Lens reveals why:
Apply the Lens
Department
Their "Prospect"
Layer
Criteria
Marketing
Ad engagers
Intuitive
"Showed interest"
Sales
Hot leads
Attribute
callback_requested = TRUE
CRM
Nurture pool
Attribute
newsletter = TRUE AND bookings = 0
The Resolution
All three are valid — they're just different lenses on the funnel. The Segmentation Lens makes the implicit explicit, turning vocabulary conflicts into structured alignment.