Segments

Table of Contents

• Overview - What are segments?
• Enabling segments
• What can be controlled in a segment?
• Subscriptions and audiences
• Segment personalization menu
• Social campaigns
• Analytics
• Permissions and views across segments
• FAQ

Overview - What are segments?

Segments allow an organization to provide tailored experiences for different groups of employees within a single company-wide intranet. Think of them as viewing the same information through different lenses.

Employees can be segmented based on either:

• Division
• Department
• Company
• City
• State/Province
• Country
• User type

Each of these attributes can be used for segmentation, but only if they are marked as non-user editable from your syncing source in Manage > Application > People > Provision & sync users.

Each segment can have individual settings for Branding, Home defaults and Home settings (e.g. the Carousel and Dashboard configurations), and Featured sites.

The example below shows a graph of four different divisions within one major company using Simpplr. They will each have their own segment set up by the App manager. As you can see, all the same sites are there for all segments. All that changes is which sites and content get displayed in each segment.

Divisional Architecture for McPherson (fictional energy company)

Note:

Segments serve to provide a different look and feel into your version of Simpplr. The same sites and content will live across all segments. For example, a China-based branch may have a different home dashboard layout than users from the US, but all users will have the same access to content throughout the intranet. Site membership is NOT affected by segmentation. User permissions MAY be affected by segments depending on the use case, e.g., if a Branding manager is assigned to a segment, they will now only be able to control the branding for their segment, not the entire application or other segments.

Enabling segments

As the App manager, head to Manage > Application > Segments you can enable segments. You can select from the following attributes to create segments:

• • Division
  • Department
  • Company
  • City
  • State/Province
  • Country
  • User type

Note that once segments are created, you can create new audiences out of segments as well.

You have the option for all segments to be branded individually or for the same branding to be used.

Only App managers can create and manage segments across your intranet. Once you decide which attributes to choose:

1. When first setting up segments for your org, you'll notice that two options, Home dashboards and Featured sites will be grayed out for switching to "Same for all segments." These two options will always be set to "Managed per segment" as the primary purpose for segmentation on the intranet is to highlight different sites and content for different user groups. These two options cannot be set to "Same for all segments." 

   There will always be a default segment for users who don’t have the attribute marked that determines segment. This default segment will be where those users go.

Note:

When you're ready to launch your segments, note that it can take up to 4 hours for segments to be created. During this time, your intranet will be in maintenance mode and cannot be accessed. We highly recommend letting the system set up segments during non-working hours for the majority of your users.

What can be controlled in a segment?

In summary, the following intranet components can be configured per segment:

• Branding
• Home dashboard
• Home defaults
• Featured sites
• Apps & links
• Subscriptions and audiences

To open the Segment personalization menu, head to Manage > Segments. 

Branding

Each segment can have its own personalized branding, including color palette, logos and favicons. For full instructions on branding your intranet, check out this article!

Home dashboard

If the home control is set to 'User-controlled' at the application level, then home dashboards will be configurable for each user within their segment. The App manager will be able to add new tiles and push them to users’ dashboards across all segments.

If the home control is set to 'App manager-controlled' at the application level, then users will not be able to configure their home dashboard. Under this setting, only App managers will be able to configure a different home dashboard for users across each segment.

Home defaults

The 'Home default' takes effect when home control is set to 'User-controlled,' This is the view that a new employee will see when logging in for the first time - after this, employees can customize their own home with layout and tiles of their choice. App managers will be able to set the layout and tiles for new employees.

Featured sites

Featured sites can offer your users easy navigation to the most common sites. Segments can have their own featured sites as well. For documentation on enabling featured sites, click here.

Featured sites can be segment-specific. 

App managers and users with 'Manage all sites' permissions can control featured sites across segments. Since App managers have access to all segments, they can mark sites as featured site in any segment. 

• As sites are common across all segments, one site can be featured in just one or across multiple segments
• If there is a need of marking one site as featured site for multiple segments, the App manager must be in the respective segment
• A user with 'Manage all sites' permission can only add a featured site to their own segment

Users are able to add up to 10 featured sites from the 'Add/update' modal in the Featured tab.

Apps & links

The Apps modal can be configured per segment to show applicable apps and links for those users. For full instructions on setting up apps & links, click here.

Subscriptions and audiences

For global and site-level subscriptions:

• Only App managers can add new subscriptions
• Subscriptions are NOT segment specific. App managers can add subscriptions for the entire org or a specific audience

It's also worth noting that audiences are NOT segment specific, but there will be a Segment attribute to choose from when adding new audiences. Subscriptions should be able to use all the audiences irrespective of the Segment attribute.

If segments are enabled, the Segment attribute will be available as an option while creating an audience. It allows the creation of an audience of all the users within a segment. These audiences are not limited to a segment, and can be visible and used in other features across segments.

Segment personalization menu

App managers can launch the Segment personalization bar from the Manage menu or from the Edit section under Segmentation, allowing them to edit personalization for any segment.

Clicking on any of these options will open the Segment personalization launch bar in the header, presenting all five configurable options.
The launch bar will have the option to switch segments on the left and access segment personalization options in the header.

Social campaigns

When segments are enabled, creating a social campaign now presents an additional option to ‘Include everyone in the segment.’

Analytics

App managers are able to filter certain analytics dashboards and widgets by segments to see data for only a single segment instead of across your entire instance. Additionally, some widgets allow you to group by segment so you can compare segment performance. 

Permissions and views on segments

Viewing dashboard:

• Unlisted site content is only displayed to members of that unlisted site (or users with permission to view unlisted site content)
• Private site content is only displayed to members of that private site (or user with permission to view unlisted site content)

Editing dashboard:

• All tiles are displayed
• Unlisted site content to be redacted for non-members of the unlisted site (or users without permission to view unlisted site content)
• Private site content to be redacted for non-members of private sites (or users without permission to view private site content)

FAQ

Q: Can users belong to multiple segments? A: No, each user can belong to only one segment based on the defined attributes.

Q: How are segments created? A: Segments are created by the App manager through the Manage > Application > Segments menu.

Q: Can segments be changed after creation? A: Yes, segments can be edited or redefined by an App manager as needed.

Q: Will there be any downtime during the creation of segments? A: Yes, the intranet will be in maintenance mode for up to 4 hours during segment creation.

Q: Are there any restrictions on what can be customized per segment? A: Home dashboards and featured sites must be managed per segment.