Workarounds for Email Segments Without Upgrading Your Plan

MailChimp

If you’re using Mailchimp with a free account, you’re limited in some important ways—especially when it comes to segmentation and advanced audience targeting. Here’s what you can and can’t do, and a few workarounds if you’re trying to email a segment without upgrading:

Free Plan Limitations (as of early 2025):

• You can’t use advanced segmentation (like combining conditions, using tags, purchase behavior, etc.).
• You can only create one audience (list).
• You can tag contacts, but using tags for campaign targeting may be limited.
• Email sends are capped per month and per day.

What You Can Do:

1. Use Basic Filters in Campaigns

• When creating a campaign, you can select a “Group or new segment” and apply basic filters:
  • Example: Contact rating, sign-up source, or tag (if allowed).
• This lets you send emails to a portion of your audience even on the free plan.

2. Use Tags Manually

• Go to your Audience > All contacts.
• Tag the people you want to email.
• Create a campaign and choose send to tag (if your free plan allows this—some older free accounts do, some newer ones might not).

3. Export and Re-import (manual segmentation)

If tags/segments are blocked:

• Export the contacts you want to email (filtered by criteria).
• Create a new tag in your audience.
• Re-import them and assign that tag during import.
• Then send to that tag.

4. Use Groups (if available)

• Groups are different from tags and might be available.
• You can create group categories like “Interest” or “Type of customer” and assign people to them.
• Then target the group via campaign.

Workaround Example (No Paid Plan, Want to Email a Segment):

1. Go to Audience > All contacts.
2. Use the filter tool to narrow down your segment (e.g., only contacts from a specific location or tag).
3. Export that segment as a CSV.
4. Re-import them with a new tag (like “Segment_April2025”).
5. Create a campaign and send it to the “Segment_April2025” tag.

Constant Contact

If you’re using Constant Contact instead of Mailchimp, the good news is: segmenting is a bit easier, even on the lower-tier plans.

Here’s what to email a segment in Constant Contact—paid or non-paid:

Basic Segmentation in Constant Contact (Even on Free Trial or Core Plan):

1. Use Lists

• Constant Contact is list-based.
• So the easiest way to “segment” is to create a new list and add the relevant contacts to it.
• Then send your email to that list.

2. Tag Contacts

• You can tag contacts based on behavior, interest, or manual criteria.
• During campaign creation, you can choose to send to contacts with a certain tag.

3. Create a Segment (Dynamic Filter)

• Go to Contacts > Segments > Create Segment.
• Use filters like:
  • Contact details (location, tags, source)
  • Engagement (opened last X emails, clicked a link)
  • Date added, etc.
• Save that segment, then choose it when sending an email.

4. QuickSend from Contact Search

• If you just want to send a campaign to a handful of people quickly:
  • Search for them by name, tag, or criteria.
  • Select them.
  • Use the QuickSend option to fire off a recent campaign.

Workaround If Segmentation Feels Too Limited:

If you don’t have access to advanced filtering on your plan:

• Export the filtered contacts.
• Create a new list or tag.
• Import them with that tag or into that list.
• Send your campaign to that new list/tag.

Tip:

MailChimp and Constant Contact lets you resend to non-openers, A/B test subject lines, and use automation (on higher plans), so even basic segmentation can go far when paired with those tools.

Lovingly made by Worship Times, Websites for Ministries