Customer Tags

[burt]

As some of you might be aware, I've been playing with Customer Segmentation, but hit an inflexibility, that inflexibility was solvable (but meant all shops would have to have the same "rules" for segmenting Customers [ie giving them a tag such as "VIP", "new" or whatever). I am not keen on forcing shops to do things in a set way, so to solve it I decided to create a Customer Tagging system, where shopowners can set up flexible Tagging Rules, eg

VIP:
spent more than 1000 in the last 90 days.

First Time Buyer:
has made exactly 1 order

Repeat:
has made > 1 order

Dormant:
has not ordered in at least a year

and so on.

For some shops,
VIP might be; has made 3 orders in the past 30 days.

Whereas another shop;
VIP might be; has spent 500, over at least 10 orders, in the past year

Or;
VIP might not even exist for some shops.

So, all Tags are flexible. Right?

tag_1.png

tag_2.png

Each Customer can have only ONE tag assigned to them (I coded it this way to make is fairly simple as I am doing this on my own time and effort, and I already spend far too much time and effort on Phoenix and trying to push tt forward).

The question then is; what if a customer qualifies for more than one tag? EG, a new customer, who buys so much on their first order that they qualify for "New Customer" and "VIP". This is where Tag priority makes it mark...each Tag is assigned a priority, and only the Tag of the most important priority is assigned to the Customer. In this case, assuming VIP priority is more important than New Customer, this customer would be VIP.

Tagging Customers is a hybrid of automatic and manual;

1. automatic
- when a customer creates an account, their Tag is updated based on your Rules
- when a customer checks out, their Tag is updated based on your Rules

2. manual
- sometimes customers fall out of scope (eg if they don't make an order, they might become "dormant")
- you add a new Tag which some existing customers might be segmented under
- you first install this system and all your existing customers have no tag!
In these cases (and probably others), there is a button to press which will renew your Customers Tag based on your Rules

In the Customers Page, Tags are shown;

tag_3.png

[burt]

My questions to the Community, in the hope to get some feedback, comments, advice, critics, whatever;

Does it make sense?
What have I not thought of?

[LeeFoster]

My questions to the Community, in the hope to get some feedback, comments, advice, critics, whatever;

Does it make sense?
What have I not thought of?

What is the usage behind the tags?

[burt]

What is the usage behind the tags?

Customer Segmentation.

EG,
show me Dormant Customers who have made at least one order
show me VIP customers who have not bought in the last 90 days
show me New Customers who have signed up in the last 10 days, but haven't made an order
etcetc

Download a segmented list, push the list to (eg) Queued E-mails or Mailchimp or whatever.

[LeeFoster]

What about "returning" customer - previously dormant but came back.

[burt]

Not forgetting the possibility of doing things like;

Show "Also Purchased" module to New Customers.
Show "Crypto" payment module to VIPs.

Etc. There's so much that something like this could achieve.


1. Marketing automation

Targeted email campaigns — e.g.,
Tag: VIP → send early product announcements.
Tag: At risk (no orders in 180 days) → send a win-back coupon.

SMS or push notifications based on behavior tags.

2. Promotions & pricing
Auto-apply special discounts for certain tags.
Restrict access to limited editions for VIP tagged customers.

3. Customer service prioritization
Flag High value customers in the admin so support agents see their importance.
Show special retention scripts for At risk customers when they contact support.

4. Loyalty programs
Tag customers reaching spending or order count milestones, and sync with loyalty software.
Offer free shipping automatically to Frequent buyers.

5. Fraud prevention & risk control
Tag customers with unusual behavior patterns (e.g., multiple failed payments, frequent returns).
Trigger manual review workflows for certain tags.

6. On-site personalization
Show different banners or recommended products for different tags.
Hide/show products based on tag (e.g., wholesale vs retail customers).

7. Operational workflow triggers
Tag: Preorder only → route orders differently in fulfillment.
Tag: Bulk buyer → send orders to a different warehouse.

8. Retention & lifecycle management
Tag new customers to give them onboarding content.
Tag lapsed customers for reactivation outreach.

If we hook tag assignment into both real-time events (e.g., new order placed) and scheduled sweeps (for inactivity-based tags), it stops being just a label and becomes a trigger for actions across the store, CRM, and marketing stack.

Think outside the Box, which is hard after 25 years of "just" being a piece of software that allows someone to buy something. It's time to think about retaining customers, winning back buyers, makinig buyers feel wanted and so on. Phoenix is being left behind, because shopowner and developers are happy with what they have because they don't know what else they could (relatively easily) do...

[burt]

What about "returning" customer - previously dormant but came back.

I've more or less based this only on ordering (or lack of!), ie buyers, or those who have bought in the past.

Do we care if a dormant (eg not bought in 18 months)...comes back?
I mean if they came back...and actually buy something...GREAT!
But if they come back, and don't buy? Are they still dormant? Maybe, maybe not.
Should they change to some other Tag ?

Feedback needed.

[frankl]

Do we care if a dormant (eg not bought in 18 months)...comes back?

I've had customers come back after 10 years

However I think if customers visit but don't buy, they are still dormant! Several reasons why they may be visiting your store:

• They are comparing prices, and don't like yours so leave.

• They are not customers, they are your competition checking out your site (logging in to see if logged in customers get a better deal)

• They are a bot. For example Google Shopping's bot (if you list on Goggle Shopping) does this to check prices, shipping prices, coupon codes, etc

• It is a customer checking to see the last time they bought something

• It is a customer unsubscribing (or hopefully subscribing!) to your newsletter

• It is a customer wanting to download a tax invoice for their tax return

• Plus many more reasons

[burt]

However I think if [existing] customers visit but don't buy, they are still dormant!

I agree. More feedback needed from others.

[Dan Cole]

However I think if [existing] customers visit but don't buy, they are still dormant!

I agree. More feedback needed from others.

Makes sense to me too.

Dan