What to Do If You Cannot Update a Segment
  • 21 Nov 2022
  • 1 Minute to read
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What to Do If You Cannot Update a Segment

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Article Summary

Scheduled segments are used in campaigns and workflows or to collect filter results with multiple complex conditions.

However, some conditions are so complex that the system cannot calculate a segment.

Issues and troubleshooting

  1. If complex conditions have been applied to a Scheduled segment and it takes over 24 hours to calculate the data, the platform will pause the calculation for 24 hours and add an issue on the Campaign & Data monitoring page:
Segment update paused: update is taking too long.

Please try simplifying the segment filter or contact your support manager for assistance.

There are two ways to help resolve this:

  • Simplify the segment filters (refer to this guide for more info);
  • Split your filter conditions into multiple Scheduled segments.
BeforeAfter
00_update_a_segment01_update_a_segment

Here, we combined conditions of the same type into a Scheduled segment. We then created another Scheduled segment containing the first segment.


  1. If you’re using multiple real-time events in your Scheduled segment for recalculation or it contains a lot of complex conditions, it may take more time than usual to update. In this case, an issue will be added on the Campaign & Data monitoring page:
The segment is taking too long to update.

Use scheduled segments or select a less frequent event to check customers’ inclusion in the segment.

To fix this, you can try:

  • Simplifying the segment filter (refer to this guide for more info).
  • Consider splitting conditions into multiple Scheduled segments. For example:
BeforeAfter
02_update_a_segment03_update_a_segment

Here, we split the scheduled segment’s complex filter into two separate conditions. The first one contains the order condition, the second one — the action. Then, we created a Scheduled segment for every condition.

You can also select a smaller action template category while choosing "action issued" as an event to update a segment.

Example 1

Before: 10 action templatesAfter: 6 action templates
04_update_a_segment05_update_a_segment

Checking email opens requires going through lots of action templates.
You can significantly reduce the number of templates checked by using a specific campaign to limit the number of templates.

Example 2

Before: lots of eventsAfter: one event left
06_update_a_segment07_update_a_segment

The "before" segment had to check if customers met its conditions each time a customer was added to the database, changed their subscription or email. The selected events made it difficult to update.
In the "after" segment we reduced the number of events, where possible.

If necessary, you can create individual Scheduled segments for each event.