Refining Your Audience with Groups and Past Campaigns

Advanced targeting in ThruText helps you send the right message to the right contacts by narrowing your audience based on groups or past campaign activity. By combining segments and using Add and Remove logic, you can tailor messages, re-engage specific contacts, or avoid duplicating outreach—making your campaigns more effective and efficient.


This guide is designed for admins who are already familiar with creating ThruText campaigns and using basic targeting. You’ll set up advanced targeting during the Targeting (Audience) step when you create or edit a ThruText campaign.


TABLE OF CONTENTS


What Is a Segment?

A segment is a portion of your universe that you want to include in, or exclude from, a campaign.

In GetThru, a segment can be:

  • A group
  • The recipients of a past campaign

Every targeting setup begins with a Base Segment, which is your starting audience, that you can then add to or subtract from using additional segments.


Where Advanced Targeting Fits in the Campaign Flow

You configure targeting when you create or edit a campaign:

  1. Start a new ThruText campaign or open an existing draft.
  2. On the Targeting step, build your audience by adding one or more segments.
  3. Use Add segments to include more contacts and Remove segments to exclude contacts.

Basic targeting is selecting a single group as your audience. Advanced targeting combines multiple segments or utilizes past campaign data to refine who should (or should not) receive your messages.

Screenshot of the Targeting section in dark grey font on a white background. 3 drop down menus in a row, horizontally.

Targeting Groups

Targeting groups is the most straightforward way to build your audience. The default Source type is Group.


To create a segment from a group:

  1. On the Targeting step, confirm that Source is set to Group.
  2. Use the Group drop-down menu to select one of your uploaded groups as your Base Segment.
  3. Review the Total Contacts count at the bottom of the Targeting section to see how many people are currently included.

You can add more group segments later using the + Add Segment button if you want to combine multiple groups into a single audience.


Targeting Past Campaigns 

You can also target contacts based on their participation in a past ThruText campaign. This is helpful when you want to:

  • Follow up with people who did or did not reply last time, or
  • Narrow your audience based on survey responses from a previous campaign.


To create a segment from a past campaign:

  1. On the Targeting step, change the Source to Campaign. 
  2. Use the Campaign drop-down to select the past campaign you want to use. 
  3. Choose whether to filter by reply status and/or survey responses.


Using Reply Status Filters

Reply status filters let you target contacts based on whether they responded to the initial message in a past campaign.


After you select a campaign in the Campaign drop-down, use the Reply Status menu to choose one of the following:

  • Any Reply Status: Includes contacts regardless of how they replied.
  • Replied at Least Once: Includes only contacts who replied to the initial message.
  • No Reply: Includes only contacts who did not reply to the initial message.

Screenshot of the targeting section, there are 4 drop down menus and the fourth is expanded showing the words "Any reply status" focused.

Any reply status and No reply will include all contacts that meet those conditions, whether or not a contact was sent an initial message in the source campaign.


Using Survey Response Filters

If the targeted past campaign used survey questions, you can further filter the audience to focus on specific responses.


You’ll only see the Add Filter button when survey questions were included in the past campaign you selected. If no survey questions were added, you won’t see an Add Filter option for that segment.


To filter by survey responses:

  1. After selecting a past campaign, click Add Filter.
  2. In the Survey drop-down, choose the survey question you want to filter on.
  3. In the Response drop-down, select one of the following:
    • Any Response: Contacts who provided any answer to the survey question.
    • No Response: Contacts who did not have any response recorded for that survey question.
    • Survey Response: Contacts who gave a specific response to the survey question (for example, “Yes”).

Screenshot showing the Response drop down expanded with the options "Any Response", "No Response", "Yes", and "No".

No Filter and No Response will include all contacts that meet those conditions, whether or not a contact was sent an initial message in that targeted campaign.


AND vs OR Logic for Survey Filters

  • Adding multiple surveys beneath the same past-campaign segment creates an AND condition:
    • A contact must meet all of the selected survey criteria to be included.
  • Targeting the same past campaign in multiple segments (one survey per segment) creates an OR condition:
    • A contact only needs to meet one of the segment criteria to be included.


Combining Segments with Add and Remove Logic

Once you’ve set your Base Segment, you can use the + Add Segment button to combine multiple segments into a more precise audience.


For each segment, you can choose a Type:

  • Add: Includes contacts from that segment in your Target List.
  • Remove: Excludes contacts from that segment from your Target List.

You can mix group and past-campaign segments in the same campaign. For example:

  • Start with a group of all members in your state (Base Segment).
  • Add a past-campaign segment to include people who RSVP’d “Yes” to an event.
  • Remove a past-campaign segment to exclude anyone who already received a follow-up campaign.


Segment Order Logic

Segments are applied from top to bottom, so the order of your segments affects the final list of contacts.


Consider three example groups:

  • Group 1: Annie, Brad, Charles
  • Group 2: Daniel
  • Group 3: Brad, Daniel


Example 1: Remove After Add

  1. Base Segment: Group 1 (Annie, Brad, Charles)
  2. Add Group 2 (Daniel) → Annie, Brad, Charles, Daniel
  3. Remove Group 3 (Brad, Daniel) → Annie, Charles


Final result: Annie, Charles


Example 2: Add After Remove

  1. Base Segment: Group 1 (Annie, Brad, Charles)
  2. Remove Group 3 (Brad, Daniel) → Annie, Charles
  3. Add Group 2 (Daniel) → Annie, Charles, Daniel


Final result: Annie, Charles, Daniel


Even though the same groups are used, changing the segment order changes who is included in the final Target List. 


Always review your targeting before launching. After a campaign is launched, you can’t edit or add segments.


Additional Resources