Audience loyalty funnel and RFV segmentation
Marfeel segments audiences by reader loyalty so publishers can tailor content and marketing strategies to each engagement tier. By identifying which readers are new, casual, loyal, or deeply engaged, publishers can develop strategies that retain their most valuable audience while activating segments with growth potential.
Segmenting audiences by loyalty helps publishers identify their most valuable readers, those most likely to engage with and share content, and build strategies to keep them coming back. Learn how Marfeel segments audiences based on loyalty and the benefits and insights you can extract from each segment, even from users who prefer to browse privately. After all, the absence of data can also generate meaningful insights.
How does Marfeel determine reader loyalty?
Section titled “How does Marfeel determine reader loyalty?”Marfeel models its loyalty funnel using the RFV (Recency, Frequency, and Volume) customer segmentation model. Invented by the Financial Times, RFV is an engagement score that is actionable for every website. RFV provides a clear and measurable way to segment users and identify the most valuable readers. Marfeel shows publishers the content consumption trends of their most loyal readers in various ways throughout the platform.
How is RFV calculated?
Section titled “How is RFV calculated?”RFV combines three dimensions of reader behavior into a single engagement score:
- Recency: when was the last time the user visited the website?
- Frequency: how often does the user return to the website?
- Volume: what is the average number of pageviews this user consumes?
RFV scores run from 0 to 100, where 100 means the reader comes back every day and reads several articles each time, as recently as yesterday.
Audience loyalty funnel
Section titled “Audience loyalty funnel”Find the audience loyalty funnel in Compass to see the loyalty of concurrents in real time.
- New (RFV = 1): A first time visitor in the last 30 days
- Fly-by (RFV ≤ 10) A user that has visited more than once your site but not enough to remember your brand
- Casual (RFV ≤ 35) Casually came to your website over the last 30 days, remembers your brand but is not loyal to it and it is unlikely to come directly to your website. Typically would enter through Social or Search. It is a good segment to be activated because it has the potential to become loyal
- Loyal (RFV ≤ 60). Users that come to your website often and identify with your brand. Likely to convert.
- Lover (RFV ≤ 100): Your most loyal reader. Comes almost every day and reads multiple stories. Cannot live without it.
- Private (RFV = ?): Users who did not give their consent to track their engagement level.
Article RFV
Section titled “Article RFV”In Compass, click on the three dots next to Audience loyalty funnel to Plot it to the main graph and visualize the distribution among the different segments of the funnel.
The histograms for each post will now reflect the average RFV for the article:
Compass automatically assigns a score to each reader and aggregates it to provide an RFV score for each article. For example, an article read by users with RFV scores of 10, 12, and 20 will have an RFV of 14, indicating that overall the content is resonating with casual visitors.
The same RFV attribution can be applied to any dimension, such as Author, Section, Topic, Tag, etc:
The aggregate loyalty score for each section shows which kind of readers are gravitating toward which section, painting a picture of the value for each section in terms of acquisition and retention.
Gain more insights from the audience loyalty funnel as it relates to engagement [link], advertising, and subscriptions [link].
How does Marfeel calculate reader loyalty using RFV?
Marfeel uses the RFV model (Recency, Frequency, Volume), invented by the Financial Times. It scores readers from 0 to 100 based on how recently they visited, how often they return, and how many pages they view per session. A score of 100 means the reader visits daily and reads several articles each time.
What are the loyalty funnel segments in Marfeel?
Marfeel segments readers into six tiers: New (RFV = 1), Fly-by (RFV up to 10), Casual (RFV up to 35), Loyal (RFV up to 60), Lover (RFV up to 100), and Private (users who did not consent to tracking).
Can I see the RFV score for individual articles?
Yes. Compass assigns a score to each reader and aggregates it per article. For example, an article read by users with RFV scores of 10, 12, and 20 will have an article RFV of 14, indicating it resonates with casual visitors. The same attribution applies to authors, sections, topics, and tags.