Customer Segmentation using RFM Analysis

How well do you know your customers? Whether you operate in a B2B or B2C space, chances are that 80% of your business comes from just 20% of your customers (Pareto's Principle). According to a study by Forbes, acquiring new customers costs five times more than retaining the existing ones. Identifying high-value customers is crucial to increase revenue and building brand loyalty.

Customer Segmentation is a critical strategy for businesses to understand and engage with customers effectively. Understanding the behavioral patterns of customers can help personalize the purchases they make and cater to their needs better. 

Questions like who are the customers who contribute more to sales, who are the customers about to churn, will help digital marketers understand the behavioral patterns of their customers. 

While there are many criteria based on which the customer base can be segmented, this solution focuses on segmenting customers based on the RFM analysis.

What is RFM Analysis?

RFM analysis (Recency, Frequency and Monetary) is a method used to identify and segment existing customers based on their purchasing behavior.  The key metrics of RFM analysis include

Recency

Recency refers to how recently a customer has made their purchase and this is the most important metric of the other metrics. This metric is a strong indicator of customer loyalty and interest.

Frequency

Frequency refers to how often a customer makes purchases or interacts with a business within a specific period. It measures the level of engagement and loyalty of a customer.

Monetary

Monetary value refers to the total amount of money a customer has spent with a business during a specific period. 

Industry-Specific Applications of RFM Analysis

• SaaS and subscription services: RFM analysis can be adapted for SaaS and subscription services to segment users based on engagement, renewals, and revenue contribution.
  
• Financial Sector: RFM analysis can improve credit scoring and risk assessment by evaluating customer transaction patterns, helping financial institutions make more informed loan approval decisions.
  

Data Requirements

For RFM analysis, you'll need a transactional dataset with the following equivalent columns (details) 

• A product (Product ID)
  
• A related transaction (Transaction ID)
  
• Number of products purchased in a transaction (Product Quantity)
  
• The product purchase price (Product Price)
  
• Transaction date (Date)
  
• Customer who made the purchase (Customer ID, Customer Name)
  

We have used a sample table of e-commerce data for illustration.

Steps for Implementing RFM analysis

1. Gather and Prepare Transaction Data : 

Gather all transaction data, ensuring it includes customer identifiers, transaction dates, and monetary amounts, and address missing or inconsistent values, ensuring data integrity before analysis.

2. Compute RFM Metrics: 

To segment customers based on their behavior, we compute three key metrics: Recency (R), Frequency (F), and Monetary Value (M). Below are SQL queries for each, along with detailed explanations.

Recency (R)

Recency measures how recently a customer made a purchase. It is calculated as the number of days since their last transaction. Customers with recent purchases are more engaged, while those who haven’t bought in a long time may be at risk of churn.

The time frame for RFM analysis should be tailored to your business model and industry. Choosing the right period for RFM analysis is essential, as it directly influences the accuracy of customer segmentation and the quality of insights derived.

Frequency (F)

Frequency tracks how often a customer makes purchases within a specific period. A higher frequency indicates a loyal customer who regularly shops, while a lower frequency suggests occasional or one-time buyers.

Monetary Value (M)

The total amount spent by the customer in the same period

RFM Query Table

SELECT "Customer ID", "Customer Name", DAYS_BETWEEN(MAX("Transaction Date"), CURRENT_DATE()) AS "Recency", COUNT ("Order ID") AS "Frequency", SUM("Transaction Amount") AS "Monetary Value" FROM  "Customer Data"  GROUP BY "Customer ID",   "Customer Name"  ORDER BY "Recency" ASC,   "Frequency" DESC, "Monetary Value" DESC

3. Segment Customers using Cluster Analysis

Manual scoring can skew the results and may not be practical for handling large volumes of data. In contrast, using machine learning algorithms like cluster analysis ensures unbiased, efficient, and data-driven segmentation. Unlike traditional scoring methods such as the quantile or percentile-based approach, cluster analysis recognizes inherent relationships and patterns in the data. With cluster analysis, business can obtain accurate segmentation and devise targeted strategies to improve sales and customer retention.

Follow the below steps to apply cluster analysis,

1. Click the Create New icon and choose New chart from the drop-down menu.
   
2. Add the columns to the chart shelf as shown below,
   
1. X-axis: Customer Name
   
2. Y-axis: Monetary Value with Sum function.
   
3. Click Generate Graph and change the chart type to bar chart.
   
   
4. Click the Analysis icon and select Cluster Analysis > Add Clusters.
   
5. The Model is chosen automatically based on the columns dropped in the shelves.
   
6. By default, the columns dropped in the shelves (Monetary Value) are selected as factors. Click the drop-down icon to include Recency and Frequency columns as factors.
   
   
7. The number of clusters is determined automatically but can be adjusted based on business needs and specific customer segmentation goals to ensure optimal categorization.
   
8. Choose the Normalization method to prevent values of high ranges from dominating the results. For instance, Recency (measured in days) and Monetary Value (measured in currency) have different scales, and normalization ensures a balanced contribution from each metric.
9. Click Apply.
   
   

4. Export Clusters Data

Once the customer profiles have been segmented using cluster analysis, Export the Current view in the preferred table format to build more data visualizations to understand the clusters.

Build an RFM Analysis Dashboard

The RFM analysis dashboard provides a comprehensive view of customer behavior. Let's look at the steps involved in building this dashboard.

1. Import the Clusters Data

Import the downloaded clusters table back into Zoho Analytics using the files option as given below.

1. Click the New icon on the side navigation panel and choose New Table/ Import Data.
   
2. Select files and choose the Clusters Table to import and click Next.
   
3. A data preview will be displayed; verify the data types of columns and click Create.
   

2. Create Reports to Understand the Characteristics of the Clusters

While the data is clustered, understanding the characteristics of each cluster is what enables businesses to take strategic actions. This includes identifying which customers need targeted marketing, personalized engagement, or retention efforts. Recognizing patterns within clusters provides insights into customer behavior, which is essential for optimizing marketing campaigns, improving retention strategies, and enhancing customer experience.

The below reports help understand the distribution of customers across different monetary value, recency and frequency segments within each cluster.

Clusters vs Monetary Value 

1. Access the cluster table (imported data) and click the new icon > chart view.
   
2. Drag and drop the columns as given below:
   
1. X-axis - Clusters
   
2. Y-axis - Monetary Value with the Count function.
   
3. Color - Monetary Value with the Actual Range function.
   
   

Analyzing the chart, we can infer that,

• Cluster 1 consists of a diverse group of customers spanning all spending levels.
  
• Cluster 2 includes moderate to high spenders who contribute significantly to revenue.
  
• Cluster 3 comprises low to mid-range spenders, often occasional buyers.
  
• Cluster 4 represents high-value customers with premium spending habits.
  
• Cluster 5 consists primarily of low spenders with minimal purchasing activity.
  

You can similarly create reports to know about the distribution of customers for the Recency and Frequency metrics.

The below table lists the characteristics of clusters

Cluster	Cluster Classification	Recency	Frequency	Monetary	Recommended actions
Cluster 1	Needs Attention	100 to 150 days	Low to Moderate	Diverse spending	Re-engagement campaigns, discounts, or reminders to encourage repeat purchases.
Cluster 2	Loyalist	0-50 (Highly Active)	High	Consistent moderate-to-high spenders	Loyalty programs, exclusive deals, early access to new products to maintain engagement.
Cluster 3	Potential Loyalist	0-50 (Active)	Low to Moderate	Budget-conscious, occasional buyers	Cross-selling, personalized recommendations, and value-based promotions.
Cluster 4	Champions	100-150 (Inactive)	Moderate to High (Frequent buyers)	High spenders	VIP experiences, personalized services, and premium offers to retain and enhance their spending.
Cluster 5	Hibernating	Mostly inactive or infrequent	Low	Minimal spending	Win-back campaigns, incentives, special discounts, and targeted ads to regain interest.

Based on the above table, you can give specific labels to the clusters using the bucket columns option.

RFM Dashboard

Limitations & Considerations of RFM Analysis

While RFM analysis is a powerful customer segmentation tool, businesses should be aware of certain limitations and factors that can influence results:

• Data Freshness and Relevance: RFM analysis relies on transactional data, making the freshness and relevance of this data crucial for accurate customer segmentation. Setting up automated data imports ensures real-time updates, reducing the risk of working with stale data.
  
• Seasonal Variations: Customer purchasing behavior often fluctuates due to seasonal trends, holidays, and industry-specific cycles, which can impact RFM scores and lead to misleading segmentation if not accounted for properly. Instead of analyzing only recent months, compare customer behavior for the same period in previous years to detect true engagement patterns.

• Topic Participants

• Nisha Angel J

  

• Hammer Group

• Juan

• Sticky Posts

• What’s New in Zoho Analytics – September 2025

  Hello Users!! In this month’s update, we’re raising the bar across multiple touchpoints, from how you bring in data, plan and track projects to how you design and brand your dashboards. We’ve added the all-new Gantt chart for project visualization, expanded

• Announcing Agentic AI - Ask Zia!

  We are delighted to roll out the new agentic AI capabilities in Ask Zia, where every stage of the BI workflow is assisted by AI. With a human-in-the-loop approach, Ask Zia ensures that you’re in command of the decision, while AI handles the complexity.

• Invitation-Based User Access in Zoho Analytics

  Hello everyone, We’re rolling out an important update on how users are added to your Zoho Analytics Organization and Workspaces. Previously, when admins added users, they were automatically added to the organization. Moving forward, to improve security

• Zoholics Europe 2025: Your Ultimate Data Analysis (Zoho Analytics) Workshop Experience

  Why should you attend? This year, Zoholics Europe 2025 is putting data analysis centre stage. With a dedicated workshop designed to answer all your data-related questions, you’ll gain practical skills, real-time solutions, and expert insights that you

• [Webinar] Evolving BI & Analytics in the Age of AI

  Artificial intelligence is redefining how data is collected, analyzed, and leveraged across industries. As businesses strive to become more agile and insight-driven, traditional BI and analytics must transform to meet new demands. AI-first organizations

• Recent Topics

• upgrade storage

  how to upgrade my storage

• Linking items from books and subscription

  Linking books and subscription It is a pity that it is not possible to associate with a product an article present in ZohoBooks This would make it possible to manage products composed of a nomenclature of articles of books

• Add the ability to view number of hours planned for a workorder while in the Dispatch Console

  Hi Zoho, When dispatching a work order through the Dispatch Console, there's currently no way to view the number of planned hours for the service tasks associated with that specific work order. Having to click into the details each time to check planned

• Uploading Files from uploads api

  I tried uploading the image from the API call but its giving me unauthorized error even i have given valid token in header. After uploading i need that id to pass in create ticket api uploads but its not uploading that file. Please help me out in th

• Categorize Items with Item Headers

  Hello customers, Did you ever want to classify items based on specific categories to help your customers understand your invoice better? With the new Item Header feature, you can easily categorize items in your invoices and estimates and give them a common title.  Item Headers are available in the Invoices, the Recurring Invoices and the Estimates module. It can be carried forward from estimates to invoices at the time of converting the estimates.  To add an item header: Go to the Estimates, Invoices

• URLs being masked despite disabling tracking

  Hey, We had disabled click tracking from an email update we are sharing with our users. Despite this, the URL the end user is receiving is masked, and looks like "https://qksyl-cmpzourl.maillist-manage.net/click/1d8e72714515cda6/1d8e72714515ca70" instead

• Change format of quantity format

  Hi,  I would like to change the qunatity format from 1,00 to 1.  Is this possible?   thanks!

• square up and Zoho books

  Since we set up the app connection between square up and Zoho books we have realised that when the amounts are getting transferred Zoho is adding VAT again making the numbers 20% more than they should be. We have checked our settings and they VAT/ Tax

• How to provide Access rights to specific Bank accounts

  We have several bank accounts. I want to provide certain members access to only 2-3 accounts. It appears that when I give permissions, they are for ALL bank accounts. How do I do that?

• Errors Getting a Bank Transaction

  Using Postman(for testing), I am receiving errors when attempting to get a single bank transaction. I am able to receive the list of bank transactions with https://www.zohoapis.com/books/v3/banktransactions/?organization_id={org_id} but when I try to

• Subscriptions Plans and CRM Products Integration?

  Is there any way to set up plans and pricing in Zoho Subscriptions and have those available as Products in the CRM? We are trying to set up the CRM and the Products seem to be more geared toward selling products that are not subscription based.  So if we sell annual or monthly contracts which are $10/seat/month, I can set this up as a plan in Subscriptions, but how can I set the same thing up in the CRM for the salespeople to sell/quote? What is the best practice for setting up the CRM Products to

• Mapping Zoho Subscription Plans and Products to CRM and Books

  We have products that are one time products and subscription products.   1) We would like to have the ability to create an opportunity in CRM that includes both one-time charge products and subscription products.  Currently the only way of creating a subscription product is by defining a "Product->Plan" hierarchy in Zoho Subscription.  It appears that the only SYNC between Subscription and CRM is around contacts and the Product->Plan hierarchy doesn't sync to CRM, thus, you would need a duplicate

• Zoho People Attendance Module - Split Shifts

  Hello, Our business employs a number of college students who often split their workdays between work hours and class schedules, resulting in split shifts. For example: Employee 1 works 9am to 11:30am and then leaves for class, returning to work at 3pm

• Bulk update fields based on date

  Hi! I need all the quotes with "Quote Stage" set to "Next Year" to update to "Draft" every January 8 (every year). Can you help?

• Target for a campaign

  Hi, Hope you can help me. I need to create a report (for a marketing campaign) that combines Deals and Contacts to export all the contacts with closed deals. I can easily do that, what I cannot do is to remove from the target the contacts that have more

• Zoho Desk + Jira integration - Email notifications and comments posted by administrator instead of real user

  Dear All, I set up the integration under my admin account, and now when users leave comments in Jira (to created tickets in Zoho Desk), the email notifications show that the ‘Administrator’ left a comment, not a real user. The same happens in the ticket

• Celebrating the power of visuals

  On World Photography Day, we would like to highlight the power of visuals in customer service. Visuals promote learning and understanding in less time. A photograph can rekindle a memory, convey more than words, and give a fresh perspective. How does

• Customer address in Zoho Bookings

  Hello,  Is it possible to add customer address information to the Zoho bookings appointment screen? Or have it pull that information automatically from the CRM? We are wanting to use this as a field management software but it is difficult to pull the address from multiple sources when it would be ideal to have a clickable address on the appointment screen that opens up the user's maps.  It would also be advantageous for the "list view" to show appointment times instead of just duration and booking

• Blocking / black listing customers

  Hi, We have a situation, we observed that certain customers are blocking multiple appointments with our advsiors but not showing up. Some of these are repeat offenders. This leads to those service hours getting blocked and not available for genuine customers.

• Option to block bookings from specific email address or ip adresss in zoho booking

  Sometime few of our client keep booking irrelevant booking service just to resolve their queries and they keep booking it again and again whenever they have queries. Currently its disturbing our current communication process and hierarchy which we have

• Feature Request: Email Templates for notifications accross all services

  Currently in Zoho Bookings, email notifications (such as booking confirmations, reminders, and cancellations) must be customized individually for each service. This becomes time-consuming and error-prone when managing multiple services that require consistent

• Allow customers to choose meeting venue and meeting duration on booking page

  My business primarily involves one-to-one meetings with my clients. Given the hybrid-work world we now find ourselves in, these meetings can take several forms (which I think of as the meeting "venue"): In-person Zoom Phone call I currently handle these

• Approval-based booking with Zoho Creator and Zoho Bookings

  Hi community members, We have developed a workaround for approval-based booking using Zoho Creator and Zoho Bookings! This provides a temporary solution as we work on the native feature, and it's useful for anyone needing an approval workflow when confirming

• Member Accounts in Related List

  Hi Team, Currently, when a parent account is associated with an account in FSM, there is no related list displaying the associated member accounts under the parent account’s related list section. To view member accounts, I have to manually search using

• how do i remove a specific Zoho Service from my account

  I no longer need Zoho CRM, ZRM Assist nor ZRM BugTracker. How do I remove them from the list of apps for my account?

• I Want migarte all invoice details to zoho sheets

  I want to migrate all existing invoice details to Zoho Sheet, and automatically update the sheet whenever a new invoice is created.

• were can i find my invoices i need this for my accountant

  were can i find my invoices i need this for my accountant, how can i get id direct to my email?

• ONLY email field not populating Writer fillable document (randomly)

  I have a Zoho Writer fillable document that has pulled all my data from my Zoho Sheets file, EXCEPT the email column. It pulled every data before and after that column with no issues. Screenshots attached. It's not my first time using the app or the feature,

• My number is marked as spam

  Hello Zoho Mail Support, My phone number was incorrectly flagged as “spam” during sign-up. This is my personal number, and I have not engaged in any spam activities. Kindly review and verify my account so I can proceed with my email setup. Thanks.

• Personnalisation des paramètres dans Zoho Mail

  Pourquoi cela compte-t-il ? La personnalisation des paramètres dans Zoho Mail permet aux administrateurs de configurer l’environnement de messagerie en fonction des besoins spécifiques de leur organisation. Que ce soit pour alléger l’interface pour certaines

• How To Save Data Into Zoho CRM Sandbox

  Hi Community, I want to save data into my zoho sandbox , for this I am using this api endpoint - https://www.zohoapis.com/crm/v8/Patients but I am getting this error - { "success": false, "message": "Zoho API request failed", "error": { "code": "INVALID_MODULE",

• Automate pushing Zoho CRM backups into Zoho WorkDrive

  Through our Zoho One subscription we have both Zoho CRM and Zoho WorkDrive. We have regular backups setup in Zoho CRM. Once the backup is created, we are notified. Since we want to keep these backups for more than 7 days, we manually download them. They

• Question about retrieving unsubscribed contacts (outside of lists) via API

  Hello, I am currently using Zoho Marketing Automation and would like to integrate it with our company’s core system. For this purpose, I am exploring the API options available to retrieve contact information. Specifically, I would like to know if there

• Getting “mandatory field missing: Service_Line_Items” When Creating Work Order via Zoho Flow Deluge

  Hi Team, I’m trying to create a Work Order in Zoho FSM with only a Service Line Item (no Parts). However, I keep getting this error: Work Order Response: {"code":"MANDATORY_NOT_FOUND","details":{"api_name":"Service_Line_Items"},"message":"required field

• How to customize the colors of the Client Portal login screen and add the company logo?

  As title, how to customize the colors of the Client Portal login screen and add the company logo?

• Daily updates/fixes and how to see what was changed?

  When I receive the notification that zoho was updated and I need to refresh it. How can I see what was changed or fixed? Sometimes they change things that effect my books and I need to know what they did. For example over this past weekend something was

• Upcoming Change: Snowflake Username/Password Authentication Deprecation – Action Required

  Hello Users, Snowflake has officially announced that username and password-based authentication will be deprecated by November 2025. You can find the official announcement [here]. If you're using a Snowflake connection in Zoho Analytics to import data,

• Why should I choose Zoho Inventory vs Odoo?

  Hello there! I have used Zoho in different companies I've worked in, and I have a positive perception of it. I am starting a new import business for pipes, tubes, fittings, valves, elbows, etc., which all have serial numbers, cast numbers, etc., so I

• Product Updates in Zoho Workplace applications | July 2025

  Hello Workplace Community, Let’s take a look at the new features and enhancements that went live across all Workplace applications this July. Zoho Mail Import bookmarks from Pocket Worried about losing your Pocket bookmarks? Don't worry we have got you.

• PLEASE FIX YOR BUGS

  PICTURES ARE BEING REJECTED DESPITE THEM FOLLOWING THE GUIDELINES ON DIMENTIONS.

• Next Page