How to Build a Group

Table of Contents

• Overview
• How Group Filters Work
• Create a New Group
• Add Conditions to a Filter Set with "+"
• Choose Any or All
• Use Includes and Excludes
• Example Groups
• Build a Group from within the Campaign Wizard
• Common Questions

Overview

The Super Pixel tracks the Activities and Attributes of people who visit your site. You can use those Activities and Attributes, along with data you import, to filter your Community and save the results as a Group.

A Group is a saved set of filters that runs against your whole Community. Groups are dynamic: new people join automatically when they meet the filters, and people leave when they no longer match. You can use a Group as the audience for ad and email campaigns, as a campaign Goal to track conversions, or as a distinct audience for web analytics.

Note: If you edit a Group, the change applies everywhere that Group is used, including any live campaigns.

This article walks through building a Group by hand. It also explains how filter sets, the "+" button, Any/All, and Includes/Excludes work together, so you can be confident your Group contains the people you expect. Prefer to describe your audience in plain language? Try the Pixl Group Builder, then use this article to review and refine the filters it creates.

How Group Filters Work

Every page visit, email open, ad click, and form submission a person makes is saved as its own Activity. Feathr sometimes calls these Activities Breadcrumbs. Group filters check a person's Activities (what they did) and Attributes (facts about them, like Times Seen or Email) to decide whether they belong in the Group.

Six building blocks make up every Group:

For the full list of filter options, see Activity Fields and Attribute Fields.

Create a New Group

Step 1: Go to the Community section in the left navigation pane.

Step 2: In the People area, preview the preset filters or create a custom filter.

Step 3: Click + Add Filter Set and choose the variable that decides who belongs in your Group. The default is URL Visited, which filters by page visits. Click the variable to see the other options in the dropdown.

Note: Hover over any variable to see a description of what it does.

Step 4: Add more rules if you need them:

• To add another condition about the same Activity (for example, which email link someone clicked), click the "+" to the right of the filter set. See Add Conditions to a Filter Set with "+".
• To add a separate behavior or Attribute (for example, someone who visited a page and opened an email), click + Add Filter Set again. Then choose Any or All. See Choose Any or All.
• To remove people who match a filter set, switch its toggle from Includes to Excludes. See Use Includes and Excludes.

Step 5: Set the date range. Click from any time to choose starting from, within the last, or before and set a custom range. If you leave it as from any time, the Group includes all the data the Super Pixel has collected.

Step 6: Check the people count at the top of the list. If it's much larger or smaller than you expected, review your filters before saving. Opening a few person records to see why they qualified is a quick way to check.

Step 7: Click Save as Group in the bottom right. The Edit Group modal appears.

Step 8: Give your Group a name. We recommend a consistent naming convention, like "Audience – Behavior – Timeframe" (for example, "2026 Conference – Visited Pricing – Last 30 Days"). Tags are optional, but they help organize Groups by Project or Campaign. Click Save Changes to finish.

You can view and edit your Groups anytime from the Groups area of the Community menu.

Add Conditions to a Filter Set with "+"

The "+" button next to a filter set adds another condition to that filter set. We call a filter set with more than one condition a compound filter. In a compound filter, every condition must be true on the same Activity.

Clicking + Add Filter Set is different. It adds a new, independent filter set, and each filter set can be matched by a different Activity, even one from a different day.

This difference matters most when you filter by a campaign or email. Here's an example. You want everyone who opened your Spring Newsletter:

• Compound filter (correct): One filter set: Campaign is Spring Newsletter + Activity Type is Opened email. Feathr looks for a single Activity where the person opened that email.
• Two separate filter sets (too broad): Campaign is Spring Newsletter and, with All, a second filter set, Activity Type is Opened email. This matches anyone who had any Activity with the Spring Newsletter (even just being sent it) and opened any email. That includes people who never opened the Spring Newsletter.

Use "+" when your conditions describe one action. Some examples:

• Opened, clicked, or was sent a specific email: Campaign is [campaign] + Activity Type is [type]
• Clicked a specific link in an email: Campaign is [campaign] + Activity Type is Clicked email + Link target is [URL]
• Submitted a specific form: Form is [form name] + Activity Type is Submitted form
• Clicked (not just saw) an ad in a specific campaign: Campaign is [campaign] + Activity Type is [click]

Use + Add Filter Set when you're combining different behaviors or Attributes. Some examples:

• Visited your pricing page and opened any email
• Visited the registration page but did not reach the confirmation page
• Has been seen more than 10 times and has an email address

Tip: Ask yourself, "Could one click or one page view make all of these true at once?" If yes, use "+". If the conditions describe different moments, use + Add Filter Set.

Choose Any or All

When a Group has more than one filter set, the People matching Any / All toggle decides how they combine.

• Any (OR): A person joins the Group if they match at least one filter set. Use it to widen an audience, like combining visitors of several event pages or people who interacted with any of three campaigns.
• All (AND): A person joins only if they match every filter set. Use it to narrow an audience, like people who visited the pricing page and have an email address.

Note: Any/All applies to the filter sets in your Group. The conditions inside a single filter set (added with "+") must always all be true together.

Use Includes and Excludes

Each filter set has an Includes / Excludes toggle. An Excludes filter set removes the people it describes from your Group. Use Excludes to remove people who have already done what you're asking them to do, like registering, purchasing, opening, or unsubscribing.

Pair Excludes with All

When your Group combines an Includes filter set with an Excludes filter set, set the toggle to People matching All. This tells Feathr: "Include the people in the first filter set, and they must not match the excluded filter set."

If you leave it on Any, the Group matches people in your Includes filter set or anyone who doesn't match your Excludes filter set. That's usually most of your Community. If a Group with an Excludes filter set is much larger than you expected, check this toggle first.

Exclude people instead of using "is not"

Is not and Excludes look similar, but they give different results.

• Is not checks individual Activities. URL Visited is not /confirmation matches anyone who visited any other page, so it still includes people who reached your confirmation page, as long as they also visited another page (and nearly everyone does).
• Excludes checks the whole person. An Excludes filter set with URL Visited is /confirmation removes anyone who has ever visited that page in your date range.

Use Excludes when you want to leave out people who have done something. Use "is not" inside a compound filter when you want to leave out one kind of Activity but keep the person. For example, URL Visited starts with https://www.example.com/ + URL Visited is not https://www.example.com/careers finds people with at least one site visit that wasn't to your careers page.

Keep exclusions specific

An Excludes filter set removes everyone who matches it, so make it as specific as the people you mean to remove. To exclude people who opened a campaign, exclude a compound filter (Campaign is [campaign] + Activity Type is Opened email). Excluding Campaign is [campaign] by itself would remove everyone who had any Activity with that campaign, including everyone it was sent to.

Exclude in the Group or in the campaign?

Many campaigns, including email campaigns and Email Mapping, let you add a Group as an exclusion in the campaign wizard. Both approaches work, so choose based on how you'll reuse the audience:

• Exclude in the Group when the exclusion is part of what the audience is. For example, "Visited registration page but didn't register" is only useful with the exclusion built in.
• Exclude in the campaign when you want to reuse one standard Group, like "All Registrants" or "Unsubscribed contacts," as an exclusion across many campaigns. When you update that one Group, every campaign that excludes it stays current.

Note: Because Groups are dynamic, people who match an Excludes filter set leave the Group automatically. For example, someone who registers mid-campaign stops qualifying for a "hasn't registered" Group.

Example Groups

Use these recipes as a starting point. Each one starts in Community after you click + Add Filter Set. The labels you see may vary slightly depending on your account's data. For example, some organizations track conversions with a Conversion Pixel and others with a confirmation page URL.

People who were sent an email but didn't open it

Use it to re-send an email to non-openers, or to retarget them with ads.

1. Filter set 1 (Includes): Campaign is [original campaign] + Activity Type is Was sent email
2. Filter set 2 (Excludes): Campaign is [original campaign] + Activity Type is Opened email
3. Set the toggle to People matching All.
4. Optional: set the date range, like within the last 14 days.

People who interacted with a campaign but haven't converted

Use it to follow up with people you've reached (for example, through Email Mapping, Geofencing, or an email campaign) who haven't registered or purchased yet.

1. Filter set 1 (Includes): Campaign is [campaign name]
2. Filter set 2 (Excludes): Conversion Pixel is [your conversion pixel]
   • Tracking conversions with a confirmation page instead? Use URL Visited is [confirmation URL].
3. Set the toggle to People matching All.

People who clicked a specific link in an email

1. Filter set 1: Campaign is [email campaign] + Activity Type is Clicked email + Link target is [link URL]

All three conditions belong in one filter set because they describe a single click.

People who submitted a specific form

1. Filter set 1: Form is [form name] + Activity Type is Submitted form

All website visitors

1. Filter set 1: URL Visited starts with https://www.example.com/
   • Use starts with rather than is, so the Group includes every page on your site.
   • End the URL with a forward slash ( / ).

If your Super Pixel is on more than one website, create a separate Group for each.

People who reached a confirmation page with a unique ID

Some registration systems add a unique ID to each confirmation URL, like https://exampleevent.com/Conference2026/registrant/**8675309**/Confirmation/.

1. Filter set 1: URL Visited matches pattern https://exampleevent.com/Conference2026/registrant/\*/Confirmation/
   • Replace the unique ID with an asterisk ( * ) so the Group matches every registrant.

Unsubscribed contacts

• Unsubscribed from all Feathr email: Unsubscribed From Email is True. This includes people who opted out of your emails and people on an opt-out import list.
• Unsubscribed from a specific Project: Unsubscribed From Project contains [Project name]

These Groups work well as campaign exclusions.

For more Group ideas, like Super Users and Campaign Interaction Groups, see Best Practices for Groups.

Build a Group from within the Campaign Wizard

In campaigns like Pixl Plus, Retargeting, and Email, you can add an existing Group as your audience, or build a new Group without leaving the Campaign Wizard.

Step 1: Go to the audience step of your campaign and click the box that says Choose or create a group.

Step 2: Click + Create new group at the bottom of the dropdown.

Step 3: A new Group appears, named "Group created for [your campaign's title]."

Step 4: Click the ellipsis on the right side of the Group and select Configure Filters.

Step 5: Add filters the same way you would in Community, then click Save.

Common Questions

My Group has far more people than I expected. What happened?

Check these three things first:

1. An Excludes filter set with Any. Switch to People matching All. See Pair Excludes with All.
2. "Is not" where you meant Excludes. "Is not" checks individual Activities, so it rarely removes people. See Exclude people instead of using "is not".
3. Separate filter sets where you meant "+". If your conditions describe one action, like opening a specific email, they need to be in the same filter set. See Add Conditions to a Filter Set with "+".

My Group has fewer people than I expected, or none. What happened?

• Two conditions joined with "+" can't both be true on one Activity. For example, URL Visited is /pricing + Activity Type is Opened email will never match, because a page visit isn't an email open. Move the second condition into its own filter set.
• All is selected when you meant Any.
• The date range is narrower than the activity you're looking for.
• You used is for a URL that has sub-pages or query strings. Try starts with or matches pattern.

Why is a specific person in my Group?

Open their person record and look at their Activities. To see only the Activities that matched the Group, view the person from the Group's detail page and switch the Activity filter from All activity to Group activity.

If I edit a Group, will it change my campaigns?

Yes. A Group's filters apply everywhere the Group is used. If you want to test a change without affecting a live campaign, duplicate the Group or build a new one first.

Can the Pixl Group Builder build these for me?

Yes. The Pixl Group Builder can turn a plain-language description into filter sets, and it works especially well as a first draft. Always review what it builds, using the checks in this article, before you use the Group in a campaign.