Tags and segments: sending an issue to part of your list

How reader tags work in Brieva: defining the vocabulary, letting readers pick tags on the sign-up form, tagging readers yourself, and restricting sends to a segment.

The short version

A tag is a short label on a reader, such as vip, customer or auckland. A reader can carry several.
The newsletter defines its tag vocabulary once, under Tags & segments. Everything else refers to that list.
Readers get tags three ways: they tick them on the sign-up form, you set them in the Subscribers panel, or a CSV import supplies them.
Send to controls who receives issues: leave it empty to send to everyone, or pick tags to send only to readers carrying at least one of them.
A link like /subscribe/{id}?tag=vip pre-ticks a tag on the sign-up form, which is how you route different audiences into segments from different places.

The three lists in the panel

Tags & segments has three parts and it helps to keep them straight. Tags is the vocabulary: every tag this newsletter uses, comma-separated. Readers may pick these on the sign-up form is the subset that appears as tick boxes to the public. Only send issues to readers with any of is the subset that gates sending. The second and third lists can only contain tags from the first.

A typical setup for a builders' newsletter: tags are vip, trade and auckland; the sign-up form offers trade and auckland so readers self-describe; send-to is empty so everyone gets every issue, with vip kept aside for the occasional members-only send.

How readers get tags

On the sign-up form. If any tags are marked public, the form shows them as tick boxes under the email field and the reader's choices are saved when they confirm. Readers can only give themselves tags you have made public; a tag posted to the sign-up endpoint that is not public is ignored.

From a link. Append ?tag=vip (or ?tag=vip,auckland) to the sign-up page URL and those boxes are pre-ticked. Put the vip link in a customer-only email and the plain link on your website, and readers sort themselves without being asked.

By you. In the Subscribers panel each reader has a Tags button that opens the vocabulary as chips; tick and save. The filter row at the top shows a count per tag and narrows the list to one tag.

From a CSV. The third column of an import is tags separated by | or ;. See the CSV import help page.

Sending to a segment

Choose one or more tags under Only send issues to readers with any of and save. From then on every issue, whether scheduled or approved by hand, goes only to active readers who carry at least one of those tags. It stays that way until you clear the selection, so it suits an ongoing members-only newsletter better than a one-off. For a one-off, set it before approving the issue and clear it afterwards.

The Issues page shows the recipient count once an issue has gone out, so you can confirm the segment took effect. Readers outside the segment are untouched: they stay active and receive issues again as soon as the send-to list is emptied.

Tag names

Lowercase letters, digits, hyphens and underscores, up to 32 characters, up to 30 tags per newsletter. Brieva lowercases and trims what you type; a name with spaces or other characters is dropped, so use auckland-north rather than Auckland North.

Renaming a tag is two steps: add the new name to the vocabulary, retag the readers, then remove the old name. Removing a tag from the vocabulary does not strip it from readers who already carry it; they simply stop matching any segment until retagged.

What segments are not

Tags do not change what is written. Every reader who receives an issue receives the same issue. If you need different content for different audiences, run them as separate newsletters (Pro allows three, Scale ten), each with its own sources and sign-up form.

Tags and segments are available on Pro and Scale.

Ready to set it up?

Open the app See plans