The Consumer in Your Segmentation Model May No Longer Exist

Most segmentation models are built on a simple premise: consumers can be grouped into stable categories. Whether those categories are based on age, income, social class or life stage, the underlying assumption is the same. People belong somewhere, and once we know where they belong, we can make reasonable assumptions about how they think and behave.

For a long time, that approach worked well enough. Demographic categories provided a practical way to organize audiences, target media and build marketing strategies. But a growing body of evidence suggests consumers are becoming harder to describe through fixed labels alone.

Recent research conducted by Attest points to a shift in how people understand their own identities – with social class being a prime example. Nearly half of Americans and more than a third of Brits say they are a different social class to the one they were born into. Around one in seven consumers in both countries identify with more than one social class simultaneously. These findings reveal a growing group of consumers who no longer fit comfortably within a single category. We call them the Polyclass.

The Broader Trend 

But this isn’t just about class; it highlights something much broader. Increasingly, consumers are living between categories rather than inside them. Their identities are shaped by multiple influences, experiences and aspirations that do not always align neatly with traditional segmentation frameworks.

Consumers routinely move between identities depending on context. They may behave differently at work than they do at home. They may pursue status in one area of life and practicality in another. They may identify with the values of one generation while displaying the behaviors of another. The idea that a single label can fully explain a person's motivations is becoming increasingly difficult to sustain.

This does not mean demographics have lost their value. Age still provides context, income continues to influence purchasing power, and geography shapes experience and opportunity. The problem arises when these variables are treated as explanations rather than descriptors. Two consumers can share identical demographic characteristics while making decisions for completely different reasons. The demographics are accurate. They are simply incomplete.

Researchers have attempted to bridge this gap by combining quantitative and qualitative methods. They use surveys to reveal patterns in behavior, and interviews and focus groups to provide context and explanation. But while this type of qualitative research uncovers rich motivations, it is expensive, difficult to scale and typically conducted as a standalone project. As a result, most profiling work remains episodic. A large segmentation study is commissioned, personas are developed and teams align around the findings. Those profiles then guide decisions for months or even years until the next major refresh. The assumption is that the consumer remains broadly stable in the meantime.

The Polyclass findings suggest otherwise. Identity itself appears increasingly fluid. People move between social groups, adapt to different environments and continually renegotiate how they see themselves. More than half of consumers in our study of 4,000 respondents report changing aspects of how they present themselves to fit in with different social or professional groups. A single static profile is unlikely to capture this complexity.

Why We Need to Join the Dots 

The challenge for marketers and researchers is not simply that consumers have become more complex; it’s that our research systems are still largely designed around static snapshots. When identities evolve faster than research cycles, there is a growing risk that the consumers described in our segmentation models no longer reflect the people making decisions today.

This is where the idea of Connected Insights becomes important. Rather than treating quantitative and qualitative research as separate exercises, Connected Insights brings together multiple sources of understanding into a single, evolving picture of consumer behavior. Quantitative and qualitative research, first-party and panel audiences, historical studies and current findings can all contribute to a more complete understanding of how people think, behave and change over time.

The aim is to connect the evidence that already exists and make it easier to build on what we know. So instead of restarting the process with every new project, insight can become cumulative, allowing organizations to track behavioral shifts, revisit assumptions and develop a more dynamic view of their customers. 

Recent advances in AI-moderated interviewing are helping to make this vision a reality. By making qualitative depth more scalable and accessible, they help connect the "why" behind consumer behavior with the patterns revealed through quantitative research. And rather than relying on commissioning agencies to carry out this work via small focus groups, organizations can explore motivations and decision-making across much larger audiences and do so more frequently.

While demographics will continue to provide useful context, the rise of the Polyclass suggests that the future of consumer understanding will not be built on better boxes. It will be built on systems capable of keeping pace with people as they move between them.

To explore this shift in more detail, download Attest's white paper, A New Gold Standard for Consumer Profiling.