Our 2019 in review

Each year, I like to reflect on what’s now different about Segment. Thinking back to a year ago, there’s an incredible amount that we’ve managed to accomplish.

In many ways, I see the Segment of 2020 as a new company, with fresh challenges and lots of new opportunities. 

But as the famous saying goes—the days are long but the years are short. Without further ado, here are the major highlights from Segment over the past 12 months. 

We helped customers connect anything to Segment

Segment helps businesses connect and use reliable customer data to fuel product experimentation, marketing, analytics, data science, and so much more. And in 2019 we doubled down to ensure that companies could truly add data into Segment and use the data wherever they needed.

With Functions, customers can now build their own sources and destinations with just a few lines of JavaScript. After just a few months in beta, we’ve already seen hundreds of customers building functions which adapt to internal systems and customize to their specific tools.

Simple code editor to build a function

We grew the Segment Catalog to 350+ integrations

While we’ve made it possible to build any connection with Functions, we’ve also added more than one new integration per week in 2019 to our integration catalog.

That means our customers can more easily set up 350+ tools (37% growth from 2018) to connect new sources and destinations. About 1 in every 3 customers has already tried one of the newest tools in our catalog.

We helped customers with privacy compliance

Since the early days of Segment, we’ve stood for privacy and responsible data handling. We’ve tried to avoid dealing with sketchy data brokers and third-party cookies, and instead make it easier for companies to comply with privacy-first legislation like the GDPR and CCPA.

At Synapse, our annual user conference, we launched our new Privacy Portal that allows organizations to automate detect and classify information flowing through Segment, and control where it is sent. It’s currently used by hundreds of customers to help enforce data standards at their companies. 

Aliya Dossa and Tido Carriero announce our new Privacy Portal at Synapse

 We deepened our commitment to privacy

One of our core values is karma, and we want to make sure we treat our customers’ data in a way they would expect. Privacy isn’t just a big deal for our customers. It’s a big deal to end-consumers as well.

We went beyond being ready for CCPA when it became effective on January 1, 2020. We also stood up a Privacy Program and a Public Policy Team in 2019.  We made multiple trips to Washington to help campaign for privacy rights.  We’ve also been very active in California around the CCPA.

We offered unparalleled control over your data

Data needs to be high quality to be valuable. In 2019, we helped customers achieve a new level of data quality with two new features: Destination Filters and Protocols Transformations.

Destination Filters are being used by more than one out of every three business plan customers. They are key in helping customers control their API costs and instrument basic privacy controls. Protocols Transformations allow users to alter their events without changing their code. We’re seeing companies use transformations to help standardize event names between new and old systems, connect previously siloed data, and more.

Simple UI to build a Destination Filter in a few steps

We grew our global team

In 2019, we grew from roughly 350 employees to 500+. In March 2019, we launched our Denver office as a new hub for our Customer Success org with a plucky landing crew of 3. Since then, we’ve grown the office to 17 strong, and made 24/7 customer support possible.

Segmenters around the world

We saw similar growth across our other offices too. In April, we expanded our NYC office to a high-rise right next to Times Square. In November, we expanded the SF office an entire floor. And in November, our EMEA team in Dublin made its 50th hire! There’s never been a better time to join!

We launched the Segment Startup Program

In February 2019, we launched the Segment Startup Program, to give early stage startups access to $50,000 in free Segment, and more than a million dollars in free software from companies like Intercom, AWS, and HubSpot.

We’ve onboarded 3,000+ startups into the program, and continue to add hundreds each month. More importantly, we’ve helped the next generation of startups make data-driven decisions powered with good customer data.

We held our biggest Synapse yet

This year, we expanded our customer conference, Synapse, in a big way. We hosted a record-breaking 1200 attendees. We had two full days of talks from experts and customers, as well as a partner summit.

Main stage audience at Synapse 2019

Synapse was an opportunity to learn from the best, and we continue to be impressed by the level of depth and expertise that customers shared. 

For example, it’s humbling to hear that Segment played a meaningful role in helping Allergan increase revenue by $250 million. We hope to share many more stories like this over the next year.

We told the world that CRM is not enough

Full-page Wall Street Journal advertisement

We have come together with over 100 partners to cut through the noise and make sure that businesses know that there is an entire alternative ecosystem outside of their CRM suites. 

There are alternatives that meet the demands of today’s customers, are flexible, and work together seamlessly, so that businesses can build customer technology stacks that are unique to their needs, versus a one-size-fits-all approach.

We rebuilt our documentation site

Our documentation is one of the most-visited parts of our website, and while it had grown organically over time, it was starting to show the strain. In late November we released an entirely new docs site, with a fresh, readable design, greatly improved information architecture, and better navigation. We also released new content in the form of an all-new intro to Segment, and some introductory guides tailored to different user roles.

We told the world about bad data

In August 2019, we launched one of the more iconic startup campaigns on the market: “What good is bad data?” To highlight the importance of clean, accurate data, we staged a series of mixups that found their way into billboards across Austin, New York, Los Angeles, and more. You can read more about it here.

Our billboard in San Francisco

The campaign created quite the storm, as we saw tweets and Reddit posts shared from celebrities, friends, and customers. 

We got SOC 2 Type 1 attestation

Segment has the privilege of working with many different types of clients, including Fortune 500 enterprises to industry-specific small businesses. In every case, we want to build trust and show every customer our commitment to security.

Throughout late 2019, we completed our SOC 2 Type 1 attestation. I’m excited to share that this is one of many steps we are taking to continue to build trust with our customers.

Thanks to all who made the above possible. If you’re interested in helping us build the next wave of progress, we’re hiring!