Drip campaigns

Drip campaigns are communication campaigns based on sending automated emails to customers and leads. These emails vary according to the actions taken by each customer and generally aim to achieve different KPIs.

A clear example of this is when a subscriber leaves their email address on a subscription form. Once the email address has been obtained, they will be added to the subscriber list and we send them a welcome email. The next day, we send them an email to download a free e-book; if they open the email, the next day we send them a discount and so on.

If they don’t open any of the emails for a long time, we’ll send them a reminder and, in this way, they’ll go through our sales funnel to achieve the goals we’ve set for new subscribers.

1) Types of drip campaigns

The types of drip campaigns are very broad. If we take into account the objectives we want to achieve with the drip campaign in question, we can segment them as follows:

• Training: The goal of this kind of campaign is to explain how to use a product, so leads will buy them.
• Educational: these campaigns offer specific or general content related to the lead’s interests, explaining and illustrating specific points.
• Top of mind: the aim is to keep the brand present throughout the sales process and reinforce branding.
• Promotional: these are campaigns aimed at obtaining conversions through discounts and limited-time promotions.
• Recovery or re-engagement: the aim is to get users who have stopped interacting with our brand interested in it again.
• Attracting customers from competitors: these are drip campaigns that target customers of competing brands, with the aim of getting them to switch to our product or service.

2. The keys to creating a drip campaign

As with any digital marketing or email marketing campaign, you need to consider several aspects that are fundamental to the proper performance of the drip campaign:

• Define the message. Depending on the type of target audience, you need to adapt your strategy and define the message correctly, as it’s not the same to interact with B2B (companies) or B2C consumers.
• Define the objectives (KPIs): The first thing is to be clear about what you want to achieve with the drip campaign. This should be done in the lead nurturing plan; generally, the end goal will be to convert leads into paying customers.
• Segmentation. Not all contacts are valid. Try to focus on the buyer persona you’ve defined in your inbound marketing to make your drip campaigns successful. Always keep in mind what stage of the conversion process the leads are at.
• Test, measure and learn. What works today may not work tomorrow, so keep an open mind, experiment constantly, measure the results and learn from them. Optimization is the key.