What is a drip campaign?
A drip campaign, also known as an automated email campaign, is a marketing strategy that involves creating a series of emails to be automatically delivered at specific times and usually spaced over a few days. The steady drip of information provides messaging that becomes familiar and ultimately translates to engagement and, hopefully, sales.
While the expression drip campaign brings to mind everything from leaky faucets to a gentle drizzle, it’s actually a very calculated way of expanding your brand awareness.
In a drip campaign, you probably spend as much time planning the delivery of your messages as you do crafting your content. Instead of randomly sending your messages, you create a series of email blasts to bring different parts of your messaging across.
Why are drip campaigns so important?
Drip campaigns allow you to nurture leads over time systematically. By spacing out your contact points, you can move prospects through the customer journey more invitingly, thus increasing the likelihood of converting them into customers. This allows you to move prospects from awareness to consideration and, ultimately, to the decision-making stage by providing the right information and calls to action. Drip campaigns help ensure recipients receive the right content at the right time, maximizing the chances of conversion.
When Drip Campaigns Work Best
Think about drip campaigns like the movie preview before the big show. It reels your customer in enough to make them want to see more. Drip campaigns work best when:
- Your messaging is timely or important
- You have a new launch and want to tease out the details
- Your message is potentially too big or overwhelming to drop into a single email
- You need to soften a blow or keep people salivating
For example, no one wants to hear that you’re raising your prices, but what if you created a compelling campaign where loyal customers could access more information or more exclusive data? A drip campaign could allow you to highlight the best possible parts before dropping in a zinger about raised prices and then following up with another bonus or freebie.
Things to Keep in Mind Before Starting Your Drip Campaign
Don’t be in a rush to get started
Spend time researching everything from successful campaigns like yours to effective delivery methods.
Pay attention to the drips
Take your time and ensure each drip in your campaign has a value-added impact.
Keep your expectations low on the first go-round
If you place too much hope in your first drip campaign, you’ll probably end up disappointed. Try not to invest all of your time or best ideas in the first drip campaign to see what works best.
Work with an expert
If you don’t have the team in place to scale up your campaign, it’s a great idea to outsource content when needed.
Do your best to get opt-in permission
Spam is bad. It’s never cool to use old email lists for new campaigns.
Pay attention to your inbox
You may have never noticed just how many drip campaigns are heading your way daily. Pay attention to the things you like or hate. Notice the word usage and calls-to-action that are effective.
Don’t get overwhelmed
Drip campaigns are a ton of work, and the learning curve is pretty steep. If you feel overwhelmed, have someone else who has run a drip campaign before help you set it up.
Touch base often
Even if a drip campaign is set and go, the pre-production process is not. If you’ve hired someone to write your content, ensure they are clear on the tone and intent you need. If someone is just handling the actual sending part, take time to work through the best times and dates.
Have a contingency plan
What happens if you have a system outage and your carefully planned drip campaign goes down the drain? Take time to develop at least one message dealing with any potential glitches.
Stress your call to action
The most fun part of a drip campaign is that you can explore different messaging in every single drip. You don’t need to use a hard sell, but you need to be sure of your bottom line and desired outcome. Before starting your drip campaign, create a list of hopes and goals.
An Example of an Effective Drip Campaign
In 2021, the International Business Times reported on how healthcare treatments had changed due to the pandemic and how information was collected and delivered. While the article reported that “the usage of telemedicine in California grew 1000 times compared to before the pandemic,” there was another information service boom.
The National Coronavirus Hotline (NCH), a new service run by Pandemics Project Inc., created a way of “automating and simplifying the mass delivery of healthcare services.”
While the healthcare industry traditionally is slower to keep up with certain technologies, it allowed even smaller or regional providers to instantly share fresh information with their clients. It also allowed them to connect immediately and book disinfection services.
30 days of drips
Christopher Tompkins, CEO and Head Strategist at The Go! Agency shared one campaign that he thought got it right:
“One of the best drip campaigns I have seen could be a little controversial as it was extremely aggressive,” he said. “A business coach was offering a sale-priced closing masterclass, and he had set up a 30-day email drip sequence where one email was sent EVERY DAY. An associate told me about this, and I signed up immediately. I was amazed at how great the content was and how it really made me consider taking this course… even when it is not a subject that was interesting to me.”
Build Your Drip Campaign Today
Drip campaigns are highly effective and a great way to introduce your audience to new or challenging ideas slowly. Don’t let the massive pre-production process stand in the way of growing your business. Talk to a content specialist at ClearVoice to help you strategize your next drip campaign today.
