In drip marketing campaigns, you want to attract potential customers and have them subscribe to your email list.
You also want to send the contacts on your list relevant content. Your content will contain a call to action, which will move your audience to commit to taking that action.
How does this type of marketing campaign work and what steps can you take to ensure the effectiveness of your campaign?
What is a drip marketing campaign?
A drip marketing campaign is a series of emails that are sent to your subscribers at certain days and times. These emails aren’t sent to all of your subscribers at once. They’re only sent to those who have recently subscribed to your list or to whom you’re presenting a specific offer.
For example, some marketers have created drip plans that follow a typical cadence.
Someone learns about a business/brand, is intrigued, and sees that the company is offering an incentive for subscribing to their email list.
The person signs up and receives a series of emails, similar to what follows:
- A welcome email right after they sign up
- They’ll also receive access to the incentive, such as a free eBook or a “How To” toolkit
- They’ll continue to receive regular emails at various intervals upselling the product or service that they were introduced to via the free incentive
Instead of an eBook or toolkit, some brands offer a week-long challenge with daily emails. These typically begin a few days or weeks after the potential customer signs up. Days before the challenge begins, emails are sent to their inbox that build excitement for the event.
The subscriber will then receive a daily email for the duration of the challenge. These emails not only engage the customer because of the challenge, but they give them an idea of what it would be like to invest in you/your product or service.
Finally, after the challenge, one or more emails will be sent at designated times encouraging the customer to learn more about what you have to offer or to make a purchase right then.
How to measure the effectiveness of your drip marketing campaign
A drip marketing campaign can add a lot of new subscribers to your list. That’s one way you can tell whether your campaign is working or not.
Another way is to check on the metrics throughout the campaign. Are people opening your emails? Are they clicking on the links inside? Are they taking the action you want them to take?
If not, you’ll need to make some adjustments. These can be as simple as changing the subject lines of your emails so that they’re more enticing. Or it could be as complex as revamping your whole campaign or discarding one and creating a brand new one.
If you notice that your drip marketing campaign needs some work, don’t assume you need to change everything. Start with the simple fixes first (like the subject lines) and go from there, while consistently evaluating your metrics to see if there’s any improvement.
Does it really matter?
A drip marketing campaign can help you build trust with your community, and they can help establish you as an influencer and thought leader in your industry. As a result, your customer base will grow (as will your bottom line).
In 2016, the results of a Venture Beat study showed that, for every dollar spent on a drip marketing campaign, the ROI averaged $38. Some marketers have found that people who invested in products advertised via an email marketing campaign would often spend more than people who didn’t receive those marketing emails.
What now?
A drip campaign is an essential part of your marketing campaign. Once you’ve made the commitment to implement one, the next step is to create a plan.
- The right tools
- Segmentation
- Identifying your goals
- Regularly analyzing your success metrics
Put your strategy into place and you’ll soon see success from your drip marketing campaign.