Drip, lead nurture, email campaigns. What’s the difference?

Drip Campaigns. Lead Nurturing. Email Campaigns. Workflows.  Using all of these terms interchangeably?  We sympathize.

Content may be King, but Email is its Queen in this case.

The foundation to drip, lead nurture, (and email) campaigns is email.

1. First up, email campaigns. Typically, singular, not timed, not automated, may be targeted to an audience segment that regularly goes out like a newsletter. Our best practice for B2B is a monthly cadence.
2. Next, drip campaigns. These are regularly scheduled email workflows targeting an audience segment. Behavior is not a factor; time is. These are automated drips of content that provide a constant ‘drumbeat’ of staying in front of your target audience, so they don’t forget about you. Our best practice is to run these every 14 days.
3. Finally, lead nurture campaigns. These are automated series of emails targeting a persona that triggers based on behavior and generally ends with a call to action. It is important to think about three factors:

• • Persona – Who are you targeting and is the content targeted to their buying committee role? Our best practice is to enroll individuals into a single workflow with content that speaks to their persona. They should only be in one campaign at a time so as not to overwhelm them.
  • Content Sequence – You’ll have original content written specifically for your target persona. You also may have content running in your other (drip or lead nurtures) campaigns that would be relevant for use. Because this persona is only in one workflow, weave some of that content into this campaign.
  • Cadence – Step back and think about the price point of the product. How many times has a company overwhelmed you in a few hours because you engaged with their email or LinkedIn ad? You want to consider, would someone be ready to buy your product within 12 hours? Will it turn off the buyer? Your goal is to move a prospect through the awareness, consideration, decision lifecycle with content that progressively drives toward a call to action (request a demo) in a timeframe that doesn’t feel too aggressive or desperate. Our best practice for a B2B lead nurture is to trigger every 2-3 days after engagement.

A couple of additional points to consider for lead nurture campaigns:

1. First, your target list will grow. New targets will enter existing workflows because you may have other channels driving engagement to your content, for example, organic and paid social, direct from the website, etc.
2. Second, identify when a (target) contact exits a campaign. Our best practice is to keep them in the campaign sequence until they complete the call to action – yes, even if they fill out a form or a lead score would normally qualify the individual to be handed off to business development or sales.

Having a clear understanding of your campaign goals and structure is an essential element of your content plan and strategy. If you are looking for help in answering the question: What campaigns should I be running? Reach out to us, and we would be happy to help.