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A Guide to Drip Marketing and the Tools You Need to Succeed

09 August 2019, 19:49 CET

Maybe you've heard the term 'drip marketing' before; it isn't a new idea. Drip marketing has been around for quite some time, but it's gained more traction recently because it has been transformed by automation software and social media.

New technologies have breathed new life into a tried-and-true marketing communications strategy, and if you're a small business owner or an entrepreneur, you should be paying attention.

What is Drip Marketing?

Drip marketing, also known as drip campaigns, lifecycle emails, and automated email campaigns, is a marketing concept and communication strategy. A constant flow of automated promotional marketing emails is sent out to existing or prospective customers over a period of time to create sales through long-term and repeat exposure of marketing messages. It's essentially pre-written messages that go out to specific groups of people based on events or actions they've taken. If a user signs up for an account, for example, a drip campaign could be triggered starting with a 'welcome' email, then an email offering a small discount or referral bonus for new users who sign someone up as well.

The beauty of drip campaigns is that the marketing messages are all pre-written and automated in a queue, so you and your team don't have to spend time manually typing out the same messages and sending them out to the proper people when the time comes. The messages 'drip' down to your customers based on event triggers and user segmentations that you define yourself. What's extremely useful is that you can reuse content rather than writing out similar messages over and over. You can create specific campaigns to on-board or teach people about your company or products, send out rewards to long-term customers and promotional ones to incentivise your new customers, trigger a campaign when people get to a certain page or point in the check-out process, and many other reasons. You can even customise your automated emails to include your contact's name and company information to add a personal touch.

The key is that you can segment your users and customers and reach the right groups of people at the right times. Your segmentations can be based on aspects such as purchase history, demographics, whether they've abandoned their cart mid-check out, or which emails they've opened in the past and clicked through. Whether they're new and curious about who you are or what you do, ready to purchase, or are in the middle of purchasing, you can communicate with them and land your business more conversions.

So, do drip campaigns work? The answer is a resounding 'yes'. Click-through rates are 100.95% higher in email campaigns that are segmented versus campaigns that are not segmented. Conversion rates increase as well. Of course, you don't want to overdo it, because too many emails or marketing messages can put people off, so it's important to find the right balance and not overwhelm or bombard your potential and existing customers. You just want your drip campaigns to be gentle reminders of who you are and what you're offering to people.

Drip campaigns were developed because of the 'Law of 29', which not everyone believes to be 100% accurate, but everyone agrees on the basic principle. The Law of 29 refers to the idea that a potential customer or prospect won't turn into an actual customer until they've seen your marketing message 29 times. Most, if not all, marketers do agree that your brand needs to remain top-of-mind and stay in front of your prospects in order to turn them into conversions, especially since there are so many other brands vying for their attention and business.

What are Good Tools to use for Drip Marketing Campaigns?

Now that you understand how beneficial drip marketing is, it's time to dive into the tools you can use in order to create successful campaigns. There's plenty of automation software out there for all kinds of drip campaigns, from the popular email campaigns to social media messaging, and anything in between to fill any gaps. Here are the most beneficial tools to use to create effective drip campaigns.

Automated Email Marketing Software

The most popular and most common drip marketing campaigns are email campaigns. They're generally low-cost and are the easiest to automate with the most number of funnels to get your potential customers into. If this is the route you want to take, you will have to do better than the old 'sign up to get email updates' opt-in message and communicate more than just an intermittent newsletter. You should do your best to find the right balance between list building and turning leads into conversions, as well as appealing to and engaging with your target audience.

Social Media Automation Software

With the rise in popularity of social media, and the fact that it's critical for businesses and brands to be active on many social platforms, drip marketing campaigns on social media are becoming more common. Combined with an overall social media strategy, social drip campaigns can be quite effective; brands are integrating company news and updates into their drip marketing efforts to keep audiences engaged and keep their brand top of mind.

Ringless Voicemail Marketing

Not many people are aware that ringless voicemail marketing can be used as part of a drip campaign, and it's actually quite effective. Ringless voicemail drip campaigns are more personal, since you can add a message to it, and lead to a 97% list rate. You can set up drip calls to be made weekly or monthly, whatever fits your strategy and schedule, that go directly into your target audience's voicemail.

You don't even need to add the list of phone numbers manually, since Slybroadcast loads your lead list right into the ringless voicemail system. You can send out bulk ringless voicemail messages and set the drip parameters as you choose, so they can be sent out at once, or scheduled for a later date and time.

Strategic planning tools

Drip campaigns can require major amounts of planning, so if you're going to undertake such a project, it's important to realise your campaign's success will ultimately be determined by your team's planning. It can definitely help the outcome if you visualise the workflows and campaigns you're working to create, so don't ignore the power of actually drawing it out on a chart or whiteboard.

Of course, you can use digital tools to make it easily editable and shareable amongst your team members. There is marketing software available that has integrated workflow builders, or to quickly mock up and share an idea, you can always use PowerPoint or an online tool like Google Draw.

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