Template

Drip campaign template

A fixed set of emails on a fixed cadence, started by something somebody did. The template is one email; the campaign is the exit condition.

Your Product <[email protected]>

to [email protected]

The report nobody sets up, and what it does

Third of four. One idea, about ninety seconds.

Your Product

The report nobody sets up

Most people build the dashboard and stop. The report that actually changes decisions is the one comparing this week to the same week last month, because it separates a trend from a Tuesday.

It is two fields: pick a comparison window, save it. Everything else in the report you already built stays as it is.

Add a comparison window

Next week: the one alert worth turning on. That is the last of these.

Alex, Your Product

You are getting this because you connected a data source. Four emails, one a week, then it stops.

Your Product Inc, 1 Example Street
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A worked example of the blueprint below. The brand, the names and the numbers are placeholders; the structure is the part to copy.

The blueprint

Rebuild it anywhere

Subject lines (5 options)

The report nobody sets up, and what it doesshown above
Third of four: comparison windows
How to tell a trend from a Tuesday
Two fields that change what the report says
The setting most people miss

When it fires

Trigger: Fires on one event, once: a tag added when somebody completed a specific action, such as connecting a source or importing their first dataset.
Timing: One email a week for four weeks. Weekly is the cadence that survives: daily reads as pressure, monthly loses the thread between emails.
Conditions: Exit the campaign the moment the reader does the thing it is asking for. A drip that keeps sending after its point has been met is the single most common reason people unsubscribe from a sequence they liked.
Skip any email whose action the account has already taken, and shorten the campaign rather than substituting filler.

The body, block by block

One idea, named in the subject
Every email in a drip carries exactly one idea, and the subject line is that idea. A drip whose subjects are "Tip 3" is a drip nobody opens by the third one.
The idea, in two paragraphs
Enough to be useful if the reader never clicks. The click is a bonus; the email has to be worth the interruption on its own, because most of the list will only ever read it.
The specific action
What to do, in the smallest form it takes. "Two fields" is an action. "Explore the reporting suite" is a suggestion, and suggestions do not get done.
One button
Straight to the screen. In a drip this matters more than elsewhere, because the reader is not in the product when it arrives and every extra step loses a share of them.
The forward reference
One line saying what the next email covers and how many are left. It raises the open rate of the next one and it stops the campaign feeling open ended.
The reason they are receiving it
Name the action that started the drip and the number of emails in it. This is not a legal footer, it is the line that stops a reader treating a useful sequence as unsolicited mail.

The rest of the sequence

Week 1
The idea closest to what they just did, so the first email is obviously related to the action that started it.
Subject Now that your data is in: the one view worth building
Week 2
The idea that fixes the most common mistake people make at this stage.
Subject The chart that lies to you
Week 3
The email above.
Subject The report nobody sets up, and what it does
Week 4
The last one, and it says so. Close on the single highest-value setting and stop.
Subject Last one: the alert worth turning on

When to use it

When you have a small number of things worth teaching and no reason to vary them per person. A drip is the simplest useful automation: a fixed set of emails, a fixed gap, started by an event. Everything harder than that is a nurture sequence or an onboarding sequence, and calling it a drip does not make it one.

The part that decides whether it works is the exit condition, not the copy. A drip is a promise of a bounded number of emails, and the promise is kept by the campaign stopping when its purpose is met. Four useful emails that stop on their own build a list that opens the next campaign. Four useful emails that keep arriving after the reader has done the thing build a list that has learned to ignore the sender.

For worked examples of complete campaigns, including the ones that are not drips, the article linked below walks through five sequences end to end.

What kills this email

No exit condition
The reader does the thing in email one and gets three more asking them to do it. Every drip needs a way to end early, and the check belongs before each send rather than at the start of the campaign.
Filling the slots because the campaign is four emails long
A campaign length picked before the content is written produces a fourth email that exists to be a fourth email. Three good ones beat four, and the difference is visible in the unsubscribe rate on the padding.
Not saying why they are receiving it
A drip that starts weeks after the action that triggered it reads as unsolicited unless it names that action. One line at the foot, naming what they did and how many emails are coming, prevents most of the complaints.
Running it daily
A daily cadence on non-urgent content is the fastest way to train a reader to archive on sight. Weekly gives each email room to be acted on before the next one lands.

When not to send it

Do not run a drip when the content genuinely depends on who the reader is. If half the emails would be wrong for half the list, you need conditions on the sends, and that is a nurture sequence rather than a drip.

Do not start one on top of an onboarding sequence. Two automated sequences arriving in the same week means two different next actions, and the reader picks neither.

Read Drip Campaign Examples: The 5 Email Sequences Every SaaS Needs

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