12 Drip Campaign Examples with Timing
A drip campaign is a pre-written sequence of emails sent automatically on a fixed schedule after a trigger, such as a signup, a download, or a purchase. Unlike a broadcast, the timing is relative to each person's entry point — day 0, day 2, day 5 — so everyone gets the same story at the same stage of their own journey.
Drip vs. nurture vs. broadcast
The terms get used interchangeably and it causes real confusion when you are building. Here is how they actually differ:
| Drip | Behavioral nurture | Broadcast | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trigger | One entry event | Ongoing behavior signals | You hit send |
| Timing | Fixed delays from entry | Branches based on actions | Calendar date |
| Path | Mostly linear | Conditional | Single email |
| Build effort | Low — an afternoon | High — weeks | Minimal |
| Best for | Onboarding, education, lead follow-up | Complex sales cycles | News, launches, offers |
Start with drips. A well-timed linear sequence captures most of the value, and you can add branches later once you have data on where people drop.
The 12 campaigns, with the delays that work
1. Welcome drip (4 emails, days 0–9)
Day 0: deliver what they signed up for plus one sentence on what to expect. Day 2: your origin story and point of view — this is the email that builds a relationship. Day 5: your single best piece of content. Day 9: a soft, specific offer. Send day 0 within five minutes; delay kills welcome engagement faster than anything else.
2. Lead magnet follow-up (5 emails, days 0–14)
Day 0: the download link, nothing else. Day 1: “did you get a chance to read page 4?” — pointing at a specific section drives more re-opens than a generic reminder. Day 4: a case study applying the idea. Day 7: address the biggest objection head-on. Day 14: the offer, framed as the natural next step.
3. Free trial drip (6 emails, days 0–14 on a 14-day trial)
Day 0: one setup action, not five. Day 1: the activation moment — the single thing that predicts whether they convert. Day 3: a second feature that compounds the first. Day 7: a customer story at the midpoint. Day 11: what happens when the trial ends, stated plainly. Day 13: the last-day email with a direct upgrade link.
4. Abandoned cart drip (3 emails, 1 hour / 24 hours / 72 hours)
Hour 1: the item, the image, a one-click return to cart. No discount. Hour 24: address the friction — shipping cost, returns policy, sizing. Hour 72: scarcity or a modest incentive, and this is where you stop. A fourth email mostly generates unsubscribes.
5. Post-purchase drip (4 emails, days 1–30)
Day 1: how to get the most out of what they bought. Day 4: a tip or accessory that improves the experience. Day 14: the review request, timed after they have actually used it. Day 30: a cross-sell that makes sense given the first purchase.
6. Re-engagement drip (3 emails, days 0, 5, 12)
Day 0: “is this still useful?” with a one-click stay-subscribed button. Day 5: your best content from the period they missed. Day 12: the honest goodbye — tell them this is the last email and mean it. Suppress non-responders after day 14.
7. Webinar drip (5 emails, T-7 to T+2 days)
Seven days out: confirmation and calendar file. Two days out: the agenda and one question to think about. One hour out: the join link, short and unmissable. Two hours after: the replay for no-shows. Two days after: the offer tied to what was taught.
8. Onboarding-by-role drip (4–6 emails, days 0–21)
Same skeleton as the trial drip, but you ask one question at signup — what is your role? — and route to a different sequence. An admin and an end user need entirely different first weeks. This is the highest-ROI segmentation most teams skip.
9. Cold outreach drip (4 emails, days 0, 3, 8, 15)
Short emails, one idea each, no attachments. Day 0: a specific observation about their business and a single question. Day 3: a relevant proof point. Day 8: a different angle, not a reminder. Day 15: the polite close-out. Note that cold outreach carries consent obligations in many jurisdictions — check the rules for your market and this is not legal advice.
10. Renewal drip (3 emails, days -30, -7, -1)
Thirty days out: a value recap — what they got from you this year, in numbers. Seven days out: the renewal terms and any changes. One day out: a simple confirmation. Dunning for failed cards runs separately with retries at 1, 3, 5, and 10 days.
11. Event or course drip (variable, weekly)
One lesson per week, each ending with a small action. Weekly beats daily for anything requiring effort; daily beats weekly for anything requiring momentum. Match the cadence to the work you are asking for.
12. Win-back drip for churned customers (3 emails, days 30, 60, 120)
Day 30: what has shipped since they left. Day 60: a customer who came back and why. Day 120: a genuine return offer. Longer gaps than any other sequence, because the answer changes with time.
Timing rules that hold across all twelve
- Email one goes out immediately. Within five minutes, ideally within thirty seconds. Attention decays fast.
- Widen the gaps as the sequence goes on. Day 0, 2, 5, 9, 16 — not day 0, 3, 6, 9, 12. Early interest is high; respect the decay curve.
- Suppress from broadcasts while someone is mid-drip, or they get three emails from you on a Tuesday and unsubscribe from all of it.
- Exit on conversion. Nothing damages trust like a “still thinking about it?” email arriving after someone has already paid.
- Respect business hours for B2B. Queue overnight sends for 8am local rather than delivering at 3am.
- Cap total volume. Set a global rule — no more than one automated email per person per day, from any sequence.
A build order that actually gets finished
- Write every email as plain text in one document first. If the sequence does not work as prose, design will not save it.
- Define the exit condition before you define the emails. Knowing what “done” means shapes the whole arc.
- Build the trigger and the delays in your automation tool, with placeholder copy, and test the timing end to end with a real address.
- Drop in the real copy and templates.
- Send yourself through the full sequence as a new subscriber, on a phone.
- Turn it on for 10% of new entrants for one week, then everyone.
Every one of these sequences is a trigger, a delay, and a message repeated — which is exactly what a visual builder is for. Our guide to email automation workflows covers the trigger types, branch conditions, and exit rules you will need to wire these up without writing code.
What to measure, and when
| Metric | Where to look | What a problem looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Step completion rate | Each email in the sequence | A single step where 40%+ stop opening |
| Time to conversion | Entry to goal event | Most conversions after your last email — add one |
| Unsubscribe by step | Per email | A spike at one step means wrong message or wrong gap |
| Sequence vs. control | Holdout group | No lift means the drip is not the problem — the offer is |
Give a new sequence at least 200 entrants before you judge it, and change one variable at a time. The most common productive fix is not new copy — it is moving an email two days earlier or later.
Frequently asked questions
How many emails should a drip campaign have?
Three to six is the sweet spot for most sequences. Fewer than three rarely gives you enough contact to move someone, and beyond six the incremental open rate usually drops below the unsubscribe cost unless the content is genuinely educational.
How far apart should drip emails be sent?
Start close and widen out: day 0, day 2, day 5, day 9, day 16. Early attention is at its peak right after the trigger, so front-loading works, while later emails need more breathing room to avoid fatigue.
What is the difference between a drip campaign and an autoresponder?
An autoresponder is typically a single automatic reply to one action. A drip campaign is a multi-email sequence with deliberate delays between messages, designed to move someone through a series of steps rather than acknowledge one.
Should drip emails be plain text or designed?
Plain-looking text tends to win for onboarding, cold outreach, and anything meant to feel personal. Designed templates win for ecommerce, where the product image is the message. Test both — the gap is often larger than any copy change.
When should someone exit a drip campaign?
The moment they complete the goal, unsubscribe, or enter a higher-priority sequence. Failing to exit on conversion is the single most common drip mistake and it actively damages the relationship you just built.
Build any of these in an afternoon. Start with IGSendMail — visual automation, unlimited contacts on paid plans, and a free plan up to 2,500 contacts.