Campaigns and sequences

A campaign sends email to everyone on a contact list. A sequence is the series of emails it sends: a first email, waits, and follow-ups that go out only when they should. Both live in the Email Hub (Outreach > Email Hub).

Requirements

• Pro plan or higher (on a shared brand, the brand owner's plan counts)

• Owner or editor access to create and run campaigns

• A connected Gmail mailbox to send from (see Sending outreach emails); without one you can still save a campaign as a draft

During a free trial you can build campaigns and save them as drafts, but launching one starts when your subscription does. Click Start subscription on the prompt to end the trial early.

Two ways to start

• From the Email Hub: on the Campaigns tab, click New campaign and build it step by step (below)

• From cited pages: on the Citations tab of Backlink outreach, select pages and click Campaign. Pages that still need it are analyzed first (1 credit per 3 pages), then Rank Prompt creates a contact list, email templates, a 3-email sequence (2 follow-ups, 4 days apart, only if there is no reply) and a draft campaign that sends from 9am to 5pm and skips weekends. Review it, then launch it.

Building a campaign

The builder has four steps. Your work is saved as a draft as you go; if you leave and come back, choose Restore draft or Start fresh.

Step 1: Audience

Pick an existing contact list, or create one here:

• Static list: you choose the contacts

• Dynamic list: every contact that matches your filter conditions, now and later

Only contacts with an email address are enrolled. If a dynamic list's filters do not ask for authors, a note suggests adding one: authors own the content, so they answer outreach best.

Step 2: Content

• Single email: pick an Email template (or Create template) and Preview it

• Email sequence: pick a saved sequence, or choose New sequence and build it right there (see "Building a sequence" below)

Your email signature is added automatically.

Step 3: Settings

Step 4: Review

Review and launch shows the campaign, its audience, its content and its schedule, with a Pre-launch checklist: campaign name, audience, template or sequence, sending mailbox and send window. Click Launch to start, or Save draft to finish later.

Understanding sequences

A sequence is built from three kinds of steps:

For example:

Email 1: introduction and link request
Wait 4 days
Condition: Replied?
  Yes: stop here and answer by hand
  No:  Email 2, a short follow-up
Wait 4 days
Condition: Replied?
  No:  Email 3, a last note

Follow-up emails use "Re: [original subject]", so they land in the same Gmail thread as the first one.

Building a sequence

Open Outreach > Email Hub, go to the Sequences tab and click Create sequence, or choose New sequence while building a campaign. The Sequence builder opens:

1. Start with an email: every sequence starts with an Email step. Pick its Template; Subject override and Body override change the text for this step only (leave them empty to use the template's)

2. Add a wait: click Add step, choose Wait and set the days. Put a wait before every new email

3. Add a condition if the next email depends on what the contact did: choose the Condition type, then fill the Yes and No paths. No branch timeout sets how many days (0 to 30) to wait before a contact takes the No path, and Notify on yes tells you when a contact takes the Yes path

4. Let it save: your changes save on their own a moment after you make them, once the sequence holds together (the header reads Unsaved changes, then Saved); undo and redo are there while you work

A/B testing

Once a saved email step has a template, you can test variants of it: Add variant with its own template or subject, set the traffic each one gets, and compare their open and reply rates. Declare as winner sends every future email with the winning variant.

Running a campaign

Click a campaign on the Campaigns tab to open Campaign details:

On Enrollments you can Pause enrollment, Resume enrollment or Unenroll a contact (their pending emails are cancelled), and Sync with List to bring the campaign in line with its list.

Campaign actions

A campaign's status reads Draft, Active, Paused, Completed or Archived.

When a sequence stops

For each contact, a sequence stops on its own when:

• They reply: shown as Goal achieved: Replied, so you can answer by hand

• The email bounces: Sequence stopped: Bounced

• They unsubscribe: Sequence stopped: Unsubscribed

• Sending fails: Sequence stopped: Failed

Pausing the campaign, marking it complete or unenrolling the contact also stops it.

Comparing campaigns

Click Compare on the Campaigns tab, or open the Compare tab of a campaign, and pick up to 4 campaigns. You see Total contacts, Emails sent, Open rate, Reply rate and Bounced side by side, with the best open rate and reply rate marked.

Best practices

• Segment your lists: by role (editors, writers), by tier or by topic, and write to each list

• Start small: test with 20 to 50 contacts, read the numbers, then send to more

• Keep sequences short: 2 or 3 follow-ups at most, a few days apart; silence is an answer

• Add something new each time: a follow-up that only says "bumping this" rarely works

• Personalize: use {{first_name}} and mention their page with {{page_title}}

• Read the replies yourself: a reply ends the sequence for a reason

Summary

Next steps

• Email Hub overview

• Find pages to pitch

• Backlink Outreach overview

Questions?

Email [email protected] and I'll help.