If you’ve ever inherited a drip campaign that made you pause and say, “Huh,” you’re not alone. I recently worked with a global B2B client on a post-event nurture sequence that looked fine on the surface. It followed the usual formula: three emails spaced over a few weeks, each with a relevant topic, a CTA, and a nod to the event they attended.
But something felt off. Generic, perhaps? Disconnected?
Rather than rely on gut instinct alone, I turned to a more objective approach: evaluating nurture sequences with AI. This allowed me to analyze the campaign through the lens of a real buyer — not just a theoretical persona. If you want to learn more about how AI can transform your approach by engaging buyers before they even enter the sales funnel, check out this blog I wrote: AI for B2B Buyer Engagement: Engaging Buyers Before Sales Conversations. It’s a game-changer for understanding how AI bridges the gap between traditional marketing and modern buyer behavior.
Grounding AI Campaign Analysis in Buyer Reality
Before diving into the emails themselves, we started with the buyer. The client was targeting senior decision-makers, but the existing content felt scattered. To ensure our AI evaluation was meaningful, we first needed a deep understanding of the audience.
Using a combination of first-party insights, market research, and AI modeling—similar to approaches discussed in this MarketingProfs article on AI use cases in B2B marketing—I rapidly built out a well-rounded persona for one of their primary buyers which included:
- Goals & Objectives
- Key Challenges & Pain Points
- Decision-Making Criteria
- Content Consumption Preferences
This process, completed in hours instead of weeks thanks to AI, gave us a buyer-centric north star for the entire evaluation.
Evaluating the Nurture Sequence with AI: The Good, Bad, and Ugly
With a clear buyer persona defined, I used an AI-powered evaluation framework specifically designed for analyzing marketing sequences. I dropped the existing emails into the system and scored them against the persona’s mindset and typical journey stage post-event.
The AI campaign assessment revealed a clear pattern: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly. For more examples of how AI can assess and improve marketing campaigns, see these Column Five Media case studies on AI in marketing:
The Good:
- Topics chosen were generally relevant to the target audience.
- Emails acknowledged recent event activity and offered follow-up content.
The Bad:
- Messaging lacked the strategic framing needed for an executive audience.
- Calls-to-Action (CTAs) were vague and lacked urgency (“soft CTAs”).
- The tone was inconsistent – jumping between overly casual and robotic.
The Ugly:
- No clear narrative thread connecting the emails into a cohesive journey.
- Failed to explicitly tie content to tangible business impact or known buyer pain points.
- Content felt like an afterthought, not integral to a strategic story.
Strategic Pivot: From Generic Drip to Dynamic, AI-Powered Nurture
The insights gained from evaluating the nurture sequence with AI weren’t just diagnostic; they were prescriptive. Guided by the AI-refined persona, I developed a reimagined nurture strategy aimed at being more human, relevant, and connected:
- Revised Messaging: Crafted a follow-up email with sharper, executive-focused language and clearer value propositions.
- Buyer Journey Alignment: Designed a four-stage nurture framework mapped directly to the buyer’s decision-making process.
- Multichannel Engagement: Incorporated LinkedIn outreach, targeted retargeting ads, and website personalization alongside email.
- Behavior-Based Personalization: Implemented triggers to adjust follow-up based on how prospects engaged (or didn’t engage) with content.
This strategic overhaul was significantly accelerated by AI – not as an automation tool, but as an intelligent partner enhancing strategic thinking, speed, and buyer-centricity.
The Takeaway: Amplify Your Strategy by Evaluating Nurture Sequences with AI
AI didn’t replace the strategic work involved in fixing the nurture campaign; it amplified it. Evaluating nurture sequences with AI allowed me to:
- Test strategic hypotheses faster.
- Gain objective, data-backed insights into campaign weaknesses.
- Keep the buyer persona central to every decision.
If you’re looking at your own B2B campaigns and wondering if they’re truly connecting, consider how using AI to evaluate your nurture sequences could provide the clarity and direction you need.
It’s not just about automation; it’s about amplifying your strategic impact.
