Nurture Email Flow

[anandrajs786]

Hi All,

How could we possibly achieve the following email flow using Marketo Nurture stream?

Here's how the email flow works:

Week 1:

• Email 1 is sent with content about "Content 1"
• If the recipient opens Email 1, they progress to Email 2 in Week 3
• If they don't open Email 1, a resend of Email 1 is triggered after 1 week

Week 3:

• Email 2 focuses on "Content 2"
• If the recipient opens Email 2, they move on to Email 3 in Week 5
• If they don't open Email 2, a resend of Email 2 is triggered after 1 week

Week 5:

• Email 3 contains "Content 3" content
• If the recipient opens Email 3, they would presumably move to Email 4 (not shown)
• If they don't open Email 3, a resend of Email 3 is triggered after 1 week

[Katja_Keesom · Accepted solution]

Hey there,

Your question peaked my interest for sure. I have to admit I am in no way fan of reminders to non-openers, purely because of the unreliable nature of the Email Open activity. Nowadays in B2B, many recipients will have mail scanners running which will give you false positives. Also, the Email Open activity is logged when the images (and therefore the tracking pixel) are downloaded in the recipient's email client. Some email clients are configured to auto-download which means that recipient will seem to open all emails instantly without the person actually being aware the email is in their inbox in the first place. Other email clients are configured to only download images when the person clicks on a button to do so, which means the person can actually have consumed your content without downloading images so you're not aware of it. So the Open activity is essentially meaningless in understanding whether the person actually saw your content.

There, rant over.

Depending on how many emails eventually are going to be in your flow, it might be an option to make this an engagement program, but that would be a bit tricky with the notion of only sending email 2 if the recipient consumed the content in email 1.

As a drip nurture, I think I would use a PMCF date field to stamp when the last email was sent and a PMCF string field to capture which email that was. That gives you filtering possibilities for a smart campaign to send the correct next email.

[uditmathur]

Hi @anandrajs786 ,

I totally agree with @Katja_Keesom , Email opens alone should not be considered as a definitive action performed by leads.

But just to give you an option you can create an Engagement Program with streams for each mail Email 1, Email 2, Email 3 etc. ( you can create up to 25 streams in an EP). Use transition rules to pull leads on stream with email 2 using criteria as email open = email 1.

For leads who do not open mail. Clone email 1, email 2 etc. & add the clone mail to the stream.

Set the cadence of stream to match your cast routine (for stream 1 set to every week, for stream 2 set to every week starting from3rd week & so on).

Hope this Helps 🙂

[beth-corby]

Why This Flow Doesn’t Fit the Nurture Stream Model
Marketo Nurture Streams operate on a time-based, linear cadence. They’re great for steadily delivering content to leads regardless of engagement, but they don’t natively support logic like:

• "If opened, send the next email."
• "If not opened, resend the same email after X days."

That level of behavioral branching is best handled using Smart Campaigns rather than Nurture Streams.

Why Resending to Non-Openers is Risky
Resending the same email to non-openers based on open tracking can damage your email deliverability. Here's why:

• Opens are not reliable indicators – Apple Mail Privacy Protection and similar features distort open rates by triggering false opens.
• Re-sends to non-engaged recipients increase spam signals – Sending repeatedly to non-engagers can hurt your sender reputation, especially if you’re on a shared IP or haven’t implemented strong deliverability protocols like branded return-path or proper DKIM/SPF alignment.
• Gmail and Yahoo's 2024 updates now heavily penalize bulk senders with high bounce rates or low engagement. Re-sending to non-openers risks triggering these penalties.

A Better Approach: Smart Campaigns with Behavior Logic
To replicate your desired flow, use Smart Campaigns with filters such as:

• Opened Email is [Email 1]
• Not Was Sent Email in past X days
• Was Delivered Email but Not Clicked

This allows you to:

• Control timing
• Respect engagement signals
• Avoid redundant sends

[rcoppol98]

Hello - we use a similar flow for our engagement programs.

We use a series of Progressions to achieve what you are seeking. Logic as follows:

We have a separate stream within the engagement program for each set of emails. Then, we have a progressions that say, "if opened email 1a/1b (first email content), then move to stream 2 (which contains the emails 2a/2b). This logic is replicated for clicks as well. So for each transition between streams, we have an "opened progression" and a "clicked progression".

[Balkar_Singh]

I agree with most comments on here. I'm usually more inclined to keep an Engagement Program Simple, and have the conditional logics using  daisy-chain requested smart campaigns. Also, you may want the re-send using something different - e.g. subject line.