When you hear the term playbook, chances are the last thing that comes to your mind is marketing. For most, playbooks generate images of sports teams and the staple for which their offense and defense are built around. In marketing, playbooks are being leveraged in the same manner to produce better results from one campaign to the next.

Before diving into the specific tools you should consider as you build your marketing playbook, we first need to clarify that there is a big difference between playbooks and strategy. The two can often be confused and, without understanding that each plays a different role in marketing, you can easily mistake one for the other.

The easiest way to separate the two is to acknowledge that a marketing playbook is part of your overall marketing strategy. It consists of the plays that you will run throughout your campaigns and which tools will be used to measure success. 

4 Marketing Playbook Staples

Marketing playbooks can go in many different directions when you are looking at building and managing marketing campaigns, as there are so many types of campaigns. The topic alone could be its own blog article (hint, hint). Instead, let’s focus on four plays that you can and should have in your marketing playbooks, regardless of fleet size or budget.

Lead Capture

Whether you are using a trucking-specific applicant tracking system or a more generalized CRM platform, being able to capture your leads effectively is one of the first things that you should consider when building your playbook.

As a carrier, you can spend an endless amount of money on getting drivers into your pipeline. The last thing that you want is for those leads that you have worked so hard to get to fall through the cracks. Even the most diligent recruiters are human, and if you are relying on spreadsheets they will inevitably make a mistake. 

Applicant tracking systems funnel all of your leads into a single location and allow your recruiters to more easily manage their pipeline. It not only reduces the likelihood of human error, but it also helps in the event that your recruiter is out for vacation or suddenly leaves your company. Other team members can easily get up to speed and carry the torch when needed.

Mobile-Friendly Driver Applications

The world of driver recruiting is quickly becoming an arms race between carriers, and one of the best ways to keep pace is to make the process as easy as possible for prospective drivers. The days of printing out a PDF application and faxing or mailing it in are long gone. Drivers want an easy process, and it is your fleet’s responsibility to meet that demand.

This can come in a couple of different forms, depending on your fleet’s preference. For example, you could choose to have a simple short form, that is little more than a contact card. These tools give the driver the ability to get into your funnel in less than 10 seconds with any smartphone. This solution is simple and straightforward, and it puts the ball in the recruiters court.

Short forms are great, but most fleets are looking for full applications. This is where a mobile-friendly application shines. it can cut down the application time significantly and helps improve the entire application experience.

Automation Tools

What is the next play once a driver sends in a short form or full application? Can your recruiter get to that driver in less than a minute? Speed kills in the trucking industry and there is only so much time in a recruiters day. For this reason alone, every fleet should look to automate as much of the process as possible.

Over the years, automation has developed a bad stigma among driver recruiters as it “removes the human element” from driver recruiting. The truth is that automation allows recruiters to have more control over the messages that they are sending drivers, and can help generate more conversations. More conversations lead to more hires.

If you are new to automation – expect to devote a reasonable amount of time to the setup process. But, once your automation is in place, it can make your recruiters much more efficient and will help drivers through the transition from application to truck exponentially faster.

Drip Campaigns

Looking for a play that can be used in a variety of situations? Drip campaigns can be one of the most effective plays in your marketing playbook because of their versatility. Where others are focused on the front end and pipeline management, drip campaigns are there throughout the driver lifecycle.

Drip campaigns have come a long way in the last few years and work in the background to create touchpoints that do not eat into the recruiter’s day to day. Drip campaigns can be built out specifically for each fleet. Your personalization of your campaign could be something as simple as the driver stage in the hiring process, or as complicated as specific triggers that you set when building the campaign.

Whether you are looking to stay connected with your current fleet, keep drivers notified through the hiring process, or are remarketing to old leads, drip campaigns are the swiss army knife of your marketing playbook. Go to them often and they will quickly pay off.

Start Building Your Playbook

Building your marketing playbook doesn’t have to be a monumental task. Start with one piece and build on it consistently until you have a winning formula to execute your overall marketing strategy. If you are just getting started and don’t know where to begin, the KJ Media team is here to help. Our team has been in the recruiters chair and we know the challenges of marketing in a competitive landscape. Let our team help you build a bulletproof playbook today. Learn more about KJ Media by visiting our website, and schedule a consultation today.