How to Set Up Automated Interview Reminders and Follow-Ups Using Keap Campaigns
In the fast-paced world of talent acquisition, efficiency is paramount. Manual interview scheduling, reminders, and follow-ups consume valuable time and often lead to missed opportunities or a fragmented candidate experience. Leveraging Keap’s robust campaign builder, you can automate these critical touchpoints, ensuring candidates are well-informed, engaged, and that your recruiting process runs like a well-oiled machine. This guide will walk you through the essential steps to configure automated interview communications that save time and enhance your brand’s professionalism.
Step 1: Define Your Interview Communication Strategy
Before diving into Keap, clearly outline your communication needs. What are the key stages of your interview process? When should reminders be sent (e.g., 24 hours prior, 1 hour prior)? What information needs to be included in these reminders (e.g., interviewer names, video conference links, attachments)? Similarly, consider your follow-up cadence: immediate post-interview thank yous, next steps, or status updates for candidates who weren’t selected. A well-defined strategy ensures that every automated message serves a specific purpose, aligns with your brand’s voice, and provides maximum value to the candidate experience. This foundational step prevents haphazard campaign design and ensures your automation delivers a consistent, professional journey.
Step 2: Prepare Your Keap CRM with Custom Fields and Tags
Effective automation hinges on organized data. Within your Keap CRM, you’ll need custom fields to store critical interview-related information, such as “Interview Date & Time,” “Interviewer Name,” “Interview Link,” and “Interview Stage.” These fields allow for dynamic content personalization in your emails and SMS messages. Additionally, establish clear tags like “Interview Scheduled,” “Interview Completed,” or “Moved to Next Round.” These tags will serve as the triggers and decision points within your Keap campaigns, dictating which communications a contact receives and when. Properly setting up these data points ensures your campaigns have the necessary information to segment candidates and deliver highly relevant messages.
Step 3: Design Compelling Email and SMS Templates
With your strategy and data fields in place, it’s time to craft your communication templates. Create distinct templates for initial interview invitations, pre-interview reminders (e.g., 24-hour, 1-hour), post-interview thank yous, and next-step notifications. Each template should be clear, concise, and professional. Utilize the custom fields you created in Step 2 to personalize each message, pulling in details like the candidate’s name, interview time, and specific links. For SMS, keep messages extremely brief and to the point, often focusing on urgent reminders or simple notifications. Consistent branding and a clear call to action (e.g., “Confirm your attendance” or “Review attached documents”) across all templates are crucial for a seamless candidate experience.
Step 4: Build Your Keap Campaign Sequence
Now, bring it all together in Keap’s Campaign Builder. Start by defining your campaign’s entry point, which could be a form submission, a tag applied, or a manual addition. The sequence typically begins with an interview scheduled tag. From there, use a combination of “Sequences,” “Delays,” and “Goals.” For example, after the “Interview Scheduled” tag is applied, initiate a sequence that sends the initial invitation. Add “Delays” to schedule reminder emails at specific intervals before the interview. Incorporate “Goals,” such as a “Interview Completed” tag, which would trigger the post-interview follow-up sequence and remove the contact from the reminder track. Map out the entire candidate journey visually within the campaign builder, ensuring every communication point is covered.
Step 5: Implement Smart Integrations and Automation Triggers
To truly automate the process, integrate Keap with your scheduling tools (e.g., Calendly, Acuity Scheduling) or applicant tracking systems (ATS) using tools like Make.com (formerly Integromat) or Zapier. This integration is vital for automatically applying the “Interview Scheduled” tag and populating the custom fields (Interview Date & Time, Interview Link) in Keap once a candidate books an interview. This eliminates manual data entry and ensures your Keap campaign is triggered instantly and accurately. For instance, when a candidate schedules via Calendly, a Make.com scenario can create/update the contact in Keap, apply the “Interview Scheduled” tag, and pass relevant interview details to the custom fields, seamlessly initiating your automated campaign.
Step 6: Test, Monitor, and Optimize Your Campaigns
Before launching your campaigns to live candidates, rigorously test every step. Use a dummy contact to go through the entire flow, checking that emails are sent, links work, custom fields populate correctly, and delays function as intended. Once live, continuously monitor your campaign’s performance. Track open rates, click-through rates, and feedback from candidates or hiring managers. Are reminders effective? Are follow-ups timely? Use this data to identify bottlenecks or areas for improvement. Regularly refine your campaign logic, message content, and timing to ensure it remains highly effective and delivers an exceptional candidate experience. Automation is an ongoing process of optimization, not a one-time setup.
If you would like to read more, we recommend this article: Keap Marketing Automation for HR & Recruiting: Build Your Automated Talent Acquisition Machine
