Best time to send an email
Best Time to Send an Email – Myths Debunked or Reliable Findings?
You’ve worked tirelessly on an email and made sure the criteria are met; the subject line entices, the email itself is visually stunning, and the content is just what the reader wants. After a long-winded week, you have finally crafted and finished an article that is ready to be launched to your list of subscribers, but instead of scheduling a send to go imminently, hold fire on that. Scheduling a time to send your emails is another piece of the puzzle. There is a vast amount of research done on this in the past few years, where users’ habits are drastically changing, and top businesses are opting to change their methods. How do we keep up!? Is there really a best time to send an email? Let’s look at the common advice given over the years, and analyse if this is still relevant, or if it’s time to think outside the box.
‘The Best Day to Email is Tuesday by Far’
Many reports have conclusively found that Tuesday has the best open rates. If you were to send a 2nd email in the same week, you’d then use Thursday as your next sending day. These open rates were the closest to 20% and perform significantly better than the weekend, Monday, or Friday (CoSchedule). Stick to the middle of the week.
Is it still relevant? Mainly yes, and a little bit of a no. I cannot dispute that many pioneering companies in this field have released reports, including the likes of Campaign Monitor and MailChimp, and have stated Tuesday is the winner. However, the term ‘by far’ is categorically wrong. There is a minor difference between Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and only a slightly bigger difference for the remaining days of the week. In terms of open rates, Saturday is the worst because everyone is ‘on an adventure’, or ‘too busy relaxing’, but in actual fact, some studies show that there is a huge click-through rate. It depends on what you are sending, and who the customer profile is. There is no right or wrong day to send an email.
‘Send the email between 10am and 11am’
Word must have got around as more emails are sent between 10am and noon than any other time frame, with the ‘10am to 11am’ spot proving to be the most effective (Sleeknote). Many people are doing tasks and meetings first thing in the morning, so when it comes to about 11am, they’ll spend time going through their emails.
Do you need to look any further? Yes. Once again – and I’ll keep coming back to it – it depends on who you are sending to, but don’t automatically think that Tuesday at 10am is going to make your email more tempting than usual. Other research from Omnisend and CoSchedule suggest 8am on Tuesday hails better statistics, so they can’t both be right. Secondly, studies show that over 54% are now opening emails with their phones (Vertical Response), and with this figure continuously on the rise, it means more people are migrating to opening emails at literally any time of the day, whether it’s at lunch, on their way to work, or elsewhere. Also, don’t out-sheep the sheep, and do it because ‘everyone else is’. The more emails an individual have to check at a certain time, then each email will have less importance and focus. Research on these figures changes like the British weather, so don’t follow the ‘trend’. On top of that, some ESP’s may try to send your email out at 10am, but due to the fierce competition, it may be delayed and your critical time of sending could be affected – but don’t panic, that wouldn’t be a ‘nightmare’ scenario, despite some research suggesting so.
‘Timing isn’t everything’
Although it’s crucial to know when the most efficient time to send an email to your specific audience in your industry, it’s not the be-all and end-all. In terms of importance, its further down the list after subject lines, formatting of the email, and effective call-to-action buttons.
Do you agree with this? I couldn’t agree more. Many marketing experts have said that you need the perfect sending time to maximise your potential in order to get the best open rates, click-through rates, to increase subscribers and more. However, as I alluded to earlier, user habits are changing, and emails are being opened at any time. The average worker spends 30 hours a week checking emails, and 50% of us open emails when in bed, and even 42% of us open emails in the bathroom (Inc). It doesn’t matter where we are – us, the consumer – will be intrigued by the email if the subject line draws our attention, the content intrigues us, and it’s simple for us to respond and/or action – timing is far from everything.
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