When is the Best Time to Send Marketing Emails?

Apr 20, 2022
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If you send marketing emails, then you have probably spent some time considering what the best time to send an email might be.
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Many people who send marketing emails on behalf of their own business or the company that they work for will wonder if the time that they are sending out campaigns is the most effective one to help them get the results that they want. The good news is that there have been several studies conducted on this topic, so keep reading to find out more about the best time to send marketing emails, blast campaigns, and more.

What are the Best Times to Send Emails?

Studies have found that the best time for sending emails, in general, was 4 AM when judging by the open rate, or 6 AM if you’re trying to improve your click-through rate. But this does not necessarily mean that every email marketer should be sending their emails first thing in the morning as it all depends on your target audience.

If your audience is likely to read your messages early after waking up, then 6 AM might be a good time to send. This will make it more likely that your emails land at the top of inboxes and push anything from the night before further down.

On the other hand, if you don’t think your audience is going to be getting up and checking their emails straight away, then it’s important to pick the time that makes the most sense for them.

Why Consider the Best Time to Send Email Campaign?

To effectively determine when the best time is to send marketing emails, you first need to get a better understanding of your audience’s behaviours – particularly in terms of when you will be able to grab their attention and best motivate them to take the action that you want. Each email list is made up of a set of individuals who have a unique set of habits.

So, it’s important to recognise that the time that works best for one business’ marketing emails might not be the same for yours. In order to figure out the best day and time for you to send a marketing email, you will need to first take a closer look at the personas of your target audience.

Why is the Best Time to Send an Email Important?

Along with considering the time of day that you send an email, it is also important to consider the day that you send your emails. Data from studies suggest that while the days of the week play a smaller role when you are optimising your email marketing campaigns for open and click-through rates, it is worth considering which day is best to send.

You will be glad to hear that there is little difference from Monday to Friday. However, depending on your audience, you may want to avoid sending on the weekends since this is when average open rates are at their lowest. Friday is the highest day to send in terms of opens, while Tuesday is best for clicks.

The fact that there is little difference between each day of the week means that the most important thing is to consider who you are targeting and research your audience to find out when they are most likely to engage with the emails that you send.

Best Time to Send Email Blast

Email campaigns are not the only option that you can use to increase your business engagement and revenue. Sometimes, to get the best results, you will need to send email blasts to either share important information with your customers or for promotional purposes.

Understanding the best time to send an email blast will help you ensure maximum engagement.

Unlike an email campaign, an email blast is not an automated email. They are sent on a one-off, on-demand time, which can make it impractical to set a standard time for them.

Email blasts are usually emails that contain important data to be sent during a certain period. Because of this, it is important to examine the right factors to determine the best time for you to send them. This could include your audience, the type of email blast, or the topic that they will cover.

Experts advise that the best days to send an email blast are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. MailChimp says that between 1 pm and 3 pm is the best time to send an email blast, with 2 pm the optimal time. By now, most people have gotten through the worst of the morning and have some time to attend to less urgent things.

Best Time to Send Email – Why It Matters

The success of your email marketing campaigns will depend on lots of different factors, including your sending schedule. Nobody is going to open, read, and engage with your perfectly crafted email if they don’t first open your email.

So, all it takes is for you to pick the wrong time to send your email and it might get lost in your recipients’ inboxes.

In general, you can expect lower open rates during the weekends, public holidays, and common vacation times. For some people, Monday mornings and Friday evenings are also not a good time to send a marketing email.

Monday mornings are typically busy, and your inbox is full of emails and notifications from the previous weekend, and on a Friday evening, most people are ready to forget about their notifications and start enjoying their weekends.

Best Time to Send Marketing Emails

The best time to send a marketing email will depend on several factors including the type of email, type of business, and of course your target audience. Studies have found some different results.

Moosend, for example, noticed that the open rates happen between 8-9 AM, while Omnisend noticed that the peak open rates were spread out through the day at 8 AM, 1 PM, and 4 PM. They recommend that you send emails at 8 AM for maximum open rates and avoid sending emails throughout the night from 7 PM to 7 AM when most people are not at work and are either enjoying their evening at home or asleep under the bedsheets (check for more CaliforniaDesignDen).

According to CampaignMonitor’s research, open rates increase as people begin to wake up and get their day started. Over 50% of email opens occur between 9 AM and 5 PM, with a slight drop during lunch hours.

Best Time to Send Emails to B2B

Although both B2B and B2C businesses should aim for high open rates when it comes to choosing which time they should send marketing emails to their audiences, there are some slight differences to be aware of when it comes to sending emails to either B2B or B2C audiences.

For example, if you are sending emails to a B2B audience, you may want to take into consideration the length of the typical working day for your target audience. Patterns are quite different for B2C audiences in comparison, so you may find that it helps to schedule your email campaigns based on individual buyer personas and their routines.

Since most of the research that has been done so far on the best time to send a marketing email has focused on a B2B audience, it’s no surprise that most results suggest that the best time to send emails is during business hours.

However, emails that are sent during the first part of the day are usually in with a better chance of being opened compared to emails sent later in the day. This may not always be the case, however.

Take blast emails, for example, which tend to perform better when sent at 2 PM when most recipients are likely to have finished their work for the morning and are returning from their lunch break to a more relaxed afternoon with a little bit of extra time to attend to non-urgent matters in their email inbox.

Finding the Best Time to Send an Email for Your Business

While there have been several studies that you can use the results of to get an insight into when might be the best time to send marketing emails or email blast campaigns, the main takeaway is that all audiences are different, so the best thing to do is to take a tailored approach to finding the best time to send an email for your business.

There are a few things that will usually stay the same no matter your audience, such as avoiding sending emails during the night time, on weekends, and during public holidays. But the rest can be very flexible depending on your audience, so the best approach is to research your target audience and make sure that you have a clear understanding of them before you send an email.

Find out who your email subscribers are and become more familiar with their occupations, demographics, and daily routines. You can then segment your lists based on these factors.

For example, you will need to come up with different sending times for a recipient who works a standard 9-5 job Monday to Friday as an accountant compared to a nurse who works unsociable hours and weekends.

Getting the timing right can increase open rates and email engagement. Figuring out the best time to send an email is all about getting to know your audience better.

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