Entries Tagged 'email marketing' ↓

The best time to send your email can depend on a number of factors:

• who your audience is
• what your content is
• why you’re sending the email…

The best way to discover the optimum time and day is through asking your recipients and trial and error.

A general rule of thumb

This ‘general rule of thumb’ is the one I work from. You may have different ideas to me and experiences. If you do please comment below because I’d love to hear your take on this subject.

Generally I send out my emails during the working week. Not everyone is a workaholic (says she as she types this on a Sunday afternoon), so I always avoid sending out business communications such as email marketing at the weekend.

I find the best days are Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, with Tuesday and Thursday being my preferred days.

Why not Monday?

Look at your Monday – what are you normally doing? It’s the first day back in the office after the weekend. You’ll probably spend the day finishing off last weeks jobs before you even start looking through your new batch of emails.

If you do get to your emails I bet you just give them a cursory glance and pick our the most important ones. Considering how much work you have to get through that week, you’ll probably also delete those which you won’t have time to look at – i.e. the newsletters! (this is where it pays to spend extra time working on your eye-catching headline).

Why not Friday?

The same kind of thing as above – you’re now winding down for the weekend trying to finish off those last minute jobs that landed on your desk at lunchtime. You don’t have time for newsletters and marketing emails now and you definitely don’t want to see them on Monday morning so they end up being deleted.

Tuesday and Thursday then

In my experience, Tuesday and Thursday are the best days. Why? Who knows – perhaps you’re more into your stride by then or you have more time on those days. But it seems to work for me.

Remember though, there is only one way to really discover the optimum time to send your communications and that’s by testing. Try it and test it – who knows you may come up with  completely different results to me.

Everyone’s market is different so testing is the only way to determine what will really work for you. But it’s also important to keep testing. Different times of year could return different results.

Sally Ormond – freelance copywriter

The best way to dive into email marketing is to build your own opt-in  list.

Sure, if you wanted to cut corners you could buy in a list or two – but do you really know what you’re getting?

The best and safest way to market your business through email is by utilising a list you have developed.

Great! So how do you start getting a list like that. It’s all very well in theory but creating a good list takes time. But at least you know that by doing it this way, you’ll have a list that is qualified and interested in what you’re offering.

How do I build my list and stop people from unsubscribing?

First, let’s make it clear that when you produce your newsletter you must have an unsubscribe button on it. You won’t be able to please all of the people all of the time. Your news and information may only be relevant for a certain period for some people so don’t be too disheartened if you get a few people unsubscribing from your list.

Really the first thing you have to worry about is getting people to hand over their email addresses in the first place.

Why should they give you their address? The information or offers you have for them must be relevant and useful otherwise why should the bother? It would also be a good idea to give them something – e.g. a free report, eBook etc.

Give them great content

Every issue of your newsletter must contain information that is interesting and relevant to your reader. If you promise insights into SEO and give them the latest news on Wall Street they’ll get a bit hacked off and unsubscribe.

Make every page of your website count

Get your opt-in form on every page of your site – in the  same place. And make sure it’s easy to find – if you’re offering a free report/eBook make sure you show that too. Why not add them to your social media pages too such as Facebook.

Don’t make the sign up process complicated – a simple name and email address will suffice.

Psst, pass it on…

If your subscribers like your content, the chances are others will as well. Ask them to spread the work and “pass it on” to their friends and colleagues. This kind of viral marketing can be very powerful and help you grow a list quickly.

Use a squeeze page

There is only one goal for a squeeze page and that is to get opt-ins. It’s a bit like a mini sales letter. It has a strong headline followed by tantalising benefits. Research your keywords and invest in a bit of pay-per-click and you’re away.

To give it an extra boost add in a few testimonials too. You can also add video.

Blog

Blogging will generate interest and traffic to your site. If your blog is on a different URL to your website why not include a sign up box there too?

So there you go – just a few ideas to help you grow a home cultivated email marketing opt-in list.

Can you think of any other way of generating your list? If so why not post a comment and share your ideas with everyone.

Sally Ormond – freelance copywriter

If you have been following my blog, you’ll recall the last few posts dealt with the issue of email marketing.

Email remains one of the most cost effective methods for today’s small businesses to market to their customers. With a single click your offer or news item can be distributed to thousands of in boxes anywhere in the world. We have already looked at the structure and content of a great email campaign – now it’s time to take it to another level.

I came across this great post on eMarketer which gives you a further trick you can try to boost your email open rate. This is an excellent piece of advice for all business owners and definitley worth a try because Coupons Boost E-Mail Open Rate ( eMarketer).

This is such a simple idea and so easy to implement. So why not give it a go?

Next time you send out an email campaign or newsletter, try adding a coupon and see what effect it has on your open rate.

Associated posts:

Is Email Marketing Right For You?

Email Marketing – It’s All In The Subject Line

Work Your Way Towards The Perfect Email Body