Showing posts with label email newsletter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label email newsletter. Show all posts

Friday, August 14, 2015

5 Legal Requirements Every Email Newsletter Must Have

Newsletter Legal Requirements image
You may not know it, but there are a number of things that are legally required in every email newsletter that you send out. While most email services automatically address these, it's still important to know what they are and why they're enforced in the first place.

Here are the 5 legal requirements that every email newsletter must have, which have been excerpted from my Social Media Promotion For Musicians book

"While it may seem that it’s entirely up to you about what’s contained in your email, be aware that every mass email blast that you send now requires several things by law. These are:

1. Easy opt-out: You have to provide an easy way for subscribers to unsubscribe if they want. Once a subscriber opts out, you then have 10 days to stop sending them messages (although most expect it to happen immediately), and the unsubscribe option needs to be available for at least 30 days after the e-mail is sent. Most ESPs will automatically remove the address to a “do not send” list if the subscriber chooses to unsubscribe.

2. Identify your topic: The subject line of your e-mails has to clearly and accurately identify the content of the e-mail. Any misleading or bogus subject lines are construed as spam.

3. Return address: You have to include a legitimate return email address, as well as a valid postal address. Some ESPs even make you include a phone number. If you don’t want people to know your home info (I don’t want to broadcast it myself), open up a PO box, and get a Google Voice number if a phone number is required.

4. No email address harvesting: You can’t collect addresses from chat rooms, discussion forums, or blog comments. Once again, people must opt-in and give you permission to send something to them.

5. You can’t offer a reward for forwarding: You can invite subscribers to “forward this newsletter to a friend,” but you can’t entice them to do so with offers of money, coupons, discounts, awards, or additional entries in a giveaway. 

Remember that spam is a serious business. It’s not only bad form, but you could be held legally liable as well."

You can read more from Social Media Promotion For Musicians and my other books on the excerpt section of bobbyowsinski.com.

Thursday, April 17, 2014

A Strategy For Sending Out Gig Reminders

Gig image
Artists, bands, record labels and anyone doing a show needs to make their fan base very aware when they're doing a gig. You can't rely on just a single email to get the word out, it takes a more comprehensive strategy. Here's an excerpt from my Social Media Promotion For Musicians book that outlines such a strategy that has proven very effective in getting people to your show.

"Gig reminder emails fall into a different category in that they can be a lot shorter and a lot more frequent. While the email sequence below may seem like a lot of emails, remember that for true fans, you’re doing them a favor by keeping them informed, and you’re marketing yourself for other things at the same time. A potential reminder strategy is:
  • The day a show is announced or tickets go on sale. As soon as you know that you’re playing at a venue, send out an email. This could be to the entire list if it’s announcing a tour, if it’s the monthly schedule for a cover band, or if you believe that people will travel to see the show.
  • A week before the show. Send out a reminder but concentrate more on the band, regarding a new part of the show, new songs, a music video, or something that you want to the fan to see.
  • 3 days before the show. Send out a reminder and include more information about the club and who else is playing.
  • 1 day before the show. Once again, remind the fan about a a different feature of the show or the music that’s unique and won’t be seen or heard any other way than attending. You can change the headline to “You don’t want to miss this,” or “See our new show tomorrow night.”
  • The day of the show. Send out a short reminder in the late morning to just the portion of your list in the general area of the club. Use a headline like, “Can you make it tonite?”, or “Last chance to buy tickets!”
  • The day after the show. Send an email with backstage pictures, pictures of meet and greets with fans or just fans in the audience, as well as links to videos. This is a nice shout-out to those that were there, and a prod for those that weren’t not to miss you next time you’re in town.
Of course, if you’re lucking enough to have sold out your show, you won’t need to send as many reminders. That said, you might send one headlined “Sold Out!” that either announces another gig or another way for the fan to hear your music or buy your merch. A contest for two last minute tickets (put them on your guest list) also works well.
TIP: In every reminder be sure to include all the pertinent gig information, including the name of the venue, the full address, the phone number, the time you’re going on, and other acts on the bill. Consider including a map or a link to one as well.
Artists and bands are sometimes timid about sending out so many gig announcements, but fans that ordinarily would attend really do forget. Remember, you’re doing them a favor by reminding them.
TIP: When sending out multiple emails in a short space of time, be sure to continually change the headline and the email contents." 
You can read additional excerpts from Social Media Promotion For Musicians and my other books on the excerpt section of bobbyowsinski.com.

Sunday, February 2, 2014

Tips For Sending Gig Reminder Emails

Newsletter image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog
Many artists and bands are often uncertain about the correct procedure for sending emails about a gig or show to their fan base. How many is too much? How few is too little to get enough bodies to the show? Here's an excerpt from the Email Newsletter chapter of Social Media Promotion For Musicians that provides some effective guidelines for reminding your fans of your show.

"Gig reminder emails fall into a different category in that they can be a lot shorter and a lot more frequent. While the email sequence below may seem like a lot of emails, remember that for true fans, you’re doing them a favor by keeping them informed, and you’re marketing yourself for other things at the same time. A potential reminder strategy is:
  • The day a show is announced or tickets go on sale. As soon as you know that you’re playing at a venue, send out an email. This could be to the entire list if it’s announcing a tour, if it’s the monthly schedule for a cover band, or if you believe that people will travel to see the show.
  • A week before the show. Send out a reminder but concentrate more on the band, regarding a new part of the show, new songs, a music video, or something that you want to the fan to see.
  • 3 days before the show. Send out a reminder and include more information about the club and who else is playing.
  • 1 day before the show. Once again, remind the fan about a a different feature of the show or the music that’s unique and won’t be seen or heard any other way than attending. You can change the headline to “You don’t want to miss this,” or “See our new show tomorrow night.”
  • The day of the show. Send out a short reminder in the late morning to just the portion of your list in the general area of the club. Use a headline like, “Can you make it tonite?”, or “Last chance to buy tickets!”
  • The day after the show. Send an email with backstage pictures, pictures of meet and greets with fans or just fans in the audience, as well as links to videos. This is a nice shout-out to those that were there, and a prod for those that weren’t not to miss you next time you’re in town.
Of course, if you’re lucking enough to have sold out your show, you won’t need to send as many reminders. That said, you might send one headlined “Sold Out!” that either announces another gig or another way for the fan to hear your music or buy your merch. A contest for two last minute tickets (put them on your guest list) also works well.

TIP: In every reminder be sure to include all the pertinent gig information, including the name of the venue, the full address, the phone number, the time you’re going on, and other acts on the bill. Consider including a map or a link to one as well.

Artists and bands are sometimes timid about sending out so many gig announcements, but fans that ordinarily would attend really do forget. Remember, you’re doing them a favor by reminding them.

TIP: When sending out multiple emails in a short space of time, be sure to continually change the headline and the email contents."

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Follow me on Forbes for some insights on the new music business.

You should follow me on Twitter and Facebook for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Thursday, November 7, 2013

3 Questions To Ask Before You Send Your Newsletter

Newsletter image
An email newsletter is critical to the financial well-being of any artist, as it's responsible for informing your hard-core fans of what you're doing, where you're doing it , and who you're doing it with. It can be the best marketing tool you have, or it can be a complete turn-off to your audience if you're not careful. Here's an excerpt from the Social Media Promotion For Musicians book that poses 3 essential questions you should ask yourself before you hit send on your next newsletter.

"There’s a lot of thought that goes into creating a newsletter. If your title doesn’t attract attention, the email may not get opened. If the content is weak, the next one might not get opened, or worse yet, the person could unsubscribe. You could have a great offer that no one acts on because it’s presented poorly or visually buried. Let’s take a look at the elements of a great newsletter.

Sending out a newsletter for the sake of sending one out isn’t a good strategy. There has to be a good reason for you to communicate with your subscribers. Don’t forget, they gave you permission to contact them in the first place. It’s up to you not to soil that agreement. Before you decide to send any newsletter, ask yourself these three questions:
  • What is this email about? Are you informing your subscribers about the latest news? Are you trying to promote something? Is this an announcement of some kind? Decide what your email is about, then keep that as your central focus.
  • Why do my subscribers care? Is this something they would be sorry about missing? Is it something they want to participate in? What’s in it for them?
  • What do they do about it? Do you want them to pass something along? Buy something? Come to a show? Stay informed about your life? Whatever it is, be sure to ask them to do it.
If you can answer these questions, then you know you're ready to send your newsletter or any other email."

You can download a free chapter of Social Media Promotion For Musicians, or read additional excerpts from it and my other books on the excerpt section of bobbyowsinski.com.
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Follow me on Forbes for some insights on the new music business.

You should follow me on Twitter and Facebook for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

4 Reasons Why Your Email List Is So Important

Newsletter image
One of the most effective tools that any artist, band, engineer, musician, record label or person in the music business can have is an email list. Your email newsletter truly is the best way to keep people informed about what you're doing, but can also help you get work or sell more product or tickets. It's a targeted audience that's opted in and really wants to hear from you. Here's an excerpt from the new Social Media Promotion For Musicians book that outlines the 4 reasons why your email list is important.

"While the trend is to think that email is on the decline when it comes to communicating with friends, fans, clients and business associates as social networks like Facebook rise in popularity, it's a lot more important than you think when it comes to promotion. Here are four reasons why.

1. You control the message. Your email list is one of the most powerful tools you can have because you control the message, and if done well, it can feel a lot more personal than communicating via Facebook or Linkedin or any of the other popular networks. You control the information, the look, the marketing and the promotion in a way that’s not possible in any social network, since each social network has its own look and feel as well as a terms-of-service agreement that can limit what you can say and do.

2. Your message is consistent. Although the ability to control the message is important, being able to control the consistency of that message is even more so. For most artists and musicians today, the problem becomes how to effectively communicate with all of your "friends" and contacts across various networks, because social networks are a closed environment by nature. That means that you have a set of friends on Facebook, another set on Twitter, and a different set on another network like Pinterest or Instagram. As a result, the look and feel will be inconsistent because of the nature of the various networks. If you're not consistent in your presentation, you're not controlling the message.

3. It’s a memory prompt. One of the best things about a newsletter is that it reminds fans or former clients who you are. If a person hasn’t been following you on a social network and therefore doesn’t see any of your regular posts, that newsletter in their email box jogs their memory and reminds them you’re around. It doesn’t take long to drift from the public consciousness, and an email prevents that from happening. 

4. You can measure its effectiveness. One thing that email can provide that social networks don’t do nearly as well is sophisticated measurement. With email we know when a newsletter was opened, if it was opened more than once (even if it's reopened again a year later), how long it was read, if any of the links were clicked, and if it was passed along to anyone else, among many other measurements. Obviously your personal email app on your computer can't do these things, and it can't easily reach out to thousands of people as well. That's why you need a service like Constant Contact, WhatCounts, or iContact, all of which also have the added convenience of constantly cleaning the list of bounces and outdated addresses."

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Follow me on Forbes for some insights on the new music business.

You should follow me on Twitter and Facebook for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

The Best Time To Send Your Newsletter

Email icon image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog
Just like there’s a best day to send your newsletter, there’s also a definite science behind the time of day to send your emails. It’s been studied extensively, most notably by Dan Zarrella and Pure360. In this excerpt from The Music 3.0 Guide To Social Media, we'll look at all the time periods in the day and evaluate email success in each. Remember that all times are Eastern Standard Time.
  • Most opens occur between 5AM and 7AM. Most people check their email first thing in the morning even before they leave for work. Remember that open rates are as much as 53% higher in the mornings.
  • 7AM to 10AM: The second most prevalent email opening time is at the beginning of the working day.
  • 10AM to Noon: Consumers are not opening marketing emails, choosing instead to focus on work.
  • Noon to 2PM: Consumers are unlikely to open emails during their lunch break, choosing instead to spend their time on news and magazine alerts.
  • 2PM to 3PM: Right after lunch consumers remain focused on work, responding mostly to email offers related to financial services.
  • 3PM to 5PM: Consumers start thinking about their personal situation and as a result, more emails relating to property and financial services are opened during this time period than any other.
  • 5PM to 7PM: Consumers tend to open business to business (B2B) promotions during this period, but also open more holiday-type promotions during this period than any other.
  • 7PM to 10PM: The time period when recipients are most likely to respond to consumer promotions is when they get off work.
  • 10PM to 6AM: This is an email dead zone, as most sent during this period are ineffective.
Remember that these are trends and might not apply to your particular audience. The best way to proceed is to use these timings as a starting point, then experiment to see if another time works better. It's easy enough to schedule blog posts or emails to do so, just make sure that you have enough of a sample size before you make any ironclad decisions on exactly what's working.


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Sunday, November 25, 2012

10 Things That Can Destroy An Email Marketing Campaign

email newsletter image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog
An email newsletter is much more important than most musicians think. It's easy to get coddled into thinking that social media is all that you need to stay in touch with your fans, but study after study reveal that when it comes to marketing, your email newsletter is your most effective tool. That said, there are right and wrong ways to do everything, and an email newsletter is no exception.

Here's a great post from clickz regarding the 10 things that can destroy an email marketing campaign, and how to fix them.
"Your consumers are in complete control. They are empowered by their choices, with their devices, and have the ability to leave you with a click of a button. Here are 10 things that concern them and can force them off your list.
1. They do not remember who you are. This can easily happen if you do not send them their first message quickly or let a lot of time lapse between messages. If your branding is not clearly defined, it is going to be harder for the consumer to recognize you.
Rx: Send the first message quickly, stay in touch, and keep reminding the consumer about your value proposition.

2. You send them too many campaigns. When the consumer signed up you may have promised them a message a week, important updates, or emails tailored to their preferences. Your campaign frequency has now gone up significantly.
Rx: Cap your frequency to match your consumers' preferences, and if they do unsubscribe, offer to reduce the frequency to a minimum.

3. Your emails are just not interesting. If the consumer considers your campaigns to be boring they are going to lose attention quickly.
Rx: Spice it up a bit, even if you are talking about "ball bearings." Factor in some user-generated content or questions - this is what will keep the consumer engaged.

4. You do not stop selling. I once opted in to receive emails from a financial institution to learn more about their loan instruments. I even opened an account. The nurturing campaign turned to an aggressive selling campaign, forcing me to get off their list.
Rx: Mix up your messaging; the best thing might be to include useful informational content in every marketing campaign.

5. You are not relevant. Many times, we are so influenced by the merchandising or information calendar that we forget what the consumer's preferences are. We either forget that the consumer has already purchased a particular product or target her with things that she has no interest in.
Rx: While it would be ideal to segment the consumer based on her preferences, keep asking the consumer if you are missing the mark and factor in her comments into your marketing campaigns.

6. You expect your consumers to test your content. How many times have you received an email where the images are broken, the formatting is messed up, or worse yet, the landing page takes you to the land of nowhere?
Rx: Test your campaigns internally and then test them in a control group. Only then should you release them to the entire list.

7. It takes too long to load. If you do not have the bandwidth to scale, you could really turn the consumer off. The consumer might wait for a couple of seconds and just hit the delete key.
Rx: If you are having page load issues, consider deploying your campaigns in smaller segments.

8. You look horrible on mobile. Many of us look at mobile when we are mobile. It is an absolute horrible practice to take the same content and render it on mobile because it is very hard to read.
Rx: Design your message with mobile in mind and reduce the amount of content for mobile devices - don't just optimize it. Remember, you can segment and target those that tend to open on mobile devices.

9. You flaunt their data. You might think it is good personalization by displaying the consumer's account number or her home address within the content. Many consumers are alarmed that you know so much and that you are showing it off, so they resort to doing two things - reducing the amount of information they share with you or switching back to paper statements (I did that with a major credit card company).
Rx: Remind consumers that their data is protected and encrypt information to show them how secure it is.

10. You screw it up completely. I received an email from a very reputable electronics retailer telling me that my monitor was ready for pickup. It wasn't my monitor, because that email was intended for someone else. You may have heard about the airline that goofed up by mixing the names and frequent flier numbers; or the bank that sent out an email to their consumers with someone else's bank logo (it was the fault of their ESP).
Rx: Audit your partners to make sure they know what they are doing. Test before you send. If you do screw up, apologize and have a crisis plan.
See these Email Marketing concepts in action during Sundeep's ClickZ Academy workshop: Email Marketing: Driving 51% Engagement at SES Chicago 2012."

Keep these tips in mind before you hit send on your next newsletter. You'll keep your subscribers happier, and have a better chance of your newsletter succeeding in achieving your goals.

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Wednesday, November 21, 2012

The Top 10 Lists

Top 10 Lists image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog
Happy Thanksgiving to all those of you who celebrate it. I'm going to use today to look backwards a little at some of the lists that I've posted over the last year. There's a lot more than I was aware of, so determining the top 10 was next to impossible, so here are simply 10 lists that I liked from the past year.

The 6 Top Earning Dead Musicians In 2012

5 Ways To Take The Pulse Of Your Fans

Check D's 5 Tips For Music Industry Survival

3 Common Mistakes Made By Independent Musicians

The 3 Pillars Of A Successful Brand

8 Reasons For A Bad Band Picture

7 Tips For A Great Newsletter

10 Great Music Marketing Ideas

7 Tips From The Advertising Giants

13 Questions To Ask About Your Publishing Contract

Considering that I do about 260 posts a year, there are probably another 20 or so that could've been included in this list, and perhaps you'll see some more during the upcoming Christmas holiday. In the meantime, enjoy these, and email me with your favorite.

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You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

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Tuesday, October 16, 2012

7 Tips For A Great Newsletter

Newsletter image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog
A great email campaign can sometimes be the difference between popularity and obscurity. Here are 10 tips that can help your campaign be as successful as it needs to be.

1. Help subscribers remember who you are. Send the first message quickly and continue to stay in touch on a regular basis.

2. Don't send too many emails. You should tell them up front exactly how often you're going to email, and keep to it. If they unsubscribe, offer to reduce the frequency.

3. Keep your emails interesting. If your subscriber gets bored you'll lose them. Sprinkle in some user-generated content, contests, surveys and questions to keep the interest level high.

4. Don't make it all about selling or promoting. Being too aggressive is a good way to force people off the list. Make sure you include some useful or fun information along with any promotion.

5. Be sure to test your email first. Broken links, bad formatting, broken images or blank landing pages are a good way for people to lose interest. Test, test again and retest before you send.

6. Be sure it's formated for mobile. More and more people are accessing their email via their mobile device, and nothing could be worse for a newsletter than if it looks bad there. Be sure to design your newsletter with mobile in mind.

7. Be sure it's quick to load. In this day of instant gratification, we not only want, but are used to seeing everything load up quickly. If you make someone wait even a couple of seconds they're more likely to just hit the delete key instead. If your newsletter is loading slowly, consider breaking it up into smaller bits and saving some of the info for the next one.

Remember that content is king when it comes to newsletters. If you have something that's really dynamite then your subscribers are likely to overlook one or two of the above items, but the more of these that occur, the less likely you'll keep that person as a subscriber.

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You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Monday, June 11, 2012

When People Read Email

Boomerang For Gmail, a service that allows you to schedule your email through your Chrome browser, recently analyzed 5 million emails and discovered a number of interesting facts.
  • Most people read most of their emails from 5AM to 7AM, and read the least from 1PM to 4PM.
  • However, most people think that people read their email at 8 to 9AM. 
  • The best words to use in the title to get a response are "Apply, Opportunity, Demo, Connect, Payments, Conference, Cancellation."
  • The worst words to use in the title are "Confirm, Join, Assistance, Speaker, Press, Social, Invite."
But there's more. The average person gets a lot of email.
  • The average email user receives 147 messages every day and spends more than 2 1/2 hours on email every day.
  • On average, we delete 71 of those, which takes just under 5 minutes.
  • On average, we get 12 messages a day that require substantial work, and they take almost 90 minutes to complete.
  • The average person writes 40 email messages a day and each one takes an average of 72 seconds to write.
  • Deciding to defer an email for later takes about 10 seconds.
  • 77% of people expect a response to their email within 2 days.
If your newsletter is important to your marketing (and you know it is), remember that your fans get a lot of email and you have to stand out from the clutter. Send it at the right time and use the right title to make sure that it's read.

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You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

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Thursday, April 5, 2012

5 Things For Your Newsletter

mail icon from Music 3.0 blog
Social media mavin Ariel Hyatt of Ariel Publicity/Cyber PR recently posted on Music Think Tank about 5 things to keep in mind when crafting your newsletter. You can read a lot about newsletters in some of my older posts, but here are a few more things that you should consider.

"1. Keep Your Subject Line To 55 Characters Or Less. Most email programs cut off the subject line after 55 to 60 characters, so keep your subject line short and sweet and to the point. 5 or 6 words max!

2. Get Personal. Saying something personal brings you closer to your fan base. Share a photo of something you love (your pet, your kids, your friends), or something fun and non-music related that you did lately (like a vacation).

3. You Don't Have To Have A Show To Send A Newsletter. How about just inviting everyone on your newsletter out for drinks one evening, or to join you for a show, or share something fun that you've done recently. Or maybe just talk about an album that you love.

4. Mailing Address And Unsubscribe Link. Know that by law you need to put your mailing address and an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each of your newsletters. If you are uncomfortable adding your home address, then open up a PO Box and use that.

5. First Names Get Attention. Use the first name of each person you send your newsletter to. The best way to get anyone's attention is to include their first name in the subject line of an email. Something like this:

"Hey, Kevin! Summer News From The Darrin James Band"

It's catchy and gets people's attention immediately to the subject of your email. Any of the mailing list/newsletter management services, including Bandletter, Fanbridge, and Reverbnation can help you customize your emails so that the first names of your fans appear in the subject line. Testing shows that the response rates go up 50 to 70% or more if you include first names."

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You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

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Tuesday, August 31, 2010

6 Steps To Your Email Newsletter

As I've said many times on this blog and in my Music 3.0 book, the single best tool for communication with your fan base is via your email list. I found this great article on The Future Of Music blog by George Howard that described 6 vital steps in constructing your email. They are:

1. It must be short and highlight one and only one action. The total length should be less than 500 words.

2. It should be frequent; once a week (I believe that once every two weeks to a month is better) on a regularly-scheduled basis.

3. It should have a call to action. Tell the recipient what you want them to do: come to the site to get something, come to a show, etc.

4. It should be forwardable. Ask your recipients to forward the email to someone they think will enjoy it.

5. It should have sharing functions embedded. Allow people to Tweet, add to a FB status.

6. Make it easy for people to unsubscribe.

George also states the following:
"Don’t worry about overwhelming people with email blasts. If people are unsubscribing, they’re likely non-value adding “fans” any way. Instead, focus on presenting real, timely, share-able value to your current fans so that they have a tool to help you gain new ones."
This I don't buy. I think it's important NOT to overwhelm anyone, as you'll be perceived as a spammer. Emails are difficult to design well, and it's pretty difficult to keep coming up with pertinent info regularly, especially on a weekly basis. That's why I believe that it's both better for you and your fans if you have a longer period in between emails.

That being said, George's steps are right on. His post was more on psychographics and converting fans into customers, and is definitely worth checking out.

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Follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

The Best Day Of The Week For Email Marketing?

What's the best day of the week to send your email newsletter? This is a critical decision because if you send it on the wrong day, you'll have fewer of your fans open it. Why? Usually because the timing is bad and their attention is on something else. That's why you want to be sure to pick the right day.

Like record releases, I've always felt that Tuesday was the best day to release or send anything. It's usually a slow news day, everyone is over the rush and pent up obligations that Monday brings, and you're not caught up in the business craziness that grows ever crazier as the week progresses.

That being said, I recently found an article on a site called gather.com that analyzes every day of the week as a potential email day. The article drew no conclusions but did give a compelling argument for almost every day except the weekend. Here's an excerpt (by the way, I'll still stick with Tuesday).


MONDAY
Pros: After a long weekend, many email users make it a priority to organize their inboxes. This means there is a good chance that they will run across your message and open it.
Cons: Some consumers in the workforce don’t have the time or access to email during the day.
Recommended Approach: Send email late in the morning, preferably just before lunch, as this is when they are more likely to have the time to check their inbox.

TUESDAY
Pros: By now, many consumers have organized their work week and have a little extra time to devote to checking their inbox.
Cons: Campaigns aiming for recipients to take action over the weekend may trigger responses too early.
Recommended Approach: Make sure all the messages you send on Tuesday are designed to convince the recipient to react during the week.

WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY
Pros: People are preparing for the weekend and how they will spend their personal time.  On these two days, they often have a little extra time to spend in their inbox.
Cons: There is still business that needs to be handled and only two days left to get it done. Depending on the recipient, they may hold your message off until next week, or forget about it altogether.
Recommended Approach: Keep your marketing message friendlier and less aggressive as subscribers plan their time off.

FRIDAY
Pros: People tend to receive less email on Friday, which in turn, increases the visibility of your message.
Cons: By the time Friday rolls around, some consumers are in such a rush, they may automatically ignore any email that doesn’t pertain to the job.
Recommended Approach: Send your message early in the day so the recipient has more time to read it and take action.

SATURDAY AND SUNDAY
Pros: Believe it or not, people do check their inboxes on the weekend.  This factor gives your marketing message unlimited potential.
Cons: By sending business emails on Saturday or Sunday, you run the risk of coming off as too intrusive and annoy your subscribers.
Recommended Resolution: Try to avoid sending email on Saturday and Sunday.  If you must, limit your mailings to subscribers who are the most responsive on these particular days.
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