Music 3.0 Music Industry Blog: email timing

Showing posts with label email timing. Show all posts

Monday, April 9, 2012

Timing Email And Blog Posts

distorted time graphic on Music 3.0 blog

I've posted a lot on the timing of Twitter and Facebook posts, but here's a list of timing considerations for both email newsletters and blog posts, courtesy of Dan Zarella, the guru of social media timing.

Sending Emails:

Open rates are higher on the weekends since subscribers have more time to pay attention.
Most opens occur between 5 and 7AM.
Clickthrough rates are highest on the weekends.
Unsubscribes tend to happen within the first few emails after someone subscribes.
Sending emails directly after a person subscribes is very effective, since they're paying close attention.

Blog Posting:

Most blog reading occurs in the morning, declines in the afternoon, and revives at night.
The most page views are on Monday, and dip slightly on the weekend.
Blog posts published at 10 to 11AM tend to get the most views.
The highest level of blog comments comes in the morning around 7 to 8AM, and on the weekends.
Posts on Mondays and Thursdays get the most links. Posts on Friday through sunday get the least.
Blogs posted early around 6 or 7AM get the most links.
Blogs that post more than once a day get more views and links.

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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Wednesday, January 25, 2012

The Science Of Email Timing

timing clock image from Bobby Owsinski's Music 3.0 blog

As I've posted here many times before, your email list is one of the most powerful marketing tools that an artist or band (or a business or brand) can have. Recently some data courtesy of Dan Zarrella and Pure360 have shown that there is a definite science behind the timing of sending your emails. Remember that all times are Eastern Standard Time.

Before sending an email, consider:
6AM to 10AM: The second most prevalent email opening time is at the 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.

Here are a few other timing issues to consider:

Bounce rates are highest in the morning.

Open rates are highest during the weekend by 45%.

Open rates are 53% higher in the morning.

Click rates are 10% higher on the weekend and early morning.

The most effective sending frequency is 1 to 4 per month.

Conversely, the unsubscribe rate is higher at 1 to 4 per month, but levels off at 8 to 31 per month.

The highest unsubscription rate occurs among those who have been subscribers for less than 10 days.

The highest click-through-rate (CTR) is with those who have been subscribers for less than 10 days.

To sum things up, don't send those promotional emails out without first thinking about the timing. It could mean the difference between your finds reading it or not.