Timing in an email marketing campaign - that is, deciding on what day or even what time of day the send button gets hit - is as important as actually crafting the message and selecting which segmented group of customers will receive it. Unfortunately, though, that decision is rarely given the same level of attention.
Getting the timing just right, though, is becoming even more important as email marketers find themselves competing for customers' attention, not only against other email messages and spam but also social media and mobile phone content.
Longer Window
New research from Pivotal Veracity [pdf] finds that the average elapsed time between when messages are first sent to when they are first seen is growing: from 23.2 hours in January 2009 to 25.9 hours in August . "If you’re mailing time sensitive email campaigns you should consider that the average consumer would not see your email for more than 24 hours," Pivotal Veracity says. The time period between when a consumer sees the message and when he or she reacts is also growing longer, it found.
Choosing the right time involves a balancing act among various considerations starting with the season and industry. Travel marketers, for example, find that the window between first view and first read drops to a miniscule 2.9 hours in peak vacation booking season, in March and April.
Time of Day
The time of day the message is sent is also important. If the campaign is B2B, the morning is an optimal time as most deskbound workers usually start their day by going through their email inboxes. (via B2B Marketing Magazine).
The problem is, recipients "could be more focused on the priorities of the day than your message." As the day progresses, users tend to have more "fractured interactions with email" - but these are shorter in duration than the start-of-the-day episode, B2B Marketing Magazine said.
"Between 2pm and 3pm, users are likely to have five individual episodes of three-to-five minutes apiece, compared to the 8am to 9am period when they are more likely to have a single episode that is substantially longer. On the face of it, this would appear not to work in the marketer's favor, but your message may be the welcome distraction from an otherwise busy day."
Flying Blind
Sometimes companies have to go by their own instincts - or at least internal research, as a recent example by Aer Arann shows. Last month, an email marketing campaign run by European airline resulted in a 320% spike in flight bookings for that particular day, the highest sales achieved by the airline in one day this year, according to the Irish Times.
The promotion offered 50% off all flights booked between 1pm and 3pm that day. To make sure that customers knew to open their emails, they were first alerted that a deal was coming the day before. Then, the next day at 1 pm, they learned the specifics.
This window of time was no accident: Aer Arann established through research that few people book travel at home, but instead take care of such tasks at work. The peak booking period is between midday and 2pm, hence the highly targeted and small window.
