A successful email marketing campaign is reliant on subscriber engagement, or in other words, the open and click rates. When approaching email strategy it’s worth spending some time analysing subscriber engagement before mapping out your plan, especially in regards to the when and how often you should send out emails, otherwise known as timing and frequency of email marketing. 
Whilst results may vary slightly for each different industry, included below is a guide to help reach your target audience at the best moment. Bear in mind though that the most important element of any email marketing campaign is providing relevant and interesting content to your target audience.

While data released by marketing software company Responsys last year found that Thursday delivered the highest average open rates and Tuesday has the highest click through rate, another marketing software company, Get Response, has analysed 21 million messages sent to determine the best open and click-through times.

They have also analysed recipients’ top engagement times and put it all together in a handy infographic. Here are their key findings. Emails obtain the best results within the 1st hour after delivery, when 23.63% of all emails are opened. But 24 hours later and the average open rate is close to zero. Almost 40% of all messages are sent between 6 a.m. and noon. This can result in inbox clutter, and significantly decrease results for these emails. Messages sent in the early afternoon have a better chance of being noticed and consequently achieve better results: up to 10.61% open ratio and up to 2.38% click through rate. Subscribers’ top engagement times are 8 a.m. – 10 a.m. and 3 p.m.- 4 p.m. with up to 6.8% average open rates and click through rate.

Gaining the most out of your email campaigns involves many factors including looking at your content and subject line, but getting the timing right is certainly one of the most important considerations. The findings above should provide a great starting point but also take some time to review your own data, and compare it with the above to work out what is best for your own audience. Approach your email campaigns as you would any marketing strategy, that is plan, test, analyse and refine to achieve the best result possible. Do you have any interesting findings on what works for your email campaigns? Let us know in the comments below.