So, you’ve created a fantastic marketing email, the copy is eloquent, the template design is beautiful and you have a click-worthy CTA. Now you have to make the dreaded decision, when should you send this email?

Figuring out what day to send a email is a dilemma that has been plaguing marketers since the earliest days of email marketing. There is no easy answer to this conundrum, no silver bullet to make sure that you pick the right day of the week to send your email.

The best thing you can do is take a look at the data (open rates, click through rates, etc) and make some assumptions about the best day of the week to send your email. Look at your own data and the data provided by companies like MailChimp and CoSchedule. These studies show that  for most audiences (particularly those that are B2B), they seem to be most receptive to emails sent on Tuesdays, followed closely by Wednesday and Thursday. 

When you are trying to find the best day to reach your audience, don’t be afraid to try new things and do some A/B testing! Maybe you have traditionally sent emails on a specific day and they don’t perform as well as you might like. Break with tradition and try sending on a new day. It will take some time to figure out the day of the week that your specific audience is more receptive and responsive to emails.  We did this type of testing with our own MINDSCAPE emails, sending:

  • Monday morning
  • Tuesday morning
  • Tuesday afternoon
  • Wednesday morning
  • Wednesday afternoon

And found that our emails perform best when we send them on Tuesdays at 10:30 am, which is coincidentally the same time that the data from CoSchedule indicates is the optimal day and time.

Once you have pinpointed the optimal day to send your emails, take some time to think through why this is the best day.  Could it be because much of your audience works 9 -5 jobs Monday – Friday so that is why they are most receptive during the week?  Do they have any other patterns or habits that impact when they check their emails? For example if your company is B2C, your emails might be going to personal email accounts that people are checking primarily before work, after work, at lunch and on weekends. Asking questions like these can help your really get inside the heads of your audience.

We think John from MailChimp said it best;

  • “Send midmorning during the work week …”
  • “… unless you know something about your audience, which you really should. In which case, the previous point is probably wrong. “
  • “Use STO or A/B testing to get a better answer.”

Interested in getting help on your email marketing? Head over to our email marketing page to see how MINDSCAPE might be able to assist you.