How to choose the best time to send newsletters

The email inbox is a crowded space. Emails at the top of the inbox generally get better engagement than those at the bottom, which explains why the sending time is so important when planning your key email marketing campaigns.

Sending your campaigns at the right time can help you:

• Improve your open rates: Email open rates are the holy grail of email marketing. If your email is at the top of the inbox, your contacts are more likely to see it and open it, so sending at the perfect time is key to achieving that.
• Improve click-through rates: Even if your entire email list opens your message, you won’t get a decent return on investment (ROI) if no one clicks through. Sending at the wrong time might mean your contacts don’t have the time to actually read your email or to click on your great CTAs.

Understanding customer behavior, habits, and time zones can help you determine the best day and time of the week to send your email, and to ensure your message is seen first when your email subscribers check their emails.

The best day of the week to send emails

During Email Camp 2020, we peeked into the hidden vault of Mailgun statistics, revealing the best time for email engagement. We discovered that Tuesdays through Thursdays have the highest open rates. Open rates also followed suit, with midweek taking the lion shares of campaign clicks. 

While Tuesdays and Thursdays have slightly higher engagement rates, Wednesday is a solid second option. If you send emails twice a week within these days, however, make sure to pick a combination of Tuesdays and Thursdays. Sending emails on Tuesday and Wednesday, or Wednesday and Thursday, will make your customers feel overwhelmed and not read your emails at all in the process. Not good.

Fridays, while not the strongest day of the week for engagement, shouldn’t be completely disregarded either.

The worst day of the week to send emails

According to our research Saturdays and Sundays are the worst days for email engagement. We’re busy going out socialising, seeing family, or doing errands. Emails are not going to be a priority, so as a general rule of thumb, avoid the weekends.

However, if you had to choose, is it better to send an email on a Friday or a Monday? Traditionally, both Fridays and Mondays have been perceived as bad days to send emails. However, our research shows that Friday outperforms Monday significantly on open rates and click-through-rates (CTR). On Mondays, people are either planning out their week or are sifting through the weekend’s emails. And let’s be honest, we’re not the sharpest workers on Mondays. We’re still recovering from the weekend. So, as a bit of general advice, just avoid Mondays.

Choosing a day to send your newsletter

At the end of the day, the best way to choose a day to send your email campaigns is to do some A/B tests on your list. As a starting point, look at engagement data, past open rates, and click-through rates and formulate some hypotheses based on past information.

No matter what, if you regularly send weekly promotional emails or newsletters, be sure to send them on the same day every week. This builds trust and anticipation as your audience will come to expect your content at that time.

What’s the best time to send your newsletter?

It’s worth remembering, though, that just because somebody checks their email, it doesn’t mean they have the capacity to act on it, which means getting the time right is still key to drive good email engagement. 

Generally, here’s how you can choose the optimal time to send your emails:

• 6 – 8 AM: Some people look at their emails after waking up or during breakfast. Most of the time, they look at their emails via mobile, so make sure your emails are responsive and mobile-optimized.
• 10 – 11 AM: According to many studies, this is the best time to send your emails – regardless of location. In our Email Engagement Report, 42.5% of users said they check their emails in the morning, more than any other time in the day.
• 12 – 2 PM: This is also a great time to send your emails. While on lunch break, people will be looking at their emails before getting back to work in the afternoon.
• 6 – 9 PM: This is the end of most people’s work days. Some will be looking at their emails during their commute, others right after work. 
• After 10 PM: Avoid sending emails after this time, as it will not be read immediately, and by the morning, your email will appear at the bottom of the pecking order. If you’re sending at this time , then earlier is better.

How to determine the best time to send your newsletter?

Finding the best day to send your email newsletters can be a difficult task that requires experimentation, time, and coordination when establishing the best schedule. As we have already mentioned, a lot of variables are at play, including the content and scheduling of your email campaigns.