For many companies, email marketing is a huge aspect of their digital marketing strategy. Email marketing is an extremely effective channel to communicate with your customers because it allows you to speak directly to them. No need to battle algorithms or pour money into paid ads to get their attention! Ultimately, this strategy can help retain customers, increase sales, and promote brand loyalty.
With that said, it’s important that you don’t flood your customers’ mailboxes with emails! Sending too many emails can result in your customers getting overwhelmed and unsubscribing from your newsletter. This begs the question, “How often should you send marketing emails?” We sat down with nine experts and asked them to share their insights with us.
More Than You Are Now
We always recommend two things; write less copy, send more emails. No matter what business you’re in. The old way of sending monthly newsletters is dead. I always say; if you have 3 things to promote, send 3 emails, don’t send 1 email with all 3 things in it. Check out this recording of a Meetup we ran for Mailchimp where we talk about this strategy.
Doug Dennison, MailNinja, the email marketing agency
Inform, Don’t Annoy
Marketing emails are meant to inform, not be an annoyance. It is imperative to keep that thought in mind when scheduling out those emails and determining the frequency in which you send them. Marketing emails for a specific deal or a specific position that is opening should be sent once or twice, with one follow-up email. Anything beyond that is going to come off as spam and will be deleted by the person receiving the emails. Additionally, if you send more than that, you jeopardize consumers opening future emails because they have assumed that they are all spam and not worthy of opening.
Candi Luciano, Y Scouts
Only Send Emails If You Have Something Tangible to Offer
Ultimately, it becomes a game of trial and error. However, you should research your market and consider the types of products or services you offer. If you are in an industry where trends and sales come and go regularly, then frequent marketing emails might be justified. However, many consumers send marketing emails to spam if you send too many. Only send your emails when you have something tangible to offer, not just to fill an inbox!
Francesca Yardley, Threads
Quality Content in Small Doses
We employ a strategy that features quality content in relatively small doses. We send two a week if not 3, but no more. That may seem like a lot, but it isn’t compared to most travel companies. As we continue to grow our email list, we see the opportunity to do more, but never want to sacrifice quality or lose readership. We want to educate, inspire and then promote all in a week’s push.
Randall Smalley, Cruise America
Don’t Send Too Many At Once
Marketing emails, when used correctly, can be an effective strategy to reach customers. However, if done incorrectly, marketing emails will irritate customers and get sent straight to the spam file. To do things correctly, marketing emails should be sent out every two to three days while the product or sale lasts. If it is a long-term email campaign, emails should be sent out weekly and this is all. You do not want to drive customers away by sending too many at once – keeping it light with one email a week will ensure customers still read your emails.
Peter Babichenko, Sahara Case
Base Your Frequency on the Performance of Your Campaign
The frequency of your emails should be based on the performance of your current campaigns! If you are sending weekly emails and have a high open and engagement rate, you should keep it up. On the other hand, if you are seeing low open rates or lots of unsubscriptions, consider sending one a month. The key is A/B testing and letting your audience determine how often they want to hear from you!
Nikitha Lokareddy, Markitors
Make Changes as Your Stats Rise and Fall
You can send marketing emails daily, weekly, biweekly, or monthly. It all depends on your capacity (ability to write often enough) and the attitude of your audience. The usual approach is to either send emails weekly or monthly. These two intervals seem like the best choice between too often and too rarely. If you’re just starting out, pick one of these and ask your audience how they feel about this and other intervals. Monitor your open rates and unsubscribe numbers and make changes as these stats rise and fall.
Jakub Kliszczak, Channels
Look for Signs of Frequency Fatigue
Good email marketers will analyze the data coming back from their email campaigns to look for signs of “frequency fatigue.” Typically I will feel steadily increasing the frequency until I start to see a significant drop off in performance (open rate, click-through rate, and revenue). Also, if the number of people unsubscribing from the email program suddenly jumps up, that’s a sign that you have maxed out on email frequency.
Luke Grant, Principal Consultant
Ensure You Fully Understand Your Prospects’ Questions
Having a deep understanding of your prospect will guide you on how often and what to send them. Focus on the fundamentals so prospects connect to your communication. How well do you know your ideal personas wants, needs, spoken desires and unspoken desires? What value are you creating for them in your communication? What are they challenged with? What would support them to overcome those challenges? Taking the time to deeply answer your ideal prospects’ questions will help create higher open rates and engagement.
Mark Jamnik, Enjoy Life Daily
