The day and time you send your email marketing campaigns will drastically impact their success. The problem is knowing when to schedule them for, and how often to send them.

There’s an overload of information out there on the subject, and much of it is contradictory.

So what will actually work for you?

Most articles come to the frustrating conclusion of “it depends”. There’s no one-stop solution that will work for everyone. Your email list is unique.

What you can do, though, is analyze the information you have and determine what will work best for your particular case.

Making Outbound Emails Work

Picking the right day, time and frequency is a strong start. If you really want your cold email campaigns to excel, there are numerous other things to consider.

• For a comprehensive overview of the technical factors that influence outbound email success, read How to Send Mass Email Successfully: A Step-by-Step Guide.
• For tips on writing powerful cold emails that make an impact without triggering spam filters, check out Cold Email Copywriting: How to Craft the Perfect Outbound Email.

What Days to Send Email

The most accurate method of determining your strategy – whether it’s your email schedule, your content, or anything else – is by analyzing your target audience.

There have been many, many studies that tried to determine exactly what day and time is best for sending email, looking at billions (yes, billions) of email addresses, and you can use those overall results as a great place to start.

Generally, the best days to send email are reported to be Tuesday through Thursday.

That’s good to know, but it’s better to understand why those are the best days on average. Then you can see if that reasoning applies to your particular target audience as well.

So – why not Monday?

Well, first of all, it’s Monday. Nobody likes Mondays. The weekend is over, there’s usually an extra-large pile of emails to sift through. People need a bit of time to get back into work mode. They often aren’t at their most receptive on a Monday.

Fridays are also less effective than mid-week, for similar reasons. People are checking out a little, mentally getting ready for the weekend. They’re less ready to start new conversations or consider new purchases.

On top of that, if you’re sending email marketing on a Friday, it will end up sitting in the recipient’s inbox all weekend.

The reason emails perform significantly worse on the weekend is clear. Many people don’t check their work email when they aren’t at work. Those that do aren’t likely to respond to a marketing message – they’re keeping up with important conversations at their workplace.

Saturday and Sunday are, statistically, by far the worst days to send email marketing. Avoid doing so if you can.

That leaves Tuesday through Thursday as the best days of the week, logically, to send email. People are settled back into work, and have dealt with their weekend email pileup.

Best Time of Day to Send Emails

What’s the first thing that people do when they get to work in the morning?

If you answered “get coffee” … well, you’re probably right. The answer we were looking for is “check their email”, though.

It’s one of the first things people do at work every day. Ideally, when they do, your email is the right at the top of their inbox.

To achieve that, you’ll want to send your emails between 8-10 am.

Applying This to Your Contacts

So, the best time to send email marketing is Tuesdays through Thursdays, between 8 and 10 am.

This conclusion is based on studies including vast amounts of data, which means they’re very generalized. Likewise, the reasoning we’ve applied is very generalized, and might not tie in to your actual audience’s behavior.

For example, someone marketing a course for people to take in their free time will probably experience greater success sending email campaigns when their audience isn’t at work.

On the other hand, if you’re trying to generate leads for a SaaS product aimed at companies, not individuals, sending in the morning during the week is when you’ll most likely get the best results.

All of this information provides a strong starting point, but to really optimize your schedule, test different strategies and find out what’s most effective for your specific audience.

How Often to Send Email Marketing

The final piece of the scheduling puzzle is the frequency of your emails. You want your audience to keep you in mind and be engaged with your company.

On the other hand, if you send too many emails too often, you’ll annoy your recipients, and they’ll unsubscribe and probably submit spam complaints, too. Which you really don’t want.

Your email frequency depends on your recipients, but as a rule if you’re sending cold email campaigns, you should be sending far less often than to an opted-in list.

Try this: split your list into three or four equal groups. Send an email campaign each week, rotating which group you’re sending to.

This way, you can keep on sending regular email marketing campaigns – and keep the leads flowing in – without sending to the same list too often. One cold email every few weeks is a lot more acceptable than a steady stream of cold emails.

To Succeed, Use the Best Cold Email Platform

Once you have a schedule in mind for your cold email campaigns, you need a tool that can send them.

Clickback gives you everything you need to create and execute successful cold email marketing – including powerful scheduling tools. It’s packed with features designed to ensure your campaigns hit the inbox.

See it in action with a 1-on-1 live demo.