Best Time of the Week to Send Out Direct Mail?

[pdead22]

Does anyone know, What is the best day of the week to send out Direct mail? More importantly what day of the week should the mail arrive? I've heard you want the mail to arrive on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. I'm Mailing directly to business owners. Any help would be great. Thanks.

Phil

[Old Welsh Guy]

Tue, wed, thrus are the ideal days. Monday and Friday are a waste of time. Monday as it will be lost in the flood of mail, and Friday the reader will be in weekend mode.

[mktgbiz]

I completely agree with the Old Welsh Guy.

However, depending on the attention getting size of your mailing it may get opened any day of the weel. :-0


-

[pete]

More important than day to mail is how you mail. You can save money with bulk mail, (now called standard mail) but it is delivered when the carrier wants to take it. Slack day, slack bag, they'll deliver it. Maybe.

It is mainly bulk mail that is involved when you hear tales of undelivered mail stashed in empty buildings or found in dumpsters because the carrier did not want to carry it around. This is seldom the case with First Class mail. So, that extra quarter, or so, might actually get your mail to the right address.

[stevesda]

THe best day is definitely a tuesday, but i would say there are some interesting ways to go about direct mail other than just picking a good day to send it.

If you have a bit of cash to splash on it, consider sending it so has to be signed for - its ime consuming, costs money, but it works a hell of a lot better - i.e. a much better chance that the right person will read it.

Other simple ways include not using the usual boring enevlopes an same colours - get some nice translucent envelopes with bright coloured paper inside - that way if you send them regularly yours will be recognisable and may get picked out to read...

i've always thought direct mail should be donw regularly and skillfully and thoughtfully. Its best to send time on it and send it to fewer people that are good targets rather than go for the law of averages approach....

[scottco]

The better days to hit businesses is Tues-Thurs. (for both direct snail mail and email)

The conventional wisdom is that on Mondays folks are busy catching up, and "getting into the grind" of the work week. On Fridays they are thinking about the weekend. However, like all things, a lot of depends on your package, offer, etc. My experience is that a good package and offer, no matter when they receive it, will be opened, responded to, etc.

The problem with direct mail (that is "snail mail" postal service) -- unless you are mailing (I'm assuming you are in the USA) first class and local, you will have no idea when it will be delivered. Even with first class local (which should only take one day) -- it's questionable.

Do your best to plan - but with snail mail, but I've experienced all kinds of absurd delays. Standard letter mail (US -in a #10 envelope seems to be more predictable)

If you are mailing local first class, I would suggest dropping on a Monday. In the perfect world it will arrive locally on Tues, Wed. or Thurs. If you are mailing regional or national... frankly that is too hard to predict..it's a gamble

[jacqueline_p]

Hey guys, there's a company called DistributionXpress.com that did A LOT of research and found that Wednesdays ARE the best, not as much as Tuesdays. Coordinate with your advertisers that the postcard is to arrive ON wednesday ONLY. The reason is that, for some reason, Wednesdays are slow. Newspaper sales are low. News channels' ratings are low. People just like to relax and read mail on Wednesdays for some reason. All I know is that I spoke with this guy from DistributionXpress.com, Inc. who mentioned this to me over lunch. He said his company had invested thousands into this research that concluded this information.

[cnilles]

Hi:

Just a suggestion... I would also make sure it doesn't arrive close to a Holiday.

Cindy

[ExcelMailing]

Hello,
It is hard to say what is the best day to be in-homes for direct mail. As you can see that everyone that posted a reply has different opinion. Post Office studies show that 96% of the people bring in their mail everyday. Even if they don’t have the time to sort the mail that day, the person will sort through it sometime that week. So I think the better question is how long to have the expiration date on the offer. Also consider that it is up to the post office when they will actually deliver mail so expect for a 3 day window.

Mike Paholke

[iAmNameLess]

Tuesdays are the most productive day of the week! Best for direct mail and for cold calling.