This is the story of two different entrepreneurs, both employing different small business email marketing strategies to drive profits with current customers and reach new ones. Why are the strategies different? Simple. Their customers, they have found, tend to check email at different times during the week and they’ve spent long hours figuring out the best day to send marketing emails.
Ron Bloom is the owner of a successful cleaning supplies business. A traditional B2B outfit, his company is focused on selling cleaning supplies to other businesses that have a physical location. Because he sells over the Internet he isn’t limited in any real geography. But because he sells to other business owners only, not consumers, he understands that his target customer – no matter the industry – tends to open up and check email at a certain point during the week. How does he know? He’s spent the past few years testing and studying and even asking many of his customers. Ron has found success sending his emails between Mondays and Wednesdays.
The same can be said of Cathy Stronger, who is the founder of a company that offers custom designer jewelry. Like Ron much of her business is done over the Internet so she knows no boundaries in her marketing, sales and business development. She, too, has done testing on her small business email marketing strategy and found that her customers tend to be in the buying mindset at a certain time of the week as well. The clear majority of her customers are the exact opposite of Ron’s since she sells to female consumers who may or may not be running a business. And although many of them may work for a living, the majority of them don’t consider the jewelry purchase as one for a business. Cathy has found success sending her emails between Thursdays and Sundays.
Although there are clear differences between the two businesses and their customers, the email marketing strategies for both aren’t always clear cut. There is no science to the timing of email marketing, only footprints and guidelines that have been tested by people and businesses in the past. Plus, email marketing is constantly changing and their strategies may be forced to shift over time. The best day to send marketing emails for one company isn’t always the best for every company.
Ron believes since his customers are in a strict business mindset they tend to think of business matters between early and mid week. Contrary to this, Cathy believes her consumer customers tend to think of pampering themselves on the weekend. And as the weekend approaches, she sends out her email marketing to a customer base that is more than happy to receive and more often consider a purchase for an upcoming special occasion around the corner.
Now, after saying all that it should be noted that this strategy won’t work for everyone nor will it always work for Ron and Cathy. They will be the first ones to tell you there is a lot more that goes into their strategy besides a business or consumer focus. Other factors, such as holidays, events, seasons and even the economy all drive their strategies. For example, if Christmas falls on a Wednesday Ron won’t send out an email on that Monday or Tuesday. The same can be said of other major holidays.
Here are a few other guidelines:
–Study past results: Your own data can be very important here. In the next tip we’ll talk about vendor tools but sometimes the best way to see if a strategy is working is to look at your own sales data to identify trends and problem areas.
–Use reporting tools from vendors to study benchmarks: For example, MailChimp has excellent analytics and tools that breakdown the success/fail rates of each mailing. Use this information to shape and drive future small business email marketing strategies.
–Clicks and conversions: There’s a difference between a customer clicking through your email and one that actually ends up making a purchase. This is a big distinction and it’s important to study these trends as well.
–Landing page: Yes, where your customers end up can make a world of difference. Make sure you have the right landing page design and functionality.
–Business during the week: If you’re targeting business owners or people using your product for business, the best time to send an email may be between Tuesday and Wednesday.
–Consumer during the weekend: If you’re sending an email to a consumer (B2C) the best time to send your emails may be between Thursday and Sunday.
–Previous two tips may be meaningless: There is no guarantee that this approach will work best for your company, depending on a variety of factors explained in these other tips.
–How long to get the email out: Do you know how long it takes to actually send your email? If you schedule it for send on Tuesday morning but a grouping on your list doesn’t actually receive the email until late Wednesday evening, do you know this and account for it?
–List segmentation: One possible reason why you would want to throw out these two tips is because you aren’t properly segmenting your email list into possible new buyers, current buyers, and previous buyers. Remember, each has a different motivator and it’s up to you to identify those hot buttons. Thus, timing of your email will massage each hot button differently.
–Trigger events: Also affecting the timing are trigger events (birthdays, holidays and other life events). If you’ve studied your customer you’ll know when these take place and will be able to schedule email delivery accordingly.
–Auto responders: Setting up auto responders can help build trust with your audience, since people want to know you’re on top of it. After someone clicks through and makes a purchase, send them an automatic email 10 minutes later acknowledging their purchase. Send them another email 24 hours later reminding them of any shipping updates. If they simply signed up for more information, send them an email 36 hours later informing them of deals, specials or incentives they can take advantage of.
–Let the customer decide: Advanced email marketers will sometimes let the customer decide when they want to receive the email which could make a big difference in success rates.
About the author:
John Sternal
John Sternal is a public relations professional with an eye for finding a news angle for just about any type of company or product. From mundane items like wallboard to exciting products like consumer electronics gadgets, he works with companies to identify the right dialogue to get their company in the national media spotlight. John has also had client articles published in dozens of industry journals and magazines.
John is the co-founder of UnderstandingMarketing.com.
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