What’s the Best Day of the Week to Send Emails?

Tuesdays at 10am.

Just kidding!

I’ve always hated this question because it’s indicative of “batch and blast” marketing. In the email marketing 2.0 era, bulk email doesn’t fly.

There is an answer but first, some data.

I want to prove to you that the day of the week means nothing. I asked our dev team here at Vero to pull open and click rate data for 100 million emails sent by our customers.

The data tells everything we need to know.

Sure, the data varies a bit from day to day but there is no clear indication that there is a “right” day to send emails.

Quibble if you will but it’s time to think bigger about email.

So what is the right day to send emails?

There is a right day for each customer, relative to when they first discovered you, signed up, made a purchase or subscribed. The best day to send emails is different for every person in your database.

Instead of thinking in days of the week, start thinking about days in the customer lifecycle.

It’s nearly impossible to prove that Tuesday is the best day to send a promotional email but it’s very possible to prove that Day 0 is the best day to send a welcome email.

Here is a simple template for sending onboarding emails at the right time:

• Day 0: Welcome email
• Day 3: Getting started email
• Day 7: Nudge email
• Day 14: Free trial ending email

Of course, the best way to send emails at the right time is to use trigger emails based on behavior.

Examples:

• When a customer views a product page three times but doesn’t buy, send a coupon.
• When a user views a listing but doesn’t book, send related listings.
• When a user is inactive for 14 days, send a retention email.

And that’s just the beginning. Check out this list of behavioral emails for more ideas.

Your New Mindset

If you want to increase your open rate by three percent …

• A/B test the subject line
• Test sending on different days of the week
• Use a green button instead of an orange button

If you want to 10x the revenue you generate from email …

• Send emails based on behavior
• Write emails you can automatically trigger over and over again
• Communicate with your users, don’t market to them

Sounds simple. And it is.

In general, do less of this and more of this.

Now what?

1. Go read the Ultimate Guide to Lifecycle Email Marketing.
2. See how TripAdvisor sends the world’s smartest emails.
3. Sign up for the Vero newsletter for weekly inspiration.

Have questions? Feel free to drop a note in the comments.