When it comes to email marketing one of the most common things I hear people worry about is: How often should I send email?
Now you've probably heard that the #1 reason for unsubscribing from a list is that you're getting too many emails, but many people err on the side of sending too few emails because you're afraid of spamming people. What's the right email frequency for your business? To find out keep watching.
Hi I'm Tom Malesic, founder and president of EZMarketing and you're watching Ask EZ. This is where small business owners go to get real answers to their marketing questions.
4 Rules for Email Sending Frequency:
How often you should send email really depends on your business and what you're selling. But to figure out what makes sense for you here are four key rules you should follow.
Rule #1: Email as often as you have something valuable to say
I have the same rule with social media posting too: don't just post for the sake of posting, and don't just email for the sake of emailing.
If you can't find something valuable to send people aren't going to open your emails and you're going to end up wasting your time.
But what do people want? The top two reasons people sign up for email lists are:
- Sales, promotions and coupons
- Regular updates and information about your company
So a simple approach would be to email every time you have a sale, or you have new content like a blog post or a video that you want to share.
Rule #2: Establish a rhythm
While you don't need to lock yourself into a rigid schedule, do try to establish a rhythm. You don't want to send three emails in a single week and then go months without sending anything.
Creating a regular rhythm helps people to get to know your business, keeps you top of mind, and hopefully makes them look forward to seeing your next email in their inbox.
Which leads me to...
Rule #3: Let subscribers know what to expect
One of the best ways is to do an automated email welcome series. When someone signs up for your list let them know in your welcome emails what kinds of content they should be expecting from you and how often.
By setting expectations up front you can get new subscribers excited to hear from you and reduce the chances that they'll unsubscribe from getting unexpected emails.
Rule #4: Watch your metrics
Keep an eye on your unsubscribe rate. It's normal for a few people to unsubscribe, but if you have a ton of unsubscribers, you may be sending too many emails.
If people are marking it as email spam that's an even bigger red flag.
Also watch your open and click rates. These may vary from email to email, but if you see a pattern of open and click rates declining over time that may be an indication that people are tired of getting your emails and you may need to change up your frequency a little bit.
So how often should you send email marketing?
It really depends on your business, but if you thought about those four key rules and you're still stuck here's a general guideline.
- For most small businesses once a month is a great place to start.
- Once you get going with email marketing and you're sending out different types of emails try increasing it to once a week. This is the most common frequency among marketers.
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