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| Frequency
matters: 5 tips on how often to send email campaigns |
It
doesn't matter if you're totally new or an old hand
at email marketing, I'll bet at some point you've struggled
over frequency. Much of this hand-wringing happens
because there's a mighty fine line between bugging
a customer and practically abandoning them. In other
words, email campaign frequency is no different than
dating: too much or too little contact can have equally
disappointing results.
Though email frequency is not an exact science, here
are five tips that will not only help you make up your
mind about how often you should send your email campaigns,
but give you confidence about that decision: |
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| Sending
too infrequently will most likely cause customers
to lose interest. But beyond that, there's an even
bigger problem you may have to solve: accusations
that you're a spammer. Remember that even well-meaning
customers forget all the newsletters and emails
they've signed up for, and if you email them infrequently
enough, they won't remember who you are and they
may, at worst, hit the spam button. Keep up the
relationship - and familiarity - by
emailing once a month. If you can't manage that,
send once a quarter. Anything beyond that is far
too infrequent. |
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| Don't
bog down your customers with too many emails -
it's annoying to them and it dilutes your message.
For this reason, we recommend not emailing any
more frequently than once every four days. If you
have a big sale coming up and you need to bang
the drum about it, plan ahead and set up an autoresponder,
and set it up to send emails once a week. Benchmark's
autoresponder service costs just $7.95 a month,
and you can use it to set up your campaigns and
forget about them. |
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| No
one wants to see the same emails pushing products
week after week. For this reason, we recommend
mixing up your content. Send how-to demonstrations.
Customer surveys. Lists on how customers can save
money and time. This builds a bond with your customers
by letting them know that although you're interested
in making sales, you're far more interested in
sending them valued content. |
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| A
good way to find the "sweet spot" of
best frequency is to experiment by sending emails
once a month and emails once a week, and see how
customers react. Take things a step further by
checking out which customers opened your most frequent
emails and put them on a separate email list to
be mailed more often. This might mean more work
because you'll have to send to different lists
at different times, but it makes your email campaigns
more targeted, most likely bringing in more sales. |
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| When
your customers sign up in your ListBuilder (or
sign-up box) on your Website, you'll want to give
them an idea of what types of emails they'll be
receiving from you. However, you don't have to
be as clear on how often you'll email them. If
you have to, tell them you'll email them "occasionally".
By being vague about this, you'll have enough leeway
to experiment on what frequency works best. |
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| Don't forget that although
frequency is important, your content is an equal partner
in whether your campaign will soar or flop. If you
craft quality content that keeps the attention of your
customers, you have a far better chance of grabbing
their attention and keeping it. |
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| For more info, please contact
Jennifer Perez, Benchmark's PR and marketing director,
at jennifer@bmesrv.com. |
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| Highlights |
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Shoot for at least
once a month, or at very least, once a quarter |
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Never
email customers more than once every four days |
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If
you're going to send campaigns once a week,
mix up the content |
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Go
by your statistics and segment your list by
customer interest level |
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Don't
paint yourself in a corner - be vague about
frequency if you have to |
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