Myth 22: There is an ideal frequency for all users

Category: Email Marketing

One size does not fit all in email marketing: personalisation is what makes it work best. So, it's a myth that the same sending frequency works for all users, because everyone organises themselves differently and manages email in their own way. The only sure thing is that flooding their inbox with repeated campaigns and newsletters will not lead to better results, so you have to find a rhythm of impacts suitable for different subscribers.

 

How many is too many or too few shipments

The sector has a strong influence on when you can consider that you are sending too many or too few emails. Thinking about promotional campaigns, product companies tend to have more variety on offer than service companies. It may even be possible to tell people something new about them on a daily basis, but users might get tired of such insistence if they are not segmented in a way that takes into account their interests.

For example: an online clothing shop with hundreds of references can send a daily mailing if it previously chooses the recipients taking into account the type of clothes they usually buy. This way, users can receive one or two each week, but not one every day because then it would probably be too much and could end up being considered as spam.

If you look at informative newsletters, an industrial company is likely to have less news to share than a FMCG brand. B2B businesses may have a longer buying cycle and the aim of the mailings is more to reinforce brand reputation than to sell directly. Long story short, consistency is key. It is not necessary to have a high frequency, but to pay attention to the regularity of the impacts so that they remain of high quality. In addition, if you let too much time go by between mailings, it can have the opposite effect and lead to more unsubscribes than clicks.

For example: a company that organises events and sends all the information about the events on a daily basis would be making too much of a commercial effort, whereas a monthly diary could be a good option to maintain interest in its events. At the other extreme, if you opt for a quarterly newsletter, you would be missing out on many opportunities by sending too few mailings.

 

What are the most common email marketing frequencies?

According to our email marketing report, the number of sends went up last year and now stands at between 4 and 7 per month (30% chose that frequency) and almost half of them say they will increase it. This leads us to believe that the norm is to send an email or two a week, which could be equivalent to a weekly newsletter and a promotional campaign more or less regularly.

The second most popular option among our survey participants (24%) is 2 or 3 times a month, which would be equivalent to sending every 10 to 15 days, perhaps combining a newsletter and a campaign. While there are those who do not send every month (14%), putting their brand recognition at risk, there are also those who send more than 12 times (11%), in which case they risk being too insistent in their communications.

However, segmentation options should always be taken into account because, even if the company sends between 8 and 12 mailings per month (7%), they may not all reach the same recipients at the same time and achieve good results.

 

How to calculate the impacts that each user receives

Segmentation is the answer and it is the basis of the calculation so that the frequency is balanced and the email marketing meets the objectives. For example: if you want to increase sales, one option is to send a lot of mailings to the entire list, but another more efficient option is to send fewer mailings and choose only those who are more inclined to buy. This reduces the general fatigue of contacts by receiving irrelevant impacts and increases the chances of conversion among those who like to open and receive news.

To calculate how many hits each user receives, you need to know which segments and groups they are in:

• Dynamic segments are a way to keep the list updated with useful information obtained from the sign-up form (location, interests) and user interactions (who opened the latest mailings, who clicked on a campaign).
• The groups are static and are created taking into account more specific criteria, such as the last products purchased or the volume of monthly spending, i.e. data generally extracted from outside email marketing, such as a CRM.

By segmenting the list, only a high or low percentage of contacts are targeted, depending on how many filter parameters are used. As the frequency may vary between users, it is important to check that it remains balanced between the different groups so as not to neglect anyone because they are not in any segment.

 

Why allow the recipient to choose their frequency

Asking for the minimum information during registration is one way to get more sign-ups, but when you manage many types of messages, it can be interesting to know the opinion of your contacts on the topics and frequency of sending. One way to find out is through an annual survey, for example, so that they can assess whether they are receiving too many or too few messages. Another more direct way is to add a second layer of profile information after the first registration and ask them to complete it later to indicate their preferences.

With a field in the registration form that allows the user to decide how often they want to receive our newsletter or the type of information they are interested in, we will achieve:

• Better user satisfaction by adjusting to their preferences.
• Better relationship with customers by showing them that we value their time.
• More openings because we will not saturate their inbox.
• More conversions because the topics will interest them more.
• Less unsubscribes because they will be able to choose which topics they do not want to receive.

Giving autonomy to the user to decide, for example, if they prefer to receive weekly news on a single topic or monthly news on all topics, is a way to be more effective in our email marketing and get better results from each communication.

 

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