Jay Schwedelson argues Send Time Optimization (STO) is 'garbage' because it creates confirmation bias. By sending your email when a user typically opens messages (e.g., 8 a.m. Monday), the feature ensures your email arrives alongside many others, increasing competition in the inbox and hurting your performance.
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The concept of a single best day and time to send an email is misleading. Instead, marketers should vary send times throughout the week to reach different segments of their audience. The key metric is the aggregate number of unique individuals engaged weekly, not the performance of a single blast.
Instead of optimizing for a single "best" send time, marketers should vary sending days and times (e.g., evenings, weekends). This strategy acknowledges that different people within your database interact with email at different times, maximizing overall reach and engagement across your entire list.
Sending all your automated emails at a predictable time, like 9 AM, trains your audience to ignore them, turning them into "wallpaper." To break this pattern and make automations feel less robotic, vary the send times significantly, even using unconventional hours like 8 PM.
To manage multiple overlapping email series without spamming subscribers, dedicate specific days to certain sequences. For example, a "Throwback Thursday" email only goes out on Thursdays. This ensures subscribers on different timelines aren't overwhelmed with multiple automated messages on the same day.
The idea of a single best time to send an email is outdated. Instead, measure success by the weekly aggregate of unique individuals opening your emails. Sending at various days and times hits different audience segments, maximizing your total reach over time.
Marketer Jay Schwedelson argues that non-openers are distracted, not disinterested. He advises resending the same email within 48 hours but with a new, aggressive subject line that creates urgency (e.g., 'Yikes, you scrolled past this'). This gives the message a second chance to cut through the inbox noise.
Avoid sending all your automated communications at standard, predictable times like 9 a.m. By scheduling some automations to go out at unconventional hours, such as 8:07 p.m., you can cut through the noise and prevent your messages from becoming "wallpaper" that customers are conditioned to ignore.
Over 80% of marketers send emails on the hour, flooding inboxes in the first 10 minutes. By scheduling campaigns for a non-standard time, like 8:07 AM instead of 8:00 AM, you avoid this clutter and can increase open rates by around 15%.
Obsessing over a single "best day and time" is a flawed strategy. Different subsets of your audience are active at various times, including nights and weekends. Sending emails at varied, unconventional times ensures you reach these distinct segments rather than repeatedly hitting the same group.
Instead of sending less email to combat poor engagement, marketers should focus on making their content better. Jay Schwedelson argues that audiences get annoyed by boring, irrelevant emails, not frequent ones. A valuable, exciting email can be sent daily and will still be welcomed by subscribers.