To stay top-of-mind, you must regularly email your list. But what constitutes “regular”? How many emails is too many – or too few? Email marketing frequency requires a delicate balance, as your audience will quickly unsubscribe if they don’t find your emails valuable.
Email Marketing Trends and Consumer Preferences
According to the Digital Marketing Association’s 2020 report (PDF), brands send an average of 26.8 emails per week, including automated emails and segmented campaigns
- Unfortunately, most of those emails don’t provide value to consumers
- 85% of consumers believe less than half of marketing emails are “useful”
- The higher the email frequency, the fewer messages actually seem relevant to recipients
- Unsubscribe takes time and is usually easier to delete than unsubscribe
There’s no magic number for email marketing frequency
Lead with research and great content
Types of Emails
Targeted campaigns perform better than email blasts
- As the volume grows, fewer recipients will open your emails, and those who do become less likely to click
- While your unsubscribe rate may not increase, you aren’t generating enough value to justify the cost of sending so many emails
A Fine Line Between Consistency and Spam
Consumers don’t know the legal details of CAN-SPAM, GDPR, and other regulations.
- Spam reports harm your reputation with your ISP, so you should be more concerned about that than your unsubscribe rate.
High email frequency
Stay top-of-mind and give your audience more opportunities to interact with your brand
Planning Your Email Marketing Cadence
The right cadence will keep your brand recognizable, provide value to your recipients, and prevent the dreaded unsubscribe report.
- Begin with a safe schedule of 4-5 emails per month
- Segment your audience and focus on high-value content
Low email frequency
Send highly customized and creative content that may be of greater value to your audience
- Easier to manage
- Lower recognizability can cause recipients to unsubscribe or mark as spam
- Smaller inbox presence compared to other brands
- Your mix of email types affects which benefits you obtain or risks you incur
Affirming Your Audience’s Buying Journey
Segment your list, then deliver content at the frequency it makes sense for each segment
- Knowing the source of your leads, whether it’s a newsletter signup form, a landing page, or something else, will help you affirm their interests with your marketing emails
