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February | 2023 Business What should orists promote with email marketing? Products, services, in-store events/workshops, etc., or should it just be brand building? "So many retailers get this wrong," Freeman points out. "A high percentage of email marketing is 'Buy X right now ; it's Y percent off .' at's a fast track to diminishing returns, but it's also tempting because it's so much easier than actually being interesting. I recommend that 50 percent to 75 percent of your marketing emails be informational, with 25 percent to 50 percent being sales focused." MailChimp identifi es four principal types of email marketing campaigns. 1. Promotional emails. Promotional emails advertise a company's products or services, often by promoting sales, discounts, seasonal events, in-store events and so on. 2. Product update emails. ese emails inform customers about new or updated products. 3. Digital newsletters. Digital newsletters are regularly sent to inform customers about the company by providing interesting articles or relevant news. 4. Transactional emails. ese emails are typically triggered by a customer action. For example, if a customer buys a product, he or she may receive a confi rmation email or a follow-up email that asks for feedback. When are the best days and times to send email marketing messages? e answer is going to vary from shop to shop, based on each shop's clientele, but in general, Conforti suggests Tuesdays. "Many fl orists spend Mondays fi lling weekly standing orders, receiving and processing fl owers, and so on, so they are more likely to have time on Tuesdays," he notes. "However, most people in the marketing world have long believed that Tuesdays are the best days to send emails and get responses, so Tuesdays have historically been heavy email days. e bottom line is that you have to test emails and monitor your open and response rates to determine what days and times produce the best results among your specifi c customer bases." Freeman notes that it was popular 15 years ago to make bold predictions about the time of day and the day of the week while assuming certain behaviors of the email recipients. " e only sure thing about timing is that if you're not testing, you're not trying," he emphasizes. "Try diff erent times, and test diff erent ideas. If you have a time that works for you, send to 80 percent of your list at that time as a control group, then send the rest at a diff erent time, to compare. What works for one small business or customer segment might not work for another. While one client base might be more corporate, another may comprise stay-at-home or work-at-home customers. Shift work, working from home and the 'always-connected life with a smartphone' mean that the old rules are out the window." Again, there is no one clear answer to questions about the best days and times to send emails. Adobe Marketo Engage states that, in general, Tuesdays still seem to yield the highest open rates, but that doesn't necessarily mean you'll see the most conversion and revenue growth to emails sent on that day ; ursdays tend to be the highest money-making days for emails. However, as stated before, this will be dependent on the industry and the behaviors of a specifi c audience. e best way for you to determine which days will deliver optimal results for your audience and particular goals is to run multiple send tests. And don't be surprised if Tuesdays don't work well for your emails. Mornings may be the best time of day to send marketing emails: 10 a.m. typically ranks highly for open rates in a number of sectors, according to Marketo. However, while many people tend to open emails the most in the mornings, sending emails in the afternoons may also yield good results for your business—again, depending on the demographics of your customers. Sometimes, it may make sense to send emails in the afternoons—between 3 p.m. to 4 p.m.—when people are checking their inboxes as they're gearing up to fi nish their workdays, as well as early evenings when people are at home checking emails before switching off for the day. e best solution, again, is to test a range of days and times and see how your audience responds. For more on this topic, see the "Best Days and Times to Send Emails" sidebar on Page 60. Developing Email Marketing Campaigns

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