Sending emails to your subscriber list too frequently can reflect poorly on your business–so how often do subscribers want to receive emails? In this reading, you’ll learn how to decide on the right email frequency for your business.
Considerations when setting frequency
In 2021, nearly 320 billion emails were sent worldwide daily. Since then, that number has only increased. Ensuring your subscribers don’t feel overwhelmed or bombarded with emails is a big part of your email marketing strategy. You should set your email frequency with careful consideration. If you are sending emails to your subscribers’ inboxes every single day and they are trying to cut down on daily emails, they might unsubscribe.
When you evaluate how frequently you’ll send emails to your subscribers, think about the following questions:
- How large is your subscriber list?Consider setting your frequency based on the parameters below:
- Fewer than 500: Send an emailonce a month.
- 500–10,000: Send an email once a week.
- 10,000 or more: Send emails twice a week.
- What purpose is this email serving? If you’re aiming to educate users on something—like a new product—you may only need to send one email.
- What types of emails do you plan on sending? For instance, newsletters will be sent out more frequently than promotional emails about sales or discounts.
- What types of content is in your emails? If you’re including nearly identical content in emails, maybe they don’t need to be sent more than once. If you are reminding people about a sale, you might want to send a couple emails—one when the sale starts and one when the sale is about to end.
Ask your audience
Depending on how you collect email addresses, there may be a way to get feedback from your subscribers immediately. For instance, when they sign up through a website prompt, you can include a quick survey asking how often they want to receive emails. Or, you can send a welcome email when they sign up that asks them for feedback. Additionally, if subscribers select “unsubscribe,” you can provide a survey that allows them to opt to receive emails less frequently (e.g., once a month, once a week, etc.). This can reduce the number of people who unsubscribe.
Key takeaways
When it comes to managing email frequency, the last thing you want to do is to overwhelm your subscribers because this may result in them never opening your emails or even unsubscribing from your list. Before you begin sending emails, consider your list size, what types of emails you’ll send, what content is in those emails, and what purpose your emails serve.