Email Open Rates Lowest During Highest Emailing Times
We all get too many emails. That is a fact all of us deal with: Inbox clutter is real and growing. An annual report by MailerMailer (Email Marketing Metrics Report) analyzes data from more than 1 billion opt-in newsletters to see what trends in email timing for open and clicks. The chart is from MarketingCharts.com of MailerMailer’s results (H1 first half of year; H2 second half of year). Here are a few highlights:
- The largest open rates occur in the first 5 hours after an email was sent
- Inbox clutter occurs most during traditional work hours
- Open rates are climbing, but click rates are declining
- Open rates are higher in the evening, but this may be due to lower volume of emails at that time
- Short email subject lines did not pull more than longer subject lines (this may be due to smartphones showing more of the subject lines than in the past)
Mark Mathis
Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle.
After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant.
He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.”
Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.”
One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College.
Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board.
Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.