Know-How Exchange : E-Marketing

Hi John,

I'm not sure it matters with doctors because I know from fact that most of them don't take the first pass at reading their email, if they aren't expecting it, they simply don't have time.

Most often an assistant will take the first pass and either reject, reply, or pass on to the doctor what they feel is important.

Of course there are always exceptions, but this is based off my experience and my conversations with multiple doctors in multiple specialities.

Now, that being said, what I would suggest you do is depending on the size of your list, split it up into 2-4 different groups and stagger the day and time you send them. Same email, same message, same call to actions, just different days and different times when you send.

You should be using a 3rd party ASP that provides you with delivery, open and clickthrough statistics, so after running a couple of campaigns like this you will be able to see for yourself when the best time and date is.

Overall advice on email marketing is to do what Ronald Reagan said "trust but verify" i.e. regardless of what you read, hear or are told, always verify by running your own tests, and the split run A/B is usually the preferred method.

I hope that helps.

You're assuming there is one good time for the whole cohort.

Perhaps you need to ask them when they would like to receive it, and have it sent out at that time by yr ASP.

e.g. Weekday or Weekends?
Morning or afternoon?
Dawn or mid-morning?
Late afternoon or evening?
Lunchtime? etc...

Hope this helps.

chrisB

There was a similar question posted here that has some great info you to reap. See email timing.

- Shelley