Best Time to Send an Email on Saturday

Sending content at the right time of day has been an up-and-coming strategy in the email marketing space. Many marketers are beginning to realize that reaching consumers at the right time can have a significant impact on key engagement metrics like:

• Open rate
• Click rate
• Conversion rate
• Bounce rate

The reason it has these positive effects on metrics is simple. Our lifestyles and work schedules affect our energy levels and the time we have on hand at different points of the day. You want to reach subscribers when they have the highest energy and will be most likely to engage. 

Plus, the most recent emails appear at the top of inboxes. So if you email someone right before they check their inbox, it’ll likely be one of the first pieces of content they see. 

While that notion is easy to get behind, email marketers can find it more daunting to identify the best time to send new content. To help with that, this article will cover in detail the best time to email on Saturday and what strategies you should have in place to email at the best time of day throughout the week. 

You’ll want to keep reading until the end to get all the information. Let’s get started. 

Is Saturday a Good Time to Send an Email?

Right away, you’ll probably want to know if Saturday is even a good time to send emails. After all, it can feel pretty disappointing to spend time crafting a great piece of content only to have it flop and get lower engagement rates than expected. Plus, it can be bad for your long-term success since consistently low engagement can cause your emails to start bouncing. 

From research on average email engagement rates on different days of the week, Saturday often has the lowest engagement. So emailing on Saturday may not be the best idea. 

Saturdays being a prime weekend day, can have more distractions like spending time with friends and family or simply relaxing from a taxing work week. That means your subscribers may be less likely to check emails and engage. 

That said, this can vary. Saturday may even be a great day to email certain audiences. For instance, those who work on the weekends, like postal workers, real estate agents, or retail workers, may all be very active on Saturdays since they’re on the go during their work day. 

Ultimately, finding what works best for your audience will be important here. 

AudiencePoint can help with that using our Send Time Optimization (STO) tool. STO takes data from how your subscribers engage with content to give actionable insights on the most optimal times and days of the week to send content. It’s an easier way to make data-driven decisions that will work best for your audience. 

Is Saturday or Sunday Better for Emails?

Since Saturday isn’t always the best option based on average engagement rates, you may wonder if Sunday is better. In terms of the data on the topic, Sunday can have a slightly higher average engagement than Saturday. But the difference between the two is very minimal. 

Weekends, in general, just don’t work the best for email marketing when it comes to reaching the average consumer. However, it can vary, so knowing your audience and how they engage is essential. 

Is It Unprofessional to Email on Saturday?

It can be unprofessional to email on Saturday if it’s a work-related email and you don’t work weekends in your profession. It can also be unprofessional in terms of email marketing if you work with professional clients who keep a Monday-to-Friday schedule. So you would want to be aware of your audience in that regard before emailing on a Saturday. 

However, if you send marketing content to general consumers, nobody will be bothered by receiving promotional content on a Saturday. Depending on your subscribers, it just might not work the best to catch someone’s attention. So do your research before investing time in crafting email content for Saturdays. 

Is It Better to Send an Email on Friday or Saturday?

If the weekends don’t work well for your audience, you may wonder if Friday would be a better idea to catch subscribers before that time. In fact, Friday will be better in terms of average engagement rates. Although, one thing you should remember with Friday is that emailing earlier in the day will likely be your better bet. 

As it gets closer to 5 pm and the end of the typical work day on Fridays, many people start looking forward to the weekend. That leads to a significant drop off in engagement rates during the afternoon into the evening. That means emailing before noon on Fridays is often the best bet. 

Is It Better to Send an Email on Friday or Monday?

So Friday can work pretty well, but would waiting until Monday be a better option? 

If that were your next question, you would be right in thinking Monday, the start of a new work week, would be a better time to email. After a nice relaxing weekend, most people feel energized and ready to get back into things. That includes feeling ready to engage with new content. 

The one thing you should be aware of here is it can take a bit for many people to adjust to getting back to work on Monday mornings. That means waiting to send content until the afternoon isn’t a bad idea to reach subscribers at a more optimal time for them to engage. 

Best Time to Send an Email on Saturday

If you find that Saturday works well to email your audience or you have something going on, like a big weekend sale where you need to send content, you’ll want to lock down the best time of day to email. 

On Saturdays, it can be a good idea to send content later in the day. Many people go out on Friday nights or like to sleep in on Saturday mornings after a long work week. It means many of your subscribers may not be ready to engage with emails right away on Saturday morning. 

If you can wait to email until the afternoon between 12 pm-3 pm, that would be the most optimal time. Most people will be active during that time and have gotten into their day at that point. It’s also a good idea to email before 5 pm since many people may decide to go out on Saturday night as well. 

What Time of Day Is Best to Send Emails in General?

The overall best time to send emails in 2023 is between 9 am-3 pm. These are generally the peak hours of the average person’s workday when they have the most energy and are checking inboxes frequently. While this time range won’t work for everyone since every audience is different, it’s a good broad range that gives you a better chance of success. 

To get more pinpointed data that makes your emails the most likely to be successful, you’ll want to use an insight software tool like ours at AudiencePoint to find the best time of day to email your subscribers. 

AudiencePoint helps you remove the uncertainty, so you don’t have to take a best guess or do a lot of trial and error on your own, which would be time-consuming or impossible for most businesses. 

Is There a Best Time to Send Cold Emails?

Generally, that 9 am-3 pm time range will work best for cold emails as well. Most who are sending cold emails are trying to land professional business clients, so emailing during normal work hours would be the best time to reach this type of audience.  

What Time Do Most People Respond to Emails?

When you send a promotional email, you’ll often want to get a response. Whether that’s a conversion or someone showing more interest in your products or services, it’s always a great sign that your content has had a positive effect. 

Many people will wait to respond to emails in the afternoon. Even if they see your offer in the morning, many consumers will take time to think it over. This is especially true for bigger ticket items that require a larger investment. So you can expect many responses to content between 12 pm-3 pm. 

What Time of Day Are Most People Likely to Open Emails?

Most people are likely to open emails during that optimal time for email engagement, which ranges between 9 am-3 pm. 

Although, it’s gotten trickier to analyze metrics related to open rate in 2023 with Apple’s mail privacy protection (MPP). Apple MPP causes emails sent to the mail app on Apple devices to be opened on proxy servers before landing in inboxes. That means it can skew data for how many of your emails were opened by subscribers and when they were opened. 

Fortunately, AudiencePoint has found a solution to this. Our email insight software can identify and isolate Apple MPP opens from reporting. So if you’re trying to optimize send times for open rate, you can rest assured that we’ll provide you with accurate data that’s up to date with today’s standards. 

How AudiencePoint Can Improve Your Email Marketing Strategy

As mentioned throughout this article, AudiencePoint can help optimize send times and even provide accurate insights that account for common issues like Apple MPP. Our insight software will be your best option to improve your email marketing strategy. 

In addition to STO, AudiencePoint can help:

• Identify inactive subscribers who need to be re-engaged. 
• Accurately segment your email list based on past engagement activity. 
• Find new strategies to revitalize engagement rates that’ll prevent negative impacts like email bounces or ending up in spam folders that will happen with low engagement. 

AudiencePoint’s capabilities will be an excellent addition to your existing email marketing strategy. To learn more about getting started or get answers to any other questions you may have, contact us today.