News Releases, Emails: Timing - for Best Results

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News Releases, E-Mails: Timing - for Best Results

Expert Advice From the TNNWC News Pros and BuzzBaristas™

03.22.2011

Note: This article was originally published in the Expert Advice And Insights From TNNWC Blog. Visit. Subscribe. Read. Learn. Apply. Prosper!
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Object: Maximize the effectiveness of your communications and campaigns by optimizing timing.

Summary: If you send out a news release, mass email campaign, or even publish an article, timing is critical. Depending upon what you are sending or producing, the day of the week (and even the time of day!) when your audience receives it may be the crucial difference in whether or not 1) it will even be read, and whether or not 2) it will be successful in getting attention or action.

Most of the news releases submitted to news wire services on a Friday will be posted (by those media services) on Tuesday -- a two business day delay. The best days for a press release to "land" (i.e., to be published) in the media are on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday…these days tend to be the best for breaking a new story. Because of the 1-2 business day publishing delays, the best (and safest) days to have your News Pro submit your news releases to the electronic and print media channels are on Thursday (for Monday publication), Monday (for Wednesday publication) and Wednesday (for Friday publication) for maximum effectiveness.

The wonderful thing about news releases is that they all have a bit of longevity to them, particularly in the electronic media, where the search engines keep them alive, and where comments are accumulated about them by readers using various social media for several days after they “hit”. Print media can be problematic – if it is breaking news, few people (except historians and people wrapping fish or furniture) will pick up a yesterday’s newspaper. There is an exception it is a lengthier article about something technical, or a multi-part series, where it might be considered it is magazine or newsletter material, which means it has a significantly longer life, even in print form. Bear in mind that technical information or serial publication items are not as time-critical, and they have utility to their readers well beyond the date of publication.

In direct contrast, the best days to get your direct emails to be opened by recipients are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The worst days for recipients to receive your emails are Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Monday is the worst of the worst -- it's when you get the least attention, and maximum deletion – typically, one of the first Monday morning rituals (especially after a long weekend) is to “clean out” the email inbox. That means that you email campaign or newsletter mailing is far more likely to go into the spam box, unopened. People can even get angry at you for filling up their inboxes to bursting when they've gone to face their accumulated email mountain after a weekend of being away from the rigors of work.

Paradoxically, most people enjoy catching up with the news on Monday mornings, even while they are almost wantonly deleting emails with uninteresting or solicitous subject lines.

If you send out an email or newsletter campaign which is received on a Friday afternoon, it will probably not be looked at until Monday morning, when the spam deletion process is in full force, and many inbox items get tossed out.

One notable exception to the “don’t let your email or newsletter arrive on a Monday” rule is that people tend to get back into the swing of things after lunchtime. They are actually curious to see what new items have arrived since the Monday morning purge. This, for some reason, is not considered work at all – it is a form of stalling and recreation. I can’t tell you why.

If you publish a topical blog and have developed a following (either via email, RSS feed, or just getting a “favorite” status or listing on their browsers) your information will be anticipated and savored as soon as your readers find the time to relax from their immediate work demands.

This is the reason that some of the best News Professionals will take news releases and certain suitable campaign letters and actually re-publish them on blogs. This actually increases the probability that your message will be read and acted upon. In fact, sometimes the same piece is re-titled as well as re-published in order to draw the attention of a different audience and to broaden circulation.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle (with special thanks to Kent Martin and RD Watson)
http://aboutdouglascastle.blogspot.com/
http://www.tnnwc.com/ [ Join TNNWC - start receiving the advantages today! ]

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