​Traditional thought has long centered around sending emails Tuesday through Thursday mornings between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. Conventional wisdom and past studies have shown that these hours are when many people read their emails. However, more recent studies have since pointed to other optimal times.

One cross-industry report found unique open rates averaged 21.7 percent between 8 p.m. and 11:59 p.m., and 17.6 percent between midnight and 4 a.m. Those night owls also had the highest clickthrough rates.

Another study determined mobile activity peaks between 9 p.m. and midnight, that Monday emails produce the highest ROI, and that Friday emails produce the highest clickthrough rates. Saturdays and Sundays produced the lowest sales volumes, but the highest open and clickthrough rates in this study.

Some research indicates emails are most effective within the first hours of delivery; that’s when almost 24 percent of all emails are opened. Interestingly, virtually no emails are opened 24 hours or longer after they’ve been delivered.

Are you still using email marketing without a thought to whether your emails are mobile-friendly or not? Today, you need to think beyond mobile-friendly emails to “mobile-first” emails. Here are seven reasons why:

1. Between 2010 and 2015, the number of email opens on mobile devices increased by 30 percent, according to Campaign Monitor.
2. More than two-thirds (67 percent) of all U.S. email opens occur on a mobile device, according to a study from Movable Ink.
3. If your email isn’t mobile-optimized, it will load slowly. Think that doesn’t matter? A delay of even one second can cost you 7 percent of your conversions, according to MDG Advertising.
4. The number of mobile email users is predicted to grow by 23 percent in 2016, according to The Radicati Group.
5. By 2018, 8 out of 10 of email users are expected to access their email accounts on mobile devices, the same Radicati Group report says.
6. The number of email click-throughs on mobile devices increased 22.8 percent on Black Friday 2015 compared to the previous year, based on IBM’s Watson Trend benchmark data.
7. When your email isn’t mobile-friendly, 80 percent of recipients will delete the email, according to a study from BlueHornet. Worse, 30 percent will unsubscribe from your emails altogether!

Are you convinced yet? To succeed at email marketing now and in the future, your emails must be designed with mobile in mind from the get-go — not just as an afterthought.
That means using:

• Shorter subject lines. The average desktop inbox displays about 60 characters of an email’s subject line, but mobile devices only show 25 to 30 characters. Shorter email subject lines get more attention wherever they display.
• Single-column format. Using a single-column email template makes your emails much easier to reach on a mobile device.
• Mobile-optimized photos. Photos are one of the biggest culprits in slow-loading emails. Make sure your photos are a suitable size to load quickly on a smartphone while still being crisp.
• Lots of white space. White space around hyperlinks, buttons and other “clickable” content lessens the chances of fumbling fingers tapping the wrong thing and causing frustration.
• Streamlined design. Consider revamping icons and even logos for maximum impact on mobile. “Flat” graphics load faster and adapt better to different screen sizes and formats (from thumbnail size on a mobile device to full size on a desktop).

Bonus: Mobile-first emails will also load faster and display more of their content when viewed on a tablet or a desktop — and that gives you a better chance of getting your target customers to open, read and click no matter where they are.
​
Karen Axelton is editor for the Web.com Small Business Forum and Chief Content Officer of GrowBiz Media, a media company that helps entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. Visit them at SmallBizDaily.com.

​As seen on Samsclub.com

This infographic shared by Prestige Marketing explains email marketing best practices.

We are living in the age of the customer. Not the age of the seller. Take a look at this informative slideshare presentation on marketing in 2015.

Imagine how many more views and how much more engagement your blog posts would get if you spent as much time crafting your blog post titles as you do your email subject lines.

Whether your posts are being discovered in social media, search engines, or inside of people's inboxes, the titles are the first thingsreaders will see -- and they're the gatekeepers of the excellent content just one click away.

To help you brainstorm some clickable titles, twelveskip.com created a lovely infographic featuring 74 blog post titles "templates." All you have to do to create attention-grabbing titles is select one of the blog title templates from the list, fill in the blank(s) with relevant keywords and phrases, and voila: Your post is good to go.