Nail the Perfect Timing – A Guide to Email Scheduling in 2023

Strategy and timing are the Himalayas of marketing. Everything else is the Catskills. ~ Al Ries.

Whether you are composing your email for a client or your boss, there will be occasions when you need to send the mail at a particular date and time. And perfectly timed emails could be the fine line between positive and negative responses.

Fortunately, email scheduling makes it possible and introduces convenience to your email marketing campaign. So even if your entire marketing team is vacationing at the beach, email scheduling is maintaining engagement rates.

Here’s everything you need to know about this miracle cure for busy individuals:

Why Should You Consider Email Scheduling?

Imagine a scenario when you plan to capitalize on the prospect’s lunchtime and shoot a quick mail to scope them out. But, uh-oh, you sent the mail at 2 PM IST (Indian Standard Time) only for them to receive it at 1:30 AM PST (Pacific Standard Time)! That is not going to bode well with them!

To avoid such a grave mistake, you send the email at 2:30 AM IST so that they receive it at a ripe 2:00 PM. But clearly, all the coffee you drank wears out, and the sweet temptation of sleep steals away that window! You snooze, you lose!

Time zones can sure wreak havoc. At the same time, you need to send perfectly-timed emails. However, if the above examples feel like a stretch, then simply consider the fact – are you willing to put aside time from your busy timetable to send emails? How will you account for your global clients spread across different time zones? And what happens if you have several prospects to manage?

Even if you have the best planner, this simple task can result in a train wreck!

This illustration singularly highlights the importance and applicability of the “Send Later” button.

Email scheduling allows your marketers to plan and execute perfectly timed email campaigns to the T.

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Email Scheduling Benefits: An Overview

It has been established that you cannot afford to take email schedules lightly. Here is a quick round-up of the benefits that it offers:

1. Gain Visibility

Much like SERP, you are buried in anonymity if you are not on top of the receiver’s inbox. Given that roughly 319.6 billion emails do the rounds worldwide, you need to plan your email to land on top of that pile. And what do you gain from this visibility? A better open rate and, even better – a response!

2. Re-engagement and Follow-Up Campaigns

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Even if you fail to solicit a response, email scheduling allows you to follow up and carry out a re-engagement campaign. Such communications after meetings, networking events, or previous follow-ups can ensure that you are always on the receiver’s mind.

3. Beat Uncertainty

If you are to sit and contemplate on the best time to hit the “Send” button, then you may dilly-dally forever. Email scheduling gets the item of business out of the way so that you can focus more on the things that matter rather than when to click on send!

4. Introduces Flexibility

Email scheduling introduces flexibility. Your marketers can send emails at their convenience, and the receivers will receive them at their convenience. This situation is a win-win for all, making communication seamless, effective, and fruitful.

Diving Into the Action: How to Schedule Bulk Emails

Let’s take a look at the various ways through which you can schedule emails on multiple platforms:

a) Setting Up Email Scheduling for Gmail

You can set up a Gmail mail schedule by following the steps given below:

1. Open your Gmail inbox on your preferred browser and click on the “Compose” button present at the top left.
2. Draft your email in the compose window.

3. Click on the dropdown arrow next to “Send” and select the “Schedule Send” option.

4. You can choose from the preset values. Alternatively, you can select a custom date or time.

5. Once you have selected the delivery date and time, the email is scheduled for timely delivery!

For Gmail scheduling over mobile apps, here is what you need to do:

• Open the Gmail mobile app.
• Locate and tap on the “Compose” button.
• Draft your email.
• Tap on the kebab icon (three stacked dots) at the top-right corner and click “Schedule Send.”

• You will once again get to choose between preset values or pick a date and time of your liking.
• Your email is now scheduled.

Do keep the following in mind:

• You can schedule your email delivery more than two minutes from the current time for a custom time. Say, if the date and time are 30th March 2023, 5:00 AM, you can schedule the mail beyond 30th March 2023, 5:02 AM.
• The date and time are as per the sender’s time zone. So make necessary modifications.
• You can view the message or cancel send. You can do it by clicking on your “Scheduled” folder and choosing the appropriate option. If you go for the latter, the message reverts to your drafts folder.

b) Setting Up Email Scheduling for Outlook

If you use Outlook mail, you can set up an email schedule in the following manner:

Open your Outlook inbox in your preferred browser.

1. Open your Outlook inbox in your preferred browser.
2. Click on the “New Email” button in the top-left corner.

3. In the “Tags” menu present in the Ribbon, click on the expand button to view more options.

4. Under the “Delivery options,” check the “Do not deliver before” box and input the delivery date and time.

5. Close the menu.

6. Compose your email and click on “Send.”

7. The email sits in your Outbox until the scheduled delivery occurs.

8. If you wish to modify or cancel the scheduled mail, you can visit your Outbox, open the delayed message, and repeat steps 3 to 6.

c) Setting Up Email Scheduling for MoEngage

MoEngage allows you to schedule emails, that too, as per the receiver’s local timezone! Here’s how you can achieve it:

1. Open your MoEngage dashboard and click “Compose Email” to create an email campaign.

2. You can choose between Basic, Contextual, and Saved Templates to draft your email.

3. After your email is ready, click on “Start the Campaign.”

4. Select the “At a date and time” option.

5. Input the date and time, along with their time zone. Also, check the “Send in recipient’s time zone” option.

6. Select send.

7. You can check the delivery status by viewing the “Time zone-based delivery” section of your Campaign Analytics. Depending on the status, you will get Sent, Sending, Pending, and Not sent due to the time-lapse prompts.

Don’t know where to start? Sherpa, MoEngage’s AI-based decision engine, can learn through receiver behavior to identify the best time to send your email. Sherpa optimizes the scheduled time by projecting the CTR and displaying the variations through percentages, simplifying decision-making.

Concluding Thoughts

With email scheduling, you can worry less about when to send the email and focus on what to ship inside of it. So start composing your email now, and let MoEngage handle the rest!