Nearly 1/3 of Email Opens Occur In First Hour

We analyzed open rates for just under 2,000 HTML email campaigns recently sent from MailChimp, and found that within the first hour after delivery, nearly 1/3 of recipients opened the campaign:

• Nearly 1/3 will open within the first hour of sending (we're all addicted to email, aren't we?)
• The majority (53%) will open within 6 hours
• 78% will have opened within 1 day
• Within 1 week, 95% of openers will have opened
• And people will still open your email a full 30 days after sending (so don't archive your hosted images too soon!)

Interesting implications for email marketers who:

• Need to work with IT to properly allocate server resources according to the timing of your campaigns
• Frequently send breaking email news alerts
• Send email invitations to weekly events (give it a day or two for maximum effect, but it's nice to know that lots of people will open within hours)
• Send followup campaigns to "those who did not open." Give people at least 1 week before you assume they didn't open.

Note that the Y-axis is not a "percent of list" but a "percent of those on your list who will eventually open." For example, if 30% of your list opens your email (that's about average), this would show that 53% of that 30% will open within 6 hours.

Other Useful Resources:

• Understanding Email Campaign Reports
• Free Email Marketing Guide
• Inbox Inspector: Generate screenshots of your email designs in all the major email programs, test all the major spam filters and email firewalls, and scan for spammy keywords in one click.

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