24% of all Emails are Opened Within 1 Hour of Delivery

Email open rates are the highest within 1 hour of delivery, so marketers should take care to send emails at optimal hours.

Email Marketing Remains King – But, Effectively Using Email to Market Remains a Work in Progress

94% of all internet users use the internet to send or read e-mails. That is more than any other activity – more than the use of search engines (87%), the use of maps and finding directions (86%), checking the weather (81%), getting news (75%), buying a product (66%) or using social networking sites (61%). Additionally, studies have found that in 2011 email marketing had a return on investment (ROI) of 4,000%. The bottom line is that email marketing works and it is worth the effort.

That fact is not lost of small businesses. As was noted here, 85% of small business owners plan to increase their use of email marketing in 2013. But, increased use alone is not likely to result in a direct increase in positive results. A successful email marketing campaign is one that is carefully planned out and that considers recipient behavior. That means those small business marketers who understand how recipients of their emails will respond when that email hits their inbox are one step ahead of the rest of the pack. Check out the graphic to see at what time of day the most emails are arriving in the inboxes of the intended recipients.

Here are some tools that will help you plan out your email marketing strategy for 2013:

Docstoc Online Business Courses are comprehensive and taught be experts – check out Email Marketing for Small Business and Getting Started with Gmail.

Different times of the year bring different marketing opportunities. Check out this “Email Marketing Calendar” from Getresponse.com to get ideas for every month of the year.

Choose the best email marketing service for your business – to help you decide, check out this article Email Marketing Services.

Trying to decide between email and social media? Check out this cool infographic.

Not online yet, or still need to build your customer email list? Check and see if your domain name is available at Godaddy.com and then put up a landing page with the help of Kickofflabs.com.

Sources: Getresponse, Pinpointe, Apogee Results, AWeber