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An email marketing calendar is the cornerstone of your entire email lead generation strategy. Most email marketers use their content calendars like a map – they’d be completely lost without it! But creating this all-important roadmap can feel a bit daunting; in the fast-moving, ever-changing world of digital marketing, how can anything be set in stone…and so far in advance?

Here are a few things to consider when your team is attempting to “eat the elephant” (as they say) of creating an email marketing calendar:

Consistency is key

Search yourself, and your team, and decide what is actually doable. What can you promise to deliver, and at what cadence? Resources are the key to consistency, so be careful not to overwhelm you or your team by overshooting the moon. Keep in mind the busy and slower times in your business schedule, and plan accordingly. Some businesses find they are slower in the summer, and so could put more resources into creating email content for when the Holiday seasons roll around and take them away again.

Be prepared for seasonality

You may need to adjust your email lead generation strategy based on seasonal changes – but you can usually plan ahead for them. For example, take note of when holidays fall where you may want to send a greeting, offer, or specific piece of content. Do what your grandmother does with a new calendar every year: fill in all of the important dates FIRST, then fill in the gaps around them.

What, when, and who?

These are important question, even if you’re NOT a journalist covering a breaking story. Plan out what type of email you are going to send within your campaign schedule: Single Message Emails (SME’s) or Newsletter style. They differ in the way you’ll develop content, who will receive them, and how frequently. SME’s are often sent more frequently (perhaps once per week, or bi-weekly, or any time there’s a new offer), whereas your newsletter-style emails are usually longer reads, and sent less frequently.

When to send your emails is the next critical question. When is the best day of the week? When is the best time of the day? Those questions will be answered in your data, and by using A/B testing, but there are some industry standards that can help you make up your mind. The general rule of thumb is to send earlier in the week (avoiding monday!), and before noon (avoiding lunch hours).

The last question is who are you sending your email marketing to? Knowing whether you’re sending to a base of leads versus customers will influence the type of email you send, and frequency of your communications.

Test, test, repeat

Use the first 3-6 months of your calendar as testing ground for the rest of the year. Don’t be afraid to use metrics (good or poor) from A/B tests to re-organize or make major adjustments to your strategy, it will only make the rest of the year’s campaigns smarter. As much as marketers would love to feel as though their strategy is carved in stone without deviation, it simply isn’t the way email marketing campaigns work in a digital world. Clickback’s email lead generation software allows for intuitive and results-driven A/B testing so that marketers can test and refine using true audience data.

When building a strategic email marketing calendar, the best tip is to use what you know. Start there and build out.