What is transactional email
Understanding and finding the potential in automated messaging : the transactional email
Transactional Email are meant to complete a user’s online experience. You may see them in the form of purchase confirmations, abandoned cart notifications, or maybe subscription notices. Emails are a powerful marketing tool for websites, and Transactional Email play an important role in customer satisfactory.
Some Transactional Email are ineffective for important reasons, while others take full advantage of the marketing and positive customer relationship opportunities they can provide. Let’s take a look at who uses Transactional Email, how and when you get them, what types there are out there, and the difference between capitalizing and capsizing.
Who Uses Transactional Email?
All of your favourite online shopping destinations use some kind of transactional email. As mentioned above, one of the most common forms of Transactional Email are order/purchase confirmations as well as shipping notifications.
Other Transactional Email can come in the form of statements from your bank. This is a newer form of transactional email as online banking has become more popular through the years.
Another newer form of transactional email was created to notify recent visitors of the products left behind in their abandoned carts. This subtle reminder focuses on rekindling the potential sales left at the checkout. This transactional email is widely used by high traffic name brand sites such as, Amazon and Walmart.
How, And When do I Receive Transactional Email?
For the most part, Transactional Email like order confirmations are automated, and will pop into your inbox the second you place an order and payment is received. The same applies to shipping notifications, which will be sent immediately upon receipt of your order at specific checkpoints.
Other automated Transactional Email include abandoned carts. However, proper utilization of this email involves a slight delay of one or two days. The reason for this is to avoid an aggressive approach that may turn off customers. Monthly Transactional Email are common when dealing with your financial institution. These are usually in the form of balance statements, offers, and your points/rewards.
Other Types of Transactional Email
While there are numerous types and forms of transactional email, these are a few of the most common you can find in your day-to-day online experiences:
- Purchase confirmations
- Shipping confirmations
- Receipts
- Any type of alert, notification, and/or reminder
- Account updates
- Statements from financial institutions
- Rewards and Subscriptions
- Product info
- Rating of service or product requests
Most of these emails are glanced at and then forgotten. While customers appreciate the gesture, they are not getting enough back from Transactional Email. It is widely believed that websites are failing to take advantage of the opportunities Transactional Email offer to their customers.
Creating a Great Transactional Email
You can’t have the good without the bad, and to better understand what makes a great transactional email it is worth noting what makes an awful one:
- Bland technical wording – All of that jargon looks like a mass of illegible letters.
- Text heavy – A wall of text can hide important information.
- Overly aggressive and pressuring – BUY, BUY, BUY! This can be harmful to your image.
A great transactional email needs to portray someone on the other side. A personable message will go a long way, and so will readability. As most users scan through emails, it is important to be precise and informative without using walls of text. A little customer appreciation can guarantee repeat business and/or referrals.
