- HoneyHat

What is a transactional email?

A transactional email ( automated) is an email that is sent as a response to user actions taken on a site or application. These emails are sent to specific individuals and contain data or content that is unique to them.

The most common transactional messages include

Account creation emails
Password reset emails
Order confirmation emails
Shipping Notifications
Welcome emails
Payment invoices
Receipts of Purchase
Account Notifications

Users receive transactional emails to inform them of an action that they have taken. users expect to receive emails, and may even check their inboxes frequently until they arrive.

These emails have higher opening rates due to the importance of their content.

Marketing Campaigns vs. Transactional Emails

Transactional messages are different from marketing campaigns.

As we have said, transactional messages are sent after an action is triggered (e.g. when customers make purchases or reset their passwords) and contain specific data or content for that user.

Marketing emails are bulk distributions of the exact same message. Marketing emails, also known as promotional or bulk email, are designed to nurture leads, encourage them to act, and move them down your funnel.

Examples of common types of marketing email include:

Newsletters
Sales campaigns
Special Offers
Announcements of Events
Vouchers and giveaways

Many businesses use a combination between transactional emails and marketing emails to establish and maintain a relationship with customers. Some platforms, like Moosend or Postmark, allow you to send transactional emails and marketing emails all from the same platform.

Why do you need transactional campaigns?

First, customers need to be informed when they make changes to their account or purchase something. will keep them updated, and provide valuable information for a smooth journey. will also reduce their stress levels and increase trust in your brand.

Transactional messages can also reduce the number customer support tickets, and create amazing digital experiences for your customers!

Examples of Transactional Emails and Types

Emails that facilitate transactions are an important part of the email strategy for most online businesses (especially eCommerce). These messages are often overlooked despite the fact that they play a major role in improving customer retention and facilitating a smooth experience.

Here are some examples and types of transactional email. You’ll quickly see why these emails shouldn’t just be set and forgotten.

1. Confirmation of Email Address

You should start by setting up confirmation emails. Double opt-in will allow you to:

Maintain good list hygiene
Improve your email deliverability
Spam addresses are not acceptable

These campaigns will help you keep track of the people who join your mailing list, as well as increase your click-through rate, open rates, and conversion rates.

Example : Red Bull eCommerce

Please confirm that you have subscribed to our newsletter

After you sign up for the Red Bull email newsletter, Red Bull will automatically send a confirmation email.

This transactional campaign contains all the elements needed to motivate new subscribers to act. This email is attractive and effective. From the bold call-to action, to the voucher for the first time discount.

2. Account Creation

Emails about account creation are sent by eCommerce and SaaS companies the most.

These campaigns are launched immediately after a customer creates a profile. Marketers can use transactional emails to welcome and reward new users. They can even invite them to join their loyalty program!

Example : Tease tea – eCommerce

Confirmation of customer account Subject:

Tease emails let new customers know they’ve successfully created a brand new account. The brand takes the opportunity to welcome new customers by informing them they can reduce checkout time just by logging into their profiles.

The pink CTA stands out nicely in the background. You can also see that Tease is promoting its loyalty program, by highlighting all the benefits.

3. Welcome Email Campaigns

You might be surprised to learn that welcome emails are actually transactional emails.

You need to make an excellent first impression after someone signs up for a newsletter or account. We saw that when we looked at some of the most welcome email campaigns your “welcome wagons”, should:

Personalize your content.
Provide valuable information.
Include a clear CTA.

Keep in mind, too, that your Welcome Recipes must be activated at the appropriate time to engage and inform your audience when they are most interested.

Example: TOPOL.io – SaaS

Subject: Hello and welcome to TOPOL.io

The Welcome message from TOPOL is straightforward with a CTA in bright yellow that’s easy to miss. The SaaS provider gives users a list of cool features and information on their trial status.

It’s important to include extra elements such as the “contact us link” and the personal email of the account manager. This will give your new users an direct line for communication with your business.

Do you have trouble sending your welcome messages to guests? We got you covered! These welcome emails will help you capture the attention of your audience and move them towards conversion. Create your own using our platform!

Try Moosend

4. Password Reset Emails

We’ve all done it: we’ve forgotten our passwords. Users will then click the “Forgot Password” option, and wait to see the magic password change message. Password reset requests that are effective should:

Clarity and conciseness are key.
Include a link to change your password.
Assure the user that their passwords have not changed automatically.

Password reset emails is one of the most important transactional emails that your business should set up. You could let your customers know the date that the link to reset their password will expire. This way, you can avoid sending unnecessary emails to support.

These are the emails that you’ll receive!

Example: SaaS

Subject: Reset Your Password

Spotify’s email password change is exactly what the forgetful subscriber needs to see. The “Reset Password” link is highlighted in green, and the copy of the email is simple to avoid any confusion. The company also assures the recipient they can delete the message if it was not their request. The email is also branded with lear, making it instantly recognizable to the user.

These campaigns do not need fancy subject lines in order to achieve high open rates. When they open your campaign, subscribers will immediately take action. These campaigns must be magical after all.

5. Order confirmation emails

You will eventually see your audience make a purchase if you’ve convinced them that your product/service was worth their money and time.

What’s next on their agenda? That’s right! A message confirming the order will let your customers know that their transaction was successful. All businesses should use order confirmations to ensure that their customers are not stressed by the payment status.

Example : Udemy Online Learning

Subject: Order confirmation for March 31, 2020

Udemy ‘s Transactional Email shows you everything you need to about your latest purchase. You can see the list price and your price (which was in our case free!) You can check the list price, your price (which in our case was free!

This email does not contain any promotional messages, as they are unnecessary. The CTA is clear, urging learners to begin their new course right away. the online course platform also created an effective email subject line that shows customers exactly what the message is about. They even added a date (March 31, 2021) to make it specific.

6. Purchase Receipts

Many retailers and hospitality businesses were forced to move their business online during Covid-19. Some of them began sending e-receipts to their customers.

These receipts will let your customers know that you have received their payment. They’ll also reassure those who may be concerned that you won’t fulfill your end of the deal.

Example Home Depot – Retail

Subject: Your electronic receipt

Source

Home Depot transformed your receipt into an email. The digital copy is available to customers at any time. They can print it, save it, or access it.

Using transactional messages is not only convenient for your customers, but also for the planet! So if you want to promote an environmentally-friendly business, using e-receipts might help you out more than you think!

Watch our Academy video for more information on how you can bring your brick and mortar business online.

7. Account Notifications

Account notifications are a must! These emails can be extremely useful for those who want to stay on top of whathappens to their profile.

The of this transactional email must be short, to the point and. It should function as a real-time update.

Example: Amazon eCommerce

Subject: Updated language settings

This campaign is activated after you change the language settings on your Amazon Account. It informs the recipient of the update and provides additional details. This is a sample of the notification emails that Amazon uses to update customers on everything going on with their profiles.

Amazon also sends regular transactional messages, such as sign-in attempts and requests for information updates. It may also send emails of thanks.

8. Shipping Notifications and Updates

Your customers will be excited to receive that one e-mail that gives them additional information about shipping. Customers will open these campaigns as soon as they arrive in their mailbox. As you might expect, these campaigns also have a high rate of engagement and open.

Sending transactional emails needs to include all the information your customers need to stay informed. Insufficient or broken details can lead to customers contacting your customer service team, which will have a negative effect on their experience of your brand.

Example: Redbubble – eCommerce

Subject: You have received your order.

Redbubble improves its shipping notifications with a beautiful design. The brand provides a good customer experience by ensuring that the email design is pleasing to the eye of the recipient and includes all the information they need.

This example has a little FAQ at the bottom. Redbubble wants to reduce friction by offering assistance to customers before they open a ticket.

9. Social Media Event Triggered Notifications

Nowadays, almost everyone has a social media account. It’s important for social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to keep their users informed about what is going on.

These platforms deliver event triggered notifications to users when they take specific actions in their profiles. Here’s what these transactional email look like:

Example : Twitter – Social Media Networks

Subject: Mac Walters tweeted: I’m so looking forward to it…

These Twitter notification emails are common. Users must have notifications enabled for a particular account or be following certain tags to receive them. These messages are also perfect for your Social Media Marketing Strategy, as they allow your audience to keep track of your posts and direct them back towards your profile.

Next time you post something, why not ask your followers to activate notifications for a better engagement?

How to send transactional emails

To deliver transactional messages, you need something else. is an SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) server, i.e. a TCP/IP Protocol used to send, relay and receive messages.

To send these campaigns, you’ll need a email service, such as Moosend, or Mailchimp. Some email service providers allow you to send emails for free, but they have limitations which are not ideal for growing companies.

If you want to be serious about your strategy for digital marketing you will need an email tool that can handle all of the work! Buying a paid SMTP solution will:

Additional functionality
Offer better security
Reduce configuration time
You will be given a dedicated IP Address
Ensure high email delivery rates
Analytics allows you to track performance.

Let’s now see how to do it with Moosend.

Moosend: Delivering transactional messages

Moosend has the tools you need to deliver transactional emails, no matter what.

You must first create an account before upgrading to a paid subscription. Pricing begins at $9.00/month. You can send Unlimited emails to up to 500 recipients.

Setup Moosend server in a few simple steps:

Configuring SMTP Server

You’ll find the following details:

Selecting your recipients

Moosend allows you to send your SMTP campaigns to an address or a mailinglist.

Create your campaign, and then add the recipient’s email address. Note that Moosend automatically creates a new mailing lists called “Transactional Campaign recipients” when you send your message.

If you want to send your campaign to an existing Moosend list, you have to deliver it to “[email protected],” where you have to replace mailing_list_id with your own mailing list id.

Tracking transactional emails

You can use Moosend analytics and reporting to monitor the performance your campaign. You’ll see a campaign called “Transactional Campaign” there. By clicking on it you can view how your recipients interacted with it.

The system will also automatically create a list of “Transactional Campaign recipients” where you can add all the recipients to your transactional messages.

Need help configuring SMTP? Check out this article to get everything set up quickly!

Transactional email performance

As we have seen, transactional emails tend to get higher open rates compared to marketing emails. The following statistics show that shipping confirmations are the most opened with a rate of 149.4%.

The bounce rate is low for all emails, but especially those that are used to reset passwords! Let’s look at some of the most popular types and rates to get an idea how transactional emails perform.

These stats show that email recipients are more interested in these messages than anything else. Sending them at the exact moment that they are needed is essential to improving the customer experience and providing stellar experiences.

But be careful! You need to be careful!

Running A/B testing can improve performance.
DMARC and are both authentication protocols.
Creating a BIMI Record.

Using DMARC or BIMI can help you improve the quality of your transactional messages, especially in a world where hackers and scammers are at large.

Frequently Answered Questions (FAQs)

Let’s look at some of the most common questions that people ask about transactional emails and their answers before I send you off.

Q1. Q1. Do I need to add unsubscribe links to transactional campaigns?

A link to unsubscribe is not required for transactional campaigns. To minimize potential frustrations, you can include one so that your audience can manage their preferences and remove themselves from your mailing list.

Q2. Q2.

No. Bulk emails can be sent simultaneously to many recipients for promotional purposes. Newsletters and coupons are examples of popular bulk emails. Transactional emails, on the other hand are triggered by events, like confirmation emails, shipping notifications and so on.

Q3. Q3. Are abandoned cart emails transactional?

Cart abandonment emails may feel like transactional campaigns but are actually more marketing-oriented. You’ll need a Marketing Automation Tool such as Moosend, Mailchimp or Moosend to set these up.

Q4. How can I send a transactional campaign?

You need an SMTP or email API to deliver transactional emails. There are many transactional email services available to help you deliver your campaign. Moosend offers the most affordable plans, starting at just $9/month.

Q5. How do you write a transactional message?

Campaigns that are transactional should focus on what the recipient is looking for. Avoid promotional elements, and instead give the reader a clear call to action to accomplish your goal. Your subject lines should also be as clear and concise as possible in order to convey the email’s content at first glance.

Q6. What are the most popular transactional email use cases?

Account creation and confirmation emails are the most popular transactional campaigns. Shipping alerts and password reset requests are also popular.

Create transactional email messages Today

Customers have always had access to information through transactional campaigns.

Sending these messages to your customers will help improve their experience and increase trust.

You can get started by signing up for a paid Moosend plan.

The post Email Marketing Automation Platform for Growing Businesses : Transactional Email Guide and Examples in 2023 first appeared on Email Marketing Automation Platform.

Author: Marilia Dimitriou

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