A lot of email traffic falls under the term ‘transactional email’. The CAN-SPAM Act dictates that all email that guides or facilitates a transaction over the internet should be placed under this category.
An order confirmation, shipment notice, order status, a digital invoice, in short any service communication that accompanies a sale at a shop is a transactional email. Unfortunately firms too often believe that these electronic messages do not belong to the domain of an email marketer.
Vague
Personalizing is usually out of the question here, the messages are often vague and one usually doesn’t look further than the obvious. We are working on the current sales, we are certainly not looking forward to the next sale! However, you now have the full attention of the buyer who is behind his email client. After all, he expects your transactional email.
So this time we would like to give a few rules of thumb that can increase the effect of your transactional email:
Subject line:
It should be a bit compelling of course. With a dry ‘purchase confirmation 236525889544’ you won’t get very far. Try ‘see if you purchase of an mp3 player was correctly registered’. The reader is actively invited to open your message. Obviously you should do some AB testing within your own customer base.
Look and feel:
In our regular email marketing we always see to it that every newsletter that leaves our office inherits the correct branding. Our logo is top left and the colors of our stationery come back in the message. In an e-shop we often receive an impersonal monochrome service communication. We shouldn’t be satisfied with that, should we?
As often as necessary:
Especially if you should place the order for your client in a backorder, it’s necessary that your transactional should perform more often. Between the order confirmation and the shipping notice could pass some time. Announce in such a situation that you will be regularly sending an update. From a service standpoint that’s a beautiful thing. But you also create expectations. Your email will certainly be read.
Think about the next step:
If you’re sending a transactional email, then you certainly shouldn’t limit yourself to service-oriented communications. You can safely refer to additional gadgets, Facebook page or invite customers to read the manual to get started. There are plenty of messages that you can combine. It would be a shame to pass up on this opportunity.