Zrinity Email Marketing Blog

Testing is critical to any successful marketing campaign. Through the use of survey, feedback, and monitoring, testing can be an easy to execute in-house project prior to the launch of any email campaign. Determining whether or not the email campaign is working comes on the back end of testing, which leads us to tracking the results. According to a survey by Magill, “70% of respondent [companies] said they applied basic or no analysis to any of their email campaigns.” i This really is mind blowing with respect to two points: 1) there are so many options available for tracking results and 2) there is little way to determine ROI on an email campaign without the use of tracking measures.

With respect to transactional email, they are just as much a part of the customer experience (which is why we discuss branding, loyalty, etc.) as any other communication that you have with that customer, so monitoring their responses should be a company’s first priority. While many companies are still on the outset of deep-inbox monitoring, your practices can and should include delivery, deletion without opening, open rates, click-through rates, link usage, and others. And what all this measuring, monitoring and tracking will do is show your company what is working, what is not and what needs to be modified based on feedback and responses.

More Transactional Email Marketing Sources: Transactional Email Server, Full Transactional Email Marketing White Paper (PDF), Transactional Email Definition

When it comes to the delivery of your transactional email, timing is everything. When a customer completes a transaction, it is fair to say that they assume your company will provide information regarding that transaction immediately. Through research, we determined that many sources will tell you that within 24 hours is a good rule of thumb, but we personally think this is too long to wait as that gives the customer time to consider complimentary purchases from other vendors and even in many cases to move onto other transactions having “checked” that purchase off their list. According to Antonio Ferrara of Premiere Global Services, “90% of existing transactional messages are delivered within 10 minutes of purchase.”

More Transactional Email Marketing Resources: Transactional Email Server, Full Transactional Email Marketing White Paper (PDF), Transactional Email Definition

HTML is better for several reasons including visibility, appearance, usability through links, and tracking. As a customer of other companies, you probably also prefer HTML to a rich text format simply because it allows you to do more. However, research has shown that customers have a higher response rate to companies that utilize HTML simply because it appears more professional and as though an investment is being made in that customer. As we’ll discuss more in the section below, HTML formatting is also the only way that you will be able to track open rates and click-throughs, which are critical to campaigns such as these.

More Transactional Email Marketing Sources: Transactional Email Server, Full Transactional Email Marketing White Paper (PDF), Transactional Email Definition

First and foremost, the content of a transactional email must be relevant, and by this we mean to the transaction. This has been touched on numerous times in the text above, but it deserves added attention. According to Marketing Sherpa, relevance is the key component to any email campaign, especially transactional, as we see in the aforementioned survey. Based on their results, “The vast majority of consumers - over 83% - will accept marketing messages in their transactional email so long as those messages are relevant.” i

This is also the accomplished through the personalization-customization of the commercial content, which is done by closely monitoring customer behavior and responding with a transactional email that delivers more solutions to meet their needs. “The more highly personalized the content, the higher the open rate, and more importantly, the sustained email engagement over time.” ii Keep in mind that as far as consumers are concerned, irrelevant information is the same thing as spam—and they don’t want either of them.

More Transactional Email Marketing Sources: Transactional Email Server, Full Transactional Email Marketing White Paper (PDF), Transactional Email Definition

The Must-Haves in Transactional Email
Now that we’ve reviewed the definition, benefits, and rules of transactional email, it’s time to address the other must-haves of transactional email. According to a recent article, Email Marketing Reports is saying that, “As people take more actions online (purchases, registrations, memberships), they generate ever more transactional emails. Does that put more pressure on you to make those emails engaging, valuable, and relevant?” Our answer is yes. And below are some of the steps you can take to help ensure that your message gets noticed. i “Integrating Promotional Content Into Transactional Email Messages” b2bemailmarketing dot com

More Transactional Email Marketing Sources: Transactional Email Server, Full Transactional Email Marketing White Paper (PDF), Transactional Email Definition