Transactional e-mails—order confirmations, shipping notifications, billing statements, and the like—are known to have appreciably higher open rates than marketing e-mails. So if you’re not using these messages to bolster your brand’s relationship with the recipient and even to encourage additional sales, you’re truly missing out on a prime opportunity.
Before you can think about that, though, bear in mind the Hippocratic oath: “First, do no harm.” Make sure that you’re not damaging your relationship with customers by sending messages that don’t even provide the basic transactional information correctly. These tips should help:
* Remember that transactional messages are not completely exempt from CAN-SPAM regulations. Most provisions of CAN-SPAM do not apply to transactional messages, according to BlueHornet Networks. But the Federal Trade Commission’s definitions of transactional e-mails and marketing e-mails are somewhat vague. “How much marketing content can a transactional email contain before it crosses the line into the realm of commercial e-mail regulation by the FTC?” BlueHornet asks in its white paper “Best Practices for Transactional E-mail Messages.” “That’s a question only a federal judge can decide.”
Obviously you don’t want a judge weighing in on your e-mail efforts. So make sure that the transactional elements of your message are first and foremost. The subject line should refer to the applicable transaction (“XYZ Booking Confirmation,” “Your Widgets ‘R’ Us Order Has Shipped”), and the transactional elements must come before any promotional content in the body of the message. In addition, you should abide by some standard CAN-SPAM commercial requirements: Include your company name in the “from” field and your company’s physical mailing address in the message.
* Consider using HTML messaging. In a study of leading online merchants, Silverpop found that only 58% used HTML formatting for their transactional e-mails, while 98% used HTML for their promotional messages. That’s because transactional messages tend to be sent from a different platform than marketing e-mails. But using HTML enables you to introduce important branding elements such as logos into your transactional e-mails.
What’s more, the greater flexibility of HTML layouts enables you to adhere to the FTC requirement about placing the transactional content ahead of the marketing copy without relegating the latter to the very end of your message. “With HTML e-mails, retailers can place relevant product offerings in sidebars for better visibility,” according to the Silverpop white paper “Taming Transactional E-mail.”
A caveat: All of the transactional information must appear as text, so that it is readable even if images are blocked.
* Respond promptly. A study by Silverpop indicated that 38% of retailers sent a confirmation within 60 seconds of the order being placed; another 39% responded within 1-10 minutes. Clearly customers have become accustomed to receiving near-instant confirmation. Don’t give them reason to doubt your credibility and dedication to customer service by making them wait.
* Make sure the e-mail design is “printer friendly.” This is especially important for order confirmations, e-tickets, and itineraries. With the latter two, BlueHornet advises keeping web links to a minimum.
* Include a complete order summary. Order confirmations and shipping notifications should note the items bought, the price of each, the total price, the method of payment (though do not include the full credit-card number), the requested shipping address, and links to return policies. E-tickets and itineraries should include reservation dates and times (including time zones), itemized costs (including fees, taxes, and the like), a confirmation number, the method of payment (again, do not include the full credit-card number), relevant travel information (baggage limitations, warnings), ticket instructions, cancellation policies and information, and a link to your site’s FAQs. All of the above e-mails should also include your company’s customer service e-mail address, phone number, and URL.
* Personalize the message. By their nature, transactional e-mails are businesslike. Addressing the recipient by name is a seemingly minor but effective way of reassuring the customer that you know who he is and value his patronage.
A more-sophisticated form of personalization is to add dynamic upselling and cross-selling content to the promotional portion of the message. If the e-mail is confirming an order for a dog bed, for example, you could include a sidebar “Other products you might like...” featuring links to dog toys and collars. In response to an order for a scratching post for cats, the sidebar might link to cat toys and treats.
* Encourage recipients to opt in to your marketing e-mails. Include a link to the sub form and, BlueHornet suggests, try an incentive as well, something like “Subscribe today and receive free shipping on today’s order.”
* Say “thank you.” A little politeness goes a long way.
