The transactional email is a staple of the customer communications process for online retailers. But all too often, retailers allocate minimal resources to optimizing these emails for increased engagement, brand experience, and additional revenue opportunities. That’s despite the fact that although low-volume, high-ROI triggered emails often account for less than 5% of email volume, they can produce 40% or more of email revenue.
Savvy retailers should take a more sophisticated approach and find new ways to enhance customer relationships by connecting messages with actions such as abandoning a Website browsing session or leaving unpurchased items in a shopping cart. And when purchase confirmation messages are distributed, they should be followed by requests for satisfaction surveys or product reviews.
Before a purchase
Just because a consumer has not yet made a purchase doesn’t mean he hasn’t taken meaningful actions on your Website. One of the most frustrating, yet incredibly insightful, actions can be abandoning a shopping cart—which, according to SeeWhy, happens 71% of the time (on average) on ecommerce sites. Site visitors who take the time to put items in their cart tell you two things: that they are engaged enough with your brand to consider making a purchase and what types of items are of particular interest to them.
This is very valuable information. A cart recovery program not only can result in completed transactions—library supply store Gaylord Brothers is converting 50% of cart abandoners through a multi-email cart abandonment program—but it can sometimes even increase the original order size.
Even the simple action of abandoning a browsing session should serve as a trigger for a highly relevant message. Marketers can customize messages based on the categories or items viewed in order to create a very personalized message. In today’s hectic online world, many consumers find these highly targeted and incredibly relevant emails truly helpful.
After a purchase
Now, far be it for me to suggest that the moment of purchase is not a key moment for retailers. Of course it is. And it’s precisely for that reason that marketers need to capitalize on this moment—and the related moments that follow—even more than they already are.
Most retailers will tell you their email marketing arsenal includes order confirmations, order status updates, and shipping confirmations. But how many take advantage of more-sophisticated postpurchase messages such as review requests, related product recommendations, replenishment reminders, and satisfaction surveys? These emails use a specific transaction as a springboard to deeper customer engagement—building loyalty while also creating additional revenue opportunities.
And don’t forget about those who have purchased, just perhaps not recently. Communications such as purchase anniversary recognitions, bounce-back incentives, loyalty program invitations, and member-status statements are also creative ways to foster relationships and create brand ambassadors.
It’s true that a transactional email is just that: an email triggered by a specific action (or transaction if you will). Far too many marketers, however, have too narrowly defined that action to mean solely making a purchase. As consumers look to companies to be helpful, and not just promotional, it is time for marketers to expand their horizons (or maybe just their definitions) and see the additional opportunities that can arise from connecting specific email messages to a wider range of consumer actions.
Loren McDonald is vice president of industry relations for marketing solutions provider Silverpop.
