What is Transactional and What is Marketing?
Mar 30 2009
This question has been on my mind this past week as I worked with one of our banking clients on a new project. What entered my mind was not what they were doing, but what others deem the difference to be.
Now my understanding, and I would love your thoughts, is that a transactional email is one that:
1. Confirms an order or action that you need a confirmation email
2. An alert in a change in status or account
3. A change in relationship, privacy policy or access
Now there is a fine line in transactional emails where you can (using best practices) allocate 20% of the message to allow a marketing message. Apple does this well with iTunes transactional email receipts. They do not lead with it, nor does it interfere with the transactional email message. Subject lines are clear, copy is clear and the message can be easily scanned to know what is occurring.
But then this weekend I got this email from Technorati. I had to pause to understand if this was a transactional email OR a marketing email. My first thought was that it was alerting me to changes at Technorati in regard to features and my account. But as I read through it more, it seemed to be a straight marketing message.
So then why would they not add CAN SPAM compliance to this message? No unsubscribe, no address footer, nothing. I was a a total failure. The subject line was deceiving to me in that it made me think that it was a service message about Publishing Content on Technorati. Take a look and tell me your thoughts.
It was not unsolicited as I have an account and opted in, but the lack of Can Spam compliance leaves me wondering who was asleep at the wheel over there.
Messages like this make me question what is transactional and what is just plain old email marketing. You should consider this as you prepare messages for your users/subscribers.
Should all emails have a way to unsubscribe? Is it a best practice only in regard to transactional messages? Or is it just a good thing to do to always allow people to have a preference to the emails they get?
Back on the path of banking, I had to think it through this week about the transactional emails that they send about account notices, bank cards, or the alert of a possible account compromise. You would think that you would always want to get notices like these, but what if you don’t? Spam is in the end in the eyes of the receiver.
- Posted by Dylan Boyd
- @dtboyd
- at 8:27 AM
Published in Best Practices, E-Mail Marketing, Email News, Worst Of Email
(3 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)
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March 30th, 2009 at 9:41 am
I think transactional is just 1. Confirms an order – you’ve made a purchase, you need a receipt/confirmation for said purchase, this a transactional email has been sent to you.
You shouldn’t be able to opt out of transactional emails, because they’re required and should be unobtrusive (like those apple emails).
Points 2-3 are actually just alerts more than anything transactional. I believe most say you should be able to opt-out of receiving these, since it’s not important to all but just warn people they won’t get alerted about important stuff to do with their account.
Anything else is Marketing, as far as I’m concerned. Soon as you start talking about something you’re trying to sell to me (an upgrade, new features, etc) is Marketing. Let me opt out.
Yep, Technorati didn’t approach this brilliantly. They must have been thinking “plain text isn’t email marketing, so it’s OK!”.
Just my 2 pence.
March 30th, 2009 at 10:23 am
You can’t allow people to opt-out of transactional messages without facing other business repercussions.
In it’s simplest form a transactional message is a receipt. Without a good-faith effort to supply a purchaser with a receipt it can be quite easy for the buyer to charge back any fees incurred on their credit card.
With a charge-back not only does the business lose the revenue from the sale, they also pay additional fees and may even end up paying a higher card processing fee.
The amount of marketing than can go into a transactional message isn’t a Best Practice, it’s the law based on the Primary Purpose clause of the CAN-SPAM Act for those doing business in the US.
IMO if one can’t tell if a message is Transactional or Promotional then it’s not following the Primary Purpose guidelines of the CAN-SPAM Act and may be in violation.
If for some strange reason an organization allows people to opt-out of transactional messages, it would seem prudent business and a Best Practice for them to closely monitor opt-outs and spam complaints and compare those unsubscribing and complaining to those seeking to charge back purchases….
March 30th, 2009 at 10:33 am
The Primary Purpose clause of the CAN-SPAM Act defines the amount of space that can be used for promotional purposes and remain classified as a transactional message.
If for some strange reason an organization offers the ability to opt-out of transactional messages, it might be a Best Practice for them to compare those opting-out, along with spam complaints, to those individuals seeking a charge back to a purchase.
It would be wise to also keep in mind that if someone is paying for an alert and you let them opt-out of that messaging separate from cancellation of the alert service, you are not providing the service that they are paying for and setting yourself up for charge-backs.
March 31st, 2009 at 7:27 am
The Technorati email seems blatantly marketing oriented… So blatantly, in fact, that it appears that somebody simply neglected to append the footer or use the correct template, rather than something more sinister. If it IS deliberately dastardly, it’s a rather ham-fisted attempt at being sneaky.
@John Caldwell I don’t suppose you have the wording of that clause handy?
April 10th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
We use the term transactional to mean an automated email that is one to one, eg Reset password, welcome, purchase receipt.
And we believe that EVERY email that is automated should have an unsubscribe and a manage notifications link AND both of which should not require the user to log in.
Technorati should know better.