Transactional Email Message Best Practices

Do you send transactional email marketing messages? Transactional messages include order confirmations, shipping confirmations, demographic updates, registrations etc.

Here are some transactional message best practices:

1. Since the main communications objective of transactional emails is to give the user their order/shipping information; the message should be presented clearly and above-the-fold with minimal visual clutter.
2. A good ratio of transactional data vs. promotional offers within a transactional template is 70/30 with the promotional content further towards the bottom
3. Consider making the total width of your transactional template 580 pixels for easy printing in case the user wants a physical record of their purchase. Most transactional templates have regular email widths of 650-700 pixels, but it's something to consider.
4. When providing the user with recommended products based on their purchase, product content should be placed within a right hand column. This column should take up 35% of the total email width, with the other 65% reserved for the main order content.
5. The overall design of the template should be minimal since it's only meant to present one message.
6. Include a link to opt-in to receive email! A transactional message doesn't necessarily mean the user is also a subscriber of the main email program.

Here is a great example of a well done order confirmation from 1-800-flowers.