About Transactional email

A transactional email is a kind of email that is triggered by a user action on an app. It is sent to facilitate an agreed-upon transaction between the sender and the recipient.

Various kinds of transactional email are:

• Password resets
• Shipping confirmations
• Invoices and receipts
• Account notifications
• Social media updates
• Welcome emails

These types of emails are generally sent programmatically through an API or SMTP relay.

Transactional email vs Marketing email

Transactional emails are generally triggered in real time by a specific user action. They’re sent on individually on a one-off basis.

Just like in e-commerce, once you purchased an item, you receive an email receipt that has information about the item, price, and shipment. They are sent to individuals rather than a large list of recipients.

On the other hand, Email marketing campaigns and bulk email, are one-to-many communications that promote a product, service, sale or another event. Although a user has opted in to receive this communication, these marketing emails are not user-driven.

Since transactional emails contain the information that a user specifically requested, they tend to have much higher open rates than email marketing campaigns