Making campaign messages transactional

Overview

Ortto supports sending transactional messages.

At Ortto, we define a transactional email as an email that facilitates a necessary commercial or relationship transaction or legally-required update for a recipient. 

Common examples include:

• Order confirmations
• Subscription confirmations
• Transaction or account notification emails (e.g., shipping updates, order refunds)
• Legally mandated communications to all recipients, including suppressed subscribers

No promotional content is allowed in transactional traffic, as some providers would identify such messages as promotional even if the heart of the content is transactional in nature.

Accessing transactional feature

The option to mark an email or SMS as transactional can be accessed in each Campaign (email or SMS) > Setup > Transactional Email/SMS.

Sending a transactional message

You can send transactional messages in several ways:

• As an email or SMS, or push notification in a journey campaign.
• As an email in a playbook campaign.
• As a single-send email campaign.

Creating a transactional journey or playbook message

To create a transactional message in a Journey campaign (email, SMS, or push notification):

1. Open the journey campaign and set People can be in journey to More than once.
2. Select Messages, find the message you want to make transactional, click the three dots, and then choose Find in journey.
3. In the journey flow editor, find the message, click the three dots and click View.
4. In the message view, click Edit next to People can receive this message and select More than once (optional but recommended). This allows contacts to receive important transactional messages, like order confirmations, multiple times.
5. Check This email is transactional and fill in the purpose.

For Email and SMS:

• For email and SMS, check the This email/SMS is transactional box.
• For push notifications, check the Ignore sending limits box.

For Playbook campaign email messages:

1. In the Messages panel, click the three dots next to the email and select Edit.
2. In the email view, click Edit under People can receive this message and choose More than once.
3. Check the This email is transactional box.
4. Click Save.

In the Purpose field, provide a clear explanation of why the email or SMS is considered transactional (push notifications are excluded). This is crucial because sending an email without an unsubscribe link can lead to it being marked as spam, harming both your business and Ortto's email reputation.

Be sure to clarify:

• Why the message is transactional.
• Why unsubscribe preferences do not apply.

Create a transactional email campaign

To create a transactional single-send email campaign:

1. On the Campaigns page, click New campaign.
2. Select Email to start creating your campaign, then click Next.
3. Choose a template and select your recipients.
4. In the Setup step, fill in the necessary fields and check the Transactional email box.
5. In the Purpose field, provide a reason for marking the email as transactional. This is important because sending an email without an unsubscribe link can lead to it being reported as spam, affecting both your business and Ortto’s email reputation. Clearly explain why this is a transactional email and why unsubscribe preferences do not apply.
6. Complete the rest of the email setup by adding your content and reviewing the email.
7. At the Review step, you’ll see confirmation that the email is transactional.
8. Schedule or send the email as needed.

A/B testing transactional messages

You can A/B test transactional email and SMS messages to improve engagement, such as for appointment reminders or abandoned cart notifications.

For journeys and playbooks, you can enable A/B testing on an existing transactional message or convert an A/B tested message into a transactional one.

To turn on A/B testing for a transactional message:

1. Edit the message and, in the Setup step, click Add A/B test and configure as needed.
2. To make an A/B tested message transactional, click View (for journeys) or Edit (for playbooks). Then, in the message view:
   • Select More than once (optional but recommended).
   • Check the This email/SMS is transactional box.
   • Provide a Purpose for the message and ensure you have Ortto's approval to send transactional messages.

For single-send email campaigns, in the Setup step, click Add A/B test and configure as needed. Then, select Transactional email further down the Setup page.

Identify transactional messages

To easily identify a transactional email or SMS message, look for a dollar ($) symbol on the message in a journey or playbook.

In an email campaign or asset, you can see the transactional status in the left-hand details panel when you view the message.

View people who have received a transactional message

When a transactional message is sent, the associated email and SMS activities will include the Transactional activity attribute. This allows you to filter and see people who have received a transactional email.

You can also check this information in the activity view.