Transactional Email Hall of Fame – March 2019

Who:

Allbirds, the wool footwear company

What’s Good:

Never underestimate the power of a good play on words to delight your customers. Pair it with an adorable dancing sheep in GIF form, and you’ll have yourself a Hall of Fame-worthy transactional email.

But there’s so much more that’s good about this order confirmation. It’s clean and uncluttered, with a great balance of text to images to white space. It includes all the important order details — what was ordered, including image, color, size, price, payment method, taxes, order total, and shipping address. And while there is no obvious CTA, at least there are clear options for contacting the company for help.

Even though a cross-sell offer of related items would not be out of place here — Allbirds are, after all, ‘the world’s most comfortable shoe’ — they do get bonus points for explaining their return policy in a grand total of 17 words. And that includes ‘click here’. 👍

What’s Exceptional:

Well, that GIF, of course. So thank ewe, Allbirds, thank ewe very much.

Who:

Rover, the online marketplace for pet care services

What’s Good:

We mentioned how much we love a good onboarding checklist just last month, but with this email, Rover takes the concept to a whole new level. Triggered when the pet owner confirms a meet-and-greet with their chosen pet-sitter, the email links to a checklist of questions to ask the sitter that will help ensure both the customer and their pet have the best experience. The list includes ten questions to always ask, plus several optional lists based on specific scenarios, i.e. the sitter is coming to your home, the pet is staying at their home, etc.

The email itself is clear and to the point, accurately reflecting Rover’s brand experience. And in this case the user was new and did not know Rover even has an app, so for them, those app promos were perfectly placed and perfectly timed.

A couple of minor quibbles might be making the text on the CTA button more obvious and perhaps including a few sample questions within the email, (maybe the ten to ‘always’ ask), to entice the user to click through. But otherwise, it’s a great email.

What’s Exceptional:

As pet lovers ourselves, we ♥ the fact that Rover doesn’t just address the human by name, they include their dog’s name as well. What’s not to love about a brand that personalizes with your pet’s name?

Who:

Honda, the car company

What’s Good:

How often do you see a triggered email from the manufacturer of your new car? (Well… maybe more often than we think, but you’d have to buy a new car to see one. 😳)

Anyway… this email is great, with a clear CTA leading to a personalized web page. How cool is that? What a perfect way to keep a new customer engaged. And an engaged customer is open to cross- and upsell offers, for things like mats, air fresheners, extended warranties, tire and rim protection (whatever that is), etc. Plus a personalized web page makes it easy for the customer to make service appointments, so they’re more likely to keep up with that all-important maintenance schedule.

What’s Exceptional:

The list of the new car’s features is great. Each one links to full instructions – some with video – on how to set that feature up and get started. Beats the heck out of searching through a 900+ page owners’ manual.