Transactional or operational emails and marketing emails are two distinct types of email communication that serve different purposes within your email marketing strategy. While both emails types are vital to a business's communication strategy, they differ in their content, purpose, audience, and regulatory considerations. Understanding these differences helps businesses effectively manage email communications and optimize their engagement with customers.

Transactional emails

Transactional or operational emails serve an operational and business purpose. They are typically one-to-one communications such as order confirmations, shipping notifications, password resets, or account updates. They can also be Support emails with critical product updates such as terms of service. They contain information that is relevant to an ongoing transaction or account status, and are crucial for good customer service and seamless operation of a business’s online services. Transactional emails have high open rates and are generally expected and welcomed by recipients. 

Campaign Studio users can set an email as a transactional or operational email by setting Send to unsubscribed contacts to Yes in the Advanced tab on the Emails page.

Marketing emails

Marketing or non-transactional emails are designed to engage your contacts and include marketing related content such as newsletters, promotional announcements, event invitations, and other messages intended to build brand awareness, increase customer loyalty, and drive sales. This type of emails require recipient's consent and are typically subject to greater regulatory scrutiny, such as compliance with anti-spam laws and GDPR.

For more information, see:

• Maintaining a clean contact list
• Bounce Management FAQ
• Maintaining email reputation

Campaign Studio users can set an email as a marketing or non-transactional email by setting Send to unsubscribed contacts to No in the Advanced tab on the Emails page.

Creating transactional and marketing emails 

Campaign Studio users can set individual emails as transactional or marketing (non-transactional) emails to effectively manage their email communications and optimize engagement with customers. 

1. Log in to Campaign Studio.

2. Create a new template or segment email.

   For more information, see Email basics.

3. On the New Email page, click the Advanced tab. 

   For more information, see the Advanced section on the Email basics page.

4. Locate the Send to unsubscribed contacts field and do one of the following:

   • To create a transactional email, set the toggle to Yes.

     The system displays a confirmation dialog box. 

   • To create a marketing email, set the toggle to No.

   Based on this setting, Campaign Studio displays a Send to unsubscribed contacts status field with a Yes or No indicator for any email used in the following features:

   • Send email and Send email to user actions within a campaign 
   • Send marketing message action within a campaign
   • Marketing message email channel 
   • Send email to contact and Send email to user form actions
   • Points triggers

Important considerations for transactional and marketing emails

• Transactional emails with Send to unsubscribed contacts set to Yes are not sent to hard bounced email addresses.
• DNC contacts are not counted towards the Pending status for marketing emails with Send to unsubscribed contacts set to No.

• DNC contacts are counted towards the Pending status for transactional emails with Send to unsubscribed contacts set to Yes.

  For more in information, see Email statuses. 

• The setting for Send to unsubscribed contacts on the Advanced tab of the email determines whether an email is counted towards the Frequency Rule calculation.
  • If the Send to unsubscribed contacts toggle is set to Yes, the email is not counted towards the frequency rule.
  • If the Send to unsubscribed contacts toggle is set to No, the email is counted towards the frequency rule.

One-click unsubscribe headers

• Campaign Studio includes a one-click unsubscribe header in emails depending on the Send to unsubscribed contacts field:

  • If this field is set to Yes, Campaign Studio does not add the one-click unsubscribe header.
  • If this field is set to No, Campaign Studio adds the one-click unsubscribe header.

  If you do not want Campaign Studio to add a one-click unsubscribe header, you can disable this feature in through Email Settings.

Unsubscribe links

• Campaign Studio includes an unsubscribe link in the email body depending on the Send to unsubscribed contacts field:
  • If this field is set to Yes, Campaign Studio does not add the unsubscribe link.
  • If this field is set to No, Campaign Studio adds the unsubscribe link.

• Users can manually add unsubscribe links to the email body by using either of the following:

  • Token merge tags such as {unsubscribe_url}, {unsubscribe_text} 
  • HTML URLs such as <a href="{unsubscribe_url}">Unsubscribe</a>

  When you manually add an unsubscribe link to the email body, Campaign Studio validates the link and retains it in the email body.

Resubscribe links

Campaign Studio supports double-opt out campaigns that allow contacts to resubscribe to email communications.

• Users can manually add resubscribe links to the email body by using either of the following:
  • Token merge tags such as {resubscribe_url}, {unsubscribe_text}
  • HTML URLs such as <a href="{resubscribe_url}">Resubscribe</a>

Sending repeating emails

When sending emails in a campaign, you can select a template email to send to contacts only once or multiple times depending on your needs. 

• Repeatable emails can be sent to a contact multiple times across all campaigns and are often used for transactional or operational messages that are relevant to the contact. 

  For example, e-commerce receipts, order conformations, shipping notifications, and receipts. Also, support emails with critical product updates such as terms of service.

• Non-repeatable emails can be sent to a contact only once and are generally used for marketing type content intended for a commercial purpose.

To make an email repeatable or non-repeatable:

1. Log in to Campaign Studio.
2. Create a new campaign.
3. Create a Send email action.

4. In the Email to send dropdown, select an email.

   Based on the setting of Send to unsubscribed contacts on the Advanced tab on the Emails page, the status of Send to unsubscribed contacts is displayed.

   If status of Send to unsubscribed contacts is set to No, the system displays the Priority and Attempts fields.

5. To send the email to contacts only once, set the Repeatable email toggle to No.

6. To send the email to contacts multiple times across all campaigns, set the Repeatable email toggle to Yes.

   The default frequency rule is applied.

Transactional and marketing emails