Every email marketer is looking to improve open rates, click-throughs, and ultimately ROI. However, many are running out of ideas. While generic, mass email marketing is becoming more irrelevant, transactional and trigger-based emails are becoming more effective. Why? For one, a transactional email is usually in response to a request or an action a customer takes, therefore it is more inline with a pull marketing strategy rather than push. Below I've listed 4 ways I've successfully used transactional emails with my clients. Keep in mind many of these strategies won't work for all business types, and most of them are geared towards an e-commerce, physical product site.

1. Low-stock Notification Emails: Allow your customers to be notified when a product they are interested in is almost sold out. Many people have a tendency to wait until the last minute before they act, so this serves as a great last minute reminder. Out of all the transactional emails I've ever used, this type seems to get the best conversion rate since there is a strong focus on urgency.

2. Back In-Stock Emails: Many times customers end up on the product detail page for an item that is out of stock. Rather than simply tell them, "Sorry, too late!" why not allow them to be emailed when the product becomes available again? In my experience, people are blown away by this, and often times purchase the item immediately.

3. New Product Notification Alerts: Most websites have trained their customers to know that they're product newsletters are one size fits all. For this reason, the industry as a whole is seeing a decrease in open, click-through, and conversation rates. Rather than taking this approach, why not allow your customers to be emailed every time a product from their favorite product categories is added to the site? Implementing a system such as this, you can expect to at least double your open rate due to the increased relevance.

4. Abandoned Order Emails: These are becoming more common. When your visitor starts an order but doesn't finish it, it's a good idea to check up on them. Customers are usually surprised at this level of customer service, and many respond by completing the order. This system will also allow you to determine what barriers exist in your current checkout process.

While many of the suggestions above require a significant amount of programming to accomplish, they all have the benefit long term results, with little additional effect. For more email conversion tips, please visit Palmer Web Marketing.

About the Author

Justin Palmer is the director of online marketing for C28.com, a Christian clothing line offering positive, Christian based clothing.