Resources Hub » Knowledge base » What Are Triggered Emails?

Every email marketer wants to send the right email at the right time. How can you achieve this? By having automated or triggered emails.

automated welcome email from company broadway

As your customer moves through the sales funnel, their behavior will guide the type of emails you should be sending to them. When you pay attention to this behavior, you’ll be in a great place to send them emails that are relevant, are of value, and help them to convert.

There are different types of emails you can send: newsletters, promotional content, surveys, and so on. But all these emails need to be sent at the right time. For instance, as soon as you have a new subscriber, they should receive their welcome email. When they make their first purchase with you, why not celebrate that with a congratulatory email that highlights the benefits of the purchase?

These emails can be automatically set up and sent. The key to automated emails is organizing them by pre-set triggers.

Examples of suitable emails for automation

Read on to see a few of the examples of email campaigns that can be set up with pre-set triggers.

1. A welcome email for a new signup

automated welcome email from kate spade

This is the first email you’ll send to your new subscriber. This email is the beginning of your relationship with them and should include some information on your company and encourage engagement.

2. Cart abandonment emails for items that have been forgotten

For an e-commerce business, this is one of the most important emails you’ll be sending out. Online shopping cart abandonment is quite common. Sometimes this means customers are no longer interested in the purchase and the email won’t change their minds. However, it’s also possible that they got frustrated with their coupon or they couldn’t load their credit card details at the time. Simply reminding these customers will help them return to complete that purchase.

3. Re-engagement email for subscribers who haven’t opened an email in a while

There are currently over 1.6 billion websites in the world. This sheer number means there’s lots of competition. Sending this email to a customer after a couple of months will help to remind them about your brand and all that you have to offer them—or give them the chance to opt out of further emails.

4. Subscription renewal reminders for soon-to-end subscriptions

If you want a good chance of keeping your customers, you’ll need to set up this automated email. Ideally, this should be sent out a month before the end of the subscription, and, if there’s no activity from the subscriber, you can also automate a follow-up email a couple of weeks later.

Your primary goal here is to remind your customer about renewing their subscription. You can also add an incentive for their loyalty and renewal.

How should you measure your triggered emails rate?

Email-related metrics are essential for your marketing strategy. You need to know which emails are getting the most responses and which are not quite hitting the nail on the head. When you have these numbers, you’ll be able to improve on your marketing campaign, as you’ll be armed with relevant, insightful knowledge.

Campaign Monitor offers data of people interacting with your emails in real time. The Google Analytics integration available can also help you in tracking conversions and monitoring the success of your email campaign as a whole.

Does it really matter?

Setting up triggered emails is all about personalization for your customer and convenience for you. Your customer will appreciate the fact that you “remembered” their birthday or the reminder that it’s been two years since they first subscribed to your site.

You, on the other hand, don’t have to set up these emails individually. Unlike weekly or monthly company newsletters, automated emails only have to be set up once, and you shouldn’t have to worry about them again after that.

What now?

Taking advantage of triggered emails can help email marketers have higher conversion rates. It’s more than just sending your subscriber the right email at the right time. It’s about making the customer feel like you’re paying attention. A customer will always return to where they feel valued.


Ready to start automating your email campaign? We can walk you through the process of list segmentation, which will help you determine which triggers will work best for which campaigns.

This blog provides general information and discussion about email marketing and related subjects. The content provided in this blog ("Content”), should not be construed as and is not intended to constitute financial, legal or tax advice. You should seek the advice of professionals prior to acting upon any information contained in the Content. All Content is provided strictly “as is” and we make no warranty or representation of any kind regarding the Content.

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