Effective order Confirmation Email

do you've any good sample.

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

I think that order Confirmation emails is one of the most important touch points for keeping customers apprised of the status of their transactions and for enhancing the reputation for great customer service.

i think that Good email should take care of the email subject (many users delete emails with a like-spam subjects -- Very Important Email -... Etc.)
Also the email body should respects users' time and tells them what they need to know first like what’s already shipped and the transaction amount... Etc.

so what do you think about the Effective Confirmation Email and Transactional Messages.

[philbish]

Here is what I send out...Names changed

Subject: Thank you for shopping at xyz.com! Order number: 1000

Thank you for shopping at xyz.com. Depending on your location and shipping method, you should receive your product(s) within 3 to 5 business days after we confirm your payment.

Your satisfaction is important to us, so if you have any questions please don't hesitate to email or call us toll free at 800-123-1234. When contacting us about this order, please be sure to include your order number.

You may track the progress of this order by logging onto [www....] xyz.com/

Order Number: 1000
Order Date: Friday 30 April, 2004
Payment Method: Secure Credit Card

Products
------------------------------------------------------
2 x Dual Super Bright 12 Inch Cathode Kit = $19.98
Switch None
Color Red
2 x Dual Super Bright 12 Inch Cathode Kit = $19.98
Color Blue
Switch None
------------------------------------------------------
Sub-Total: $39.96
United Parcel Service (Ground): $11.42
Total: $51.38

Shipping Address:
Shmoe Joe Lo
123 Pine St.
New York, NY 10001
United States

Billing Address:
Shmoe Joe Lo
123 Pine St.
New York, NY 10001
United States

------------------------------------------------------
This is not a receipt!

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

I think your Subject is a little long and may be truncated with most of the Email clients,
i prefer subjects like "Xcompany Order confirmation"

About the Email format;
from the user point of view and the email-clients capabilities,do you prefer HTML or a plain TEXT email.

[philbish]

Good idea! I will try to make it shorter. I still need the order number there so I can quickly search for email correspondence for a certain order #

Did you come up with your own email text? I'd be interested in seeing some other people's text.

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

I've started this topic because I think that the effective confirmation email with all the information needed by the buyer will cut and decrease the number of (after-purchasing) support emails and support calls.

I found the Following recommendations and I think it's useful:, and waiting for a samples of frequently asked (after-purchase) questions. And how to avoid it.

<snip>

[edited by: Brett_Tabke at 2:12 am (utc) on May 3, 2004]
[edit reason] can't do copied in content without permission of all parties. [/edit]

[Shak]

I always found that a link to FAQ section reduced the telephone calls by over 50%

give em as much information as they need.

shak

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

So what was the rest of 50% calls about :)

i think it's should be to types of Confirmation emails ,
First email is the "ORDER CONFIRMATION EMAIL" which should be sent immediately after securing the transaction and should contains information related to the order (quantity, prices, total price charged to the cart), also some notes like:
-Your items are currently IN STOCK and will be shipped during XXXTime

Second: the "SHIPPING CONFIRMATION EMAIL", should be sent during the XXXTime and after the items are already shipped
And should contain:
-Shipping Currier
-When to expect your order based on the Customer Destination
-Tracking number and a link for tracking Page at your site or the Currier Site
-Link to FAQ.

Abdelrhman,

[philbish]

I've also got a "delivered" email that is automatically sent out as soon as the UPS tracking number shows the status as delivered in my site. If the item does not have a tracking number, they automatically get an email 6 days after the status was updated to "shipped". This is a very good thing for me because it makes the customers feel I took the time to check up on their order and make sure everything is ok. I have the delivered email signed as the owner of my company, to make it look like a more personal email.

Soon, I'll create about 5 different versions. One for first time orders, one for second time orders, etc... So it looks even more personalized ;)

[jsinger]

Great topic. Our confirmation, which has been re-written, fine tuned and polished to a gloss over several years, is much like those above.

We add: "Retain This Important Email for Your Records" (you can't believe how many people delete it.)

Also: "Please check all details of the order (see below) for accuracy. Are products, sizes and colors correct? Is the shipping and billing info correct? Contact us at once if there is a problem"

---
"I always found that a link to FAQ section reduced the telephone calls by over 50%" Good tip!

---
No question that a well written confirmation is a vital part of a web sale by making customers feel confident and by reducing errors and time-consuming follow up communications.

BTW, I'm surprised how inadequate the confirmation letters are from some major retailers.

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

What do you think about adding a request for a feed back, which may be help a lot improving the shopping process, prices, customer support…. Etc.
May be Some thing like that:
Feel free to submit a feedback about how do you feel about our Products and service as soon as you receive (THE ITEMS) at (FEED BACK FORM URL)

[vkaryl]

What do you think about adding a request for a feed back....

I order a LOT online, since "shopping" is practically unheard of in this area. When anyone sends me a conf. email with a suggestion to feedback, I DO SO IMMEDIATELY. It's VERY important for those who use online shops to be able to give back a definite idea about what was good, what wasn't; what was easy, what was abysmally difficult; and what would make our "shopping trips" easier, more fun, and more fulfilling.

Go for it! AND btw, WHAT are you selling?

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

Go for it! AND btw, WHAT are you selling?

Egyptian Handcrafts and Egyptian jewelry, Just the Confirmation email and the site will be ready ;)

any one else give a thumb up for the feed back request?

[philbish]

Feedback request is a great idea. It might be more natural for users to reply directly to the email though instead of going to a link, etc...

I'm selling car lights: neon underbodies, strobe lights, LEDs, etc...

[Shak]

can I just say, that is a superb post with follow up posts (apart from mine).

only by sharing data and ideas like this, can the small man/woman take on the $$$ companies out there.

the really frightening bit is that most of them have 3-4 people dedicated to roles such as ecommerce mananger, but common sense is lost with them.

keep it up

I luv WebmasterWorld

Shak

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

Shak, philbish

I was thinking to start a series of posts regarding all the e-commerce aspects (B2C) starting from choosing the business name and end with the Confirmation email :), i know that's it's will be a lot of things to be discussed but it's will give us at end a very useful and huge TextBook which will help both the newcomers and professionals, may be the post could be called (ECTB : XXXXXX) where ECTB is E-Commerce Text Book : and ****xxx will be the item which will be discussed in this thread
I'll start the thread with a introduction and then with some recommended points collected from E-commerce related resources (i think we all already has a lot of that) the we start discuss this points (adding and removing) and at the end of the discussions we will post the final points and recommendations and then close the thread and start a new one with a new Item.

What do you think, what's will be hard to done and what is the negative points that we have to take in consideration.

[bpresent]

1) Keep it simple (as you've done - not weighed down with sales hype).
2) Make sure it's correct (ie. the stuff really has gone, or is on back order etc). Don't just assume that something has happened in your (or someone else's) shipping department just because enough time has passed.
3) Perhaps provide an "opt-in" for more detailed email tracking (assuming you have automated notification of freight status). I would find this particularly useful (and nail saving) if the transaction is (a) international, (b) high $$, (c) first time customer.
4) Do unto others - what is it that you like to see when you order online?

Perhaps also avoid neagatives. For example, rather than:

This is not a receipt!

perhaps state:

Your tax invoice / receipt has been forwarded with your shipment.

Sam.

PS. FAQ is an excellent idea - but make sure it's up to date.

[philbish]

Ahhh great advice on the avoid negatives. I think I'll make it say something, like you can go to the site, log in, and then view or print out a receipt.

I don't really send out any invoices with the order. Trying to save costs :) ... And only a few people request them... When they do, I just have them go to the site and print it.

[GrantNZ]

We use to send one confirmation order, now we can send up to five e-mails over a period of hours or days:

1. Merchant.
2. Merchant, when shipped.
3. Us, when shipped.
4. Us, if we have a special offer and/or order was entered in a competition mentioned on our order page.
5. Us, if they're a winner.

[bpresent]

... now we can send up to five e-mails over a period of hours or days ...

At the customer's discretion or your's?

With my consumer hat on, that many emails may drive me away (unless I specifically asked for them).

[GrantNZ]

In more detail:

- A confirmation e-mail from the merchant when the order is placed by the user.

- A confirmation e-mail from the merchant (I can turn this option off) when we have shipped.

- A personal e-mail from the person in our org that processed and prepared/shipped the order. This e-mail may also include extra competition entry/entered, or may be a separate e-mail later on.

- Usually it stops there, or...

- Possible extra e-mail about competition entry, entered and/or won!

[blaze]

One thing the thread is missing though, is actually getting the email to the customer. This is probably the biggest stumbling block of all.

Some things I have found useful:

1. Make sure the customer can get an exact copy of the email receipt at the end of the transaction via the web browser. It's quite possible that the email won't actually get to the user, so don't use that as your only receipt for the customer.

2. Make sure you have a reverse IP address on your MTA mailer
3. Make sure the headers on your outbound email are all valid (they have don't have something like nobody@localhost)
4. Make you are not on any RBLs for email spam

.. any other things people do to make sure their email doesn't get blocked?

[philbish]

What do you mean by reverse IP address?

[cabowabo]

I think the biggest obstacle is writing a subject line that does not look like Spam. The Spammers are getting very good these days with their subject lines, and another issue is to use a mailing system that doesn't get tagged as Spam due to the way it is sent.

Cheers,

CaboWabo

[andy_boyd]

Yeah, getting legitimate confirmation email through the spam filters is becoming an issue ... especially with AOL.

[Shak]

I think the biggest obstacle is writing a subject line that does not look like Spam. The Spammers are getting very good these days with their subject lines, and another issue is to use a mailing system that doesn't get tagged as Spam due to the way it is sent.

It's amazing how far they will go to get the readers attention.

Shak

[rogerd]

I get some spam messages that say things like, "Your Order Confirmation" or "About Order #23457".

I think including the name of your company is a big help, e.g., "Your WidgetWorld Order #23456" - if the customer knows they just placed an order for widgets, they are far less likely to dump the message.

One other technique I've seen is including language on the web page that confirms the order like, "We will let confirm your order and provide tracking information by e-mail. If you or your ISP employ spam filtering, please add [e-mail] to your 'friends' list so that you don't miss these important messages."

[jsinger]

What about those anti-spam filters that require the sender to click a link and fill out some info to assure the intended recipient will see the email?

Do you guys go through that time-consuming procedure?

We don't.

Takes too long to figure out whether the link is for real (or some virus trigger) and how it works.

[webwit]

Problems are with my order confirmation emails being blocked by: AOL, Comcast, and RoadRunner .rr.

I have my reverse DNS set on a dedicated IP, and have never sent spam.

Does anyone else have problems with order confirmation emails being blocked these same three ISP's?

[the_nerd]

.. any other things people do to make sure their email doesn't get blocked?

Having a unique ID in the subject may be a problem because it might just lift you over the SPAM-Treshold. I took those numbers off the subject and moved them into the body - they are not really important to the user anyway.

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

For AOL : check
[postmaster.info.aol.com...]

also check those tools
[postmaster.info.aol.com...]