What is the difference between automations, campaigns, transactional emails?

Automations

Automations are useful when you want a sequence of events to be followed. This could involve pre-sale nurturing of a contact, post-sale up-sell emails, touchpoints, etc. 

Campaigns

Email campaigns are one-off messages sent to a list of opted-in contacts from the Campaigns Overview page. Common use cases include:

• Sending out product updates
• Newsletters
• One-time promotions

Transactional emails

Transactional emails are 1:1 unique messages that the recipient is expecting to receive. They are usually triggered by the user and do not require an unsubscribe link.

While transactional emails can help fulfill marketing needs by recovering abandoned carts or re-activating inactive users, these emails are primarily functional and provide an anticipated response to an action or a request made by the recipient.

Unlike promotional emails which are bulk distributions of the same content to many recipients simultaneously, transactional emails are personalised and typically sent to individuals one at a time.

Common use cases include:

• Process password resets
• Send account notifications
• Confirm customer orders