Email types
Kinds of email by purpose or trigger.
- Abandoned cart email
A triggered email sent to a shopper who added items to a cart but did not complete the purchase.
- AMP for Email
A format that lets an email contain interactive elements such as forms and carousels.
- Automated emails
Messages a system sends on a trigger or schedule without anyone sending them by hand.
- Autoresponder
An automatic reply or fixed series of messages sent in response to an event such as a signup or an incoming email.
- Behavioral email
An email triggered by something a person did, such as viewing a product or clicking a link.
- Bulk email
The same message sent to a large number of recipients at once.
- Burner email
A throwaway address made to receive one message or one signup and then be abandoned.
- Cold email
A first message to someone you have no prior relationship with, sent for a business purpose.
- Commercial email
A message whose primary purpose is to advertise or promote a product, service or business.
- Confirmation email
A message sent after an action, either to confirm it happened (an order) or to ask the person to confirm an address.
- Disposable email address
An address on a service built for short-lived use, often with no signup.
- Double opt-in
A signup process where the person confirms their address by clicking a link in a message you send after they subscribe.
- Drip campaign
A series of messages sent over time, on a schedule or triggered by what a person does.
- Dynamic email
An email whose content differs per recipient, from simple merge fields to blocks that change with data.
- Email blast
An informal name for sending the same message to your whole list at once.
- Email campaign
A planned set of messages sent to an audience to reach a goal, on a schedule.
- Email newsletter
A regular message with news or content sent to subscribers, usually on a fixed schedule.
- Email notification
An automatic message that alerts a person to something that happened, such as a comment, a login or a shipped order.
- Email one-time passcode
A short code sent by email to prove a person controls an address or to log them in.
- Email sequence
An ordered set of messages sent to one contact, with rules for when it stops.
- Email types
The main kinds of email by purpose: transactional, promotional, newsletter, triggered and cold outreach.
- Follow-up email
A message sent after an earlier one got no reply or no action.
- HTML email
A message formatted with HTML rather than plain text.
- Onboarding email
The first messages a new user or customer receives, to help them get started.
- Order confirmation email
A transactional message sent after a purchase with the order details.
- Out-of-office reply
An automatic reply sent while the recipient is away.
- Plain text email
A message with no formatting, images or links to styled elements.
- Promotional email
A message that advertises or sells something.
- Proxy email address
An address that forwards to a person’s real mailbox so the real one stays private.
- Spam
Unwanted bulk email: mail sent to people who did not ask for it, as judged by recipients and mailbox providers.
- Transactional email
A message triggered by a person’s own action or account activity, such as a receipt or a password reset.
- Welcome email
The first message a new subscriber or customer gets, sent straight after they join.