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I design transactional email communication for a company. My goal is that sender name, sender email, email subject and email pre-header (the preview) will help the reader to grasp the email's gist quickly.

In this context I ask myself if we should use use-case-specific sender names or generic ones?

Use-case-specific senders for fictitious eCommerce company ACME Inc.

° ACME Order confirmation <[email protected]>
° ACME Shipping confirmation <[email protected]>
° ACME Payment confirmation <[email protected]>
° ACME Returns <[email protected]>
Example leveraging the pattern above:

Sender:     ACME Shipping confirmation <[email protected]>
Subject:    Expected delivery in 2-3 days
Pre-header: Order #12345 has been shipped. <link>Track your parcel</link>

I notice that many companies use the same sender name for different types of transactional emails (e.g., ACME Inc <[email protected]>). In my view the use-case-specific is better, but I wonder if I'm missing clear disadvantages?

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  • Is there a reason why not? Nov 16, 2022 at 17:32
  • Would "ACME Order confirmation <[email protected]>" be more use-case-specific? Nov 16, 2022 at 17:33
  • @bloodyKnuckles Yes, I think it would be more use-case-specifc. I added an example to clarify. Nov 16, 2022 at 18:14
  • "...missing clear disadvantages?" — Compared to what? Compared to something like "Sender: Joe Bloe <[email protected]>" ? Nov 16, 2022 at 18:48
  • I don't know the answer overall, but I'd bet that A/B testing using open rates as the metric would help you decide if it's the right move for your company.
    – Izquierdo
    Apr 16 at 22:43

1 Answer 1

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Naturally the use-case-specific components: Name, Subject, Preview, speed recognition of intent. The email address, not likely.

However, a huge UX advantage of "use-case-specific" email addressing such as [email protected]—compared to [email protected] or [email protected]—is efficiently routing email responses, resulting in better customer service.

A consequence, not necessarily a disadvantage, of "use-case-specific" email addressing is any particular customer will have a variety of Acme, Inc. email addresses in their email contacts. Do customers need to memorize your company email address? If so, then use-case would make that more difficult.

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  • Thank you, +1 for pointing out multiple contacts in customers' address books Apr 19 at 11:34

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