> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://partner-help.letsdothis.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Transactional emails
> Create and send event-specific emails to participants of a particular event.
Transactional emails are event-scoped messages about a specific event — race-day logistics, kit collection details, pre-event briefings, and anything else that only makes sense in the context of a participant's registration.
There are two types of transactional email:
* **Automatic emails** — sent by Let's Do This on your behalf when a booking event occurs. You do not need to create or schedule these.
* **Campaigns** — emails you compose and send yourself, either on a schedule you set or triggered automatically when a participant action occurs.
## Emails Let's Do This sends automatically
Let's Do This sends the following emails automatically on your behalf. These use LDT-managed templates and do not require any action from you.
| Email | When it sends |
| ------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Booking confirmation | Immediately after a participant completes their registration |
| Booking receipt | After payment is processed |
| Abandoned cart | Up to three reminders, 1 hour, 1 day, and 3 days after a participant starts checkout without completing it |
| Entry withdrawn | When a booking is cancelled |
| Upcoming payment reminder | Before a payment plan instalment is due |
These emails are sent from a Let's Do This address, and their content cannot be edited. If you have questions about their content or need to report a delivery issue, contact Let's Do This support.
The abandoned cart reminders are the one exception: you can turn them off for an event and send your own instead. See [Replacing the Let's Do This abandoned cart emails](#replacing-the-lets-do-this-abandoned-cart-emails).
## Finding your campaigns
Organiser-created campaigns live in your dashboard under **Email campaigns**. Select the **Transactional** tab to see campaigns for all your events, or open a specific event and navigate to its email section to see only that event's campaigns.
Each campaign card shows its current status:
| Status | What it means |
| --------- | ------------------------------------------------- |
| Draft | Saved but not yet sent or scheduled |
| Scheduled | Set to send at a future date and time |
| Sending | Currently delivering to recipients |
| Sent | Delivered successfully |
| Error | Something went wrong — check the card for details |
## Creating a transactional email campaign
On the transactional emails list, click **Create**. If prompted, confirm you want to create a campaign for a specific event, then click **Apply**.
The wizard opens at the **Overview** step.
On the Overview step, complete the send configuration:
* **Campaign name** — an internal label, not visible to participants.
* **Subject** — the subject line participants see in their inbox.
* **Preheader** — the short preview text that appears after the subject in most email clients. Use it to complement the subject line.
* **From name** — the display name in the sender field. Defaults to your organizer name if left blank.
* **From email** — enable **Use a custom from email** if your account has a verified sending domain; otherwise the email comes from Let's Do This by default. See [Custom Domains](/docs/email-communications/custom-domains) to set one up.
* **Reply-to name** and **Reply-to email** — where replies are directed, so participants can reach you directly. Like the from address, the reply-to address must be on a verified sending domain; see [Custom Domains](/docs/email-communications/custom-domains).
* **Brand theme** — select a theme to apply your branding to the email layout. See [Branding & Custom Domains](/docs/email-communications/branding) for how to set up themes.
Click **Save Draft** to preserve your settings, or **Save and continue** to move to the next step.
The Builder step is where you compose the email body. When you first open it, choose your editing experience:
**Basic Builder** — add content blocks in sequence. Available block types:
| Block | Use for |
| ------- | -------------------------------------------------------- |
| Heading | A large title at the top of a section |
| Text | Body copy and paragraphs |
| Button | A call-to-action with a label and URL |
| Image | A photo, banner, or illustration |
| HTML | Custom HTML for layouts the block builder cannot produce |
Drag blocks to reorder them.
**Advanced Builder** — a full drag-and-drop visual editor. Build multi-column layouts, customize spacing, and design more complex email templates with greater visual control.
Both builders support personalization variables so each recipient sees their own data — for example, their first name or the event they registered for. See [Email personalization](/docs/email-communications/email-personalisation).
Click **Preview** to see how the email will look before continuing.
On the Audience step, choose which participants receive this email. You can target the entire event participant list or narrow it down by imported segment or filter criteria. See [Audiences](/docs/email-communications/audiences) for detail on each option.
Choose how the campaign is sent:
* **Send now** — delivers immediately after you confirm on the Launch step.
* **Schedule** — pick a specific date and time.
* **Triggered** — the email sends automatically when a participant action occurs. See [Triggered sends](#triggered-sends) below.
If you are editing a campaign that is already scheduled, you'll see a warning. To change the delivery type you must cancel the campaign first, which returns it to drafts.
The Launch step shows a summary of your send configuration and the estimated recipient count. You can still edit any field before sending.
Click **Send Test** to send a preview to yourself. When you are happy, click **Send** (or **Schedule**) and confirm.
## Triggered sends
A triggered campaign sends automatically when a participant action occurs — without you needing to schedule or manually press send each time. Use triggered sends for follow-up messages, welcome emails, or reminders that should go out relative to a specific moment for each individual participant.
On the Schedule step, select **Triggered** to configure the trigger:
**Trigger type** — the participant action that starts the send:
| Trigger | What activates it |
| ---------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Participant Registered | A participant completes registration for the event |
| Participant Checked-In | A participant is checked in at the event |
| Membership Created | A participant's membership is created |
| Abandoned Cart | A participant starts checkout for the event but does not complete it |
**Timing** — choose whether to send immediately when the trigger fires, or after a delay. Delays can be set in hours, days, weeks, or months — for example, send a follow-up 2 days after a participant registers.
A triggered campaign begins sending once it is set to Scheduled status. It
sends to participants who meet the trigger condition from that point forward —
it does not backfill participants who met the condition before the campaign
was activated.
## Replacing the Let's Do This abandoned cart emails
An abandoned cart email goes to someone who started checkout for your event but never finished it, prompting them to come back and complete their registration. Let's Do This sends a set of three of these for every event by default. If they don't suit your event — you want your own copy and branding, or a different message from the standard one — you can turn them off and send your own with the **Abandoned Cart** trigger.
Build your own campaign first and turn the Let's Do This reminders off only once it is live. An event with the automatic reminders off and no campaign of your own sends nothing at all when someone abandons checkout, so doing it in this order avoids a gap.
Whether you build the campaign as transactional or marketing decides who is
able to receive it. A transactional campaign sends regardless of a
participant's marketing preferences. A marketing campaign only reaches people
who have given marketing consent, and someone who abandoned checkout usually
never got far enough to give it — so the same campaign built as marketing
typically reaches very few of them, and often none.
Sending an abandoned cart email as a transactional message is not permitted
everywhere. Some countries and some US states treat it as marketing, which
means you would need the recipient's consent before sending it. You are
responsible for making sure your abandoned cart emails comply with the laws
and regulations that apply to you and to your participants — take your own
legal advice if you are unsure.
Create a transactional campaign for the event as described above. On the Schedule step, select **Triggered**, then choose **Abandoned Cart** as the action and pick the event.
The trigger fires about an hour after the checkout is abandoned. Selecting **Immediately** sends your email at that point; adding a delay counts from there, so a 2-day delay arrives roughly 2 days and 1 hour after the checkout was abandoned.
The trigger fires once per abandoned checkout. To send a series like the Let's Do This one, create a separate campaign for each message with a different delay.
Open the event, go to **Automated emails** in the event settings, and turn off **Enable Let's Do This abandoned cart emails**. Click **Save changes** — you'll see `Abandoned cart email setting saved.` once it applies.
The setting is per event and is on by default, so you need to turn it off for each event you want it off for. It stops all three Let's Do This reminders for that event and nothing else — your own campaigns still send.
## When an abandoned cart email is not sent
**What happens:** some abandoned checkouts never produce an email, from Let's Do This or from your own campaign.
**Why:** the reminder only makes sense when there is a checkout to return to and the person hasn't already registered. It is skipped when the entry was a ballot, application, or volunteer registration rather than a normal purchase; when the participant was editing an existing booking rather than making a new one; and when the person has since booked anything with you, so they are no longer an abandoned cart.
**What to tell the participant:** if someone expected a reminder and never got one, check whether they completed a booking with you after the abandoned attempt — that suppresses it. They can always return to your event page and register directly.
## Who your abandoned cart campaign sends to
**What happens:** the Audience step does not apply to a triggered campaign. Your abandoned cart email goes to whoever matches the trigger, regardless of what you selected as the audience.
**Why:** someone who abandoned checkout is not yet on your participant list, so there is no audience segment they could belong to. The trigger configuration alone decides who gets the email, and the dashboard shows a warning to this effect on the trigger step.
**What to tell the participant:** the email goes to the address entered during the abandoned checkout — the lead booker's, or the first participant's if no booker address was given. If a participant says a reminder went to the wrong inbox, that is the address to check.
## Unsubscribes and opt-outs
Transactional emails are sent to participants regardless of their marketing email preferences, because the content is event-specific and not promotional. Transactional emails do not include an unsubscribe link — participants cannot opt out of them through the email itself.
If a participant asks not to receive further emails for an event, you can exclude them manually by removing them from the audience before sending.
## Editing and duplicating campaigns
You can edit a **Draft** or **Scheduled** campaign at any point before it sends. Open the campaign card's menu and select **Edit**.
To reuse a campaign for another event or send a similar message again, select **Duplicate** from the campaign card menu. The duplicate starts as a draft and is not tied to any schedule from the original.
## What happens when a send has an error
If a campaign ends in an error state, the card shows the error type. Common causes include missing required fields (subject line or email body) and configuration issues with a custom from address. Correct the issue and resend. If the error persists, contact Let's Do This support with the campaign name and the error message you see.