Perfecting the Post-Purchase Customer Journey Through Secure Communications

While overall customer satisfaction scores in the retail sector are improving steadily year-over-year, recent data reveals that only 23 percent of customers feel fully satisfied with post-purchase support services.

There are a variety of reasons why customers would need post-purchase support — e.g., returning an item, confirming a payment went through, tracking their shipment, etc. — and making sure they can complete each post-purchase action seamlessly is an essential aspect of the shopping experience. Brands that aren’t able to provide a satisfying experience face the risk of high churn rates or a significant number of customers switching to a different brand. Almost half of consumers (48 percent) will abandon a brand after two bad experiences, and another 24 percent would leave after just one. By prioritizing efficient communication processes for customers to seamlessly interact with their company post-purchase, retailers can improve their customer experience (CX) capabilities and remain a trusted brand for consumers.

Email Remains a Preferred Method of Communication … But Scams Persist

After the initial purchase is made, many of the next steps in the customer journey take place over transactional email. With 69 percent of consumers preferring emails to communicate with brands, it's essential that retailers prioritize reliable email communications.

However, scammers often leverage email as a way to steal personal or financial information from consumers. For instance, ahead of the Amazon Prime Day shopping event in July 2025, the company warned customers about a phishing scam on the rise that claimed customers needed to take action regarding their membership subscription. No retailer is immune from the threat of scams targeting their customers. As such, they need to understand how to best protect customers from fraudsters. Otherwise, they risk reputational damage and a loss of trust from consumers.

Scammers also tend to use post-purchase emails as a way to demand action from consumers. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has previously stated that “attackers may attempt to gather information by sending emails requesting that you confirm purchase or account information.” By ensuring their emails are verified and easily proven to be legitimate, retailers can help consumers understand which emails can be trusted after they make a purchase.

How to Ensure Successful and Secure Email Transmission

The most efficient email strategy for retailers is one that revolves around high-volume delivery capabilities with unlimited capacity, especially since retail is an industry that experiences a significant peak season during the holidays. Online shopping data for the 2025 holiday season (Nov. 1 through Dec. 31) shows that consumers spent $257.8 billion, reflecting a 6.8 percent year-over-year increase.

However, post-purchase activity is also increasing, with return rates rising by 41 percent between November and December 2025 when compared to the same period in 2024. With this in mind, retailers must choose a scalable solution for transactional email that can support reliable delivery in the post-purchase journey when a surge of consumers are waiting for instructions on how to complete their returns, get confirmation of their refund, and any other steps that come with the return process.

The right platform will also ensure correct inbox placement for these essential messages. A retailer’s email reputation is often determined by the reputation of the sending IP address and domain (in addition to the quality of the email content). Without a good email reputation, retailers risk their messages bouncing back or ending up in spam folders. By choosing a provider with expertise in email reputation and capabilities to monitor and administer IP addresses, retailers will increase their chances of having important post-purchase emails reach their customers’ inboxes.

Lastly, security must be top of mind in order to provide customers with post-purchase emails that can be trusted and acted upon. Retailers must prioritize the authenticity of all transactional emails to prevent their customers from becoming easy targets for fraud. Verification methods, such as cryptographic signing and DKIM, ensure emails can’t be forged or altered. SPF and DMARC enforce domain trust. Every order confirmation and shipping update should carry a verifiable signature, giving recipients confidence that what lands in their inbox truly comes from a brand they trust.

By implementing an email delivery platform that ensures scalability to handle peak seasons, along with reputation management and fraud prevention, retailers can boost customer loyalty and satisfaction by providing an exceptional customer experience as a differentiator in today’s crowded retail landscape.

Oliver Paetz is the head of product management, transactional email for Retarus, a provider of enterprise cloud solutions for email, fax, and SMS.