[marcosdumay]

Hum... As an example of what the article calls "everyone", I do expect that email.

I will not read it, just mark it read and archive. It is not the contents that are important, what is important is that your email is set correctly, and receiving the service's emails without problems. So, any future issue can be solved over email.

[wenc]

I agree with this. The welcome or confirmation email is a transactional email -- I don't really read it (I usually mark as read too -- takes 1 sec), but I expect it to be there.

(This is distinct from an onboarding email. I don't need onboarding emails. Some site combine confirmation + onboarding into a single email -- that's ok with me.)

It's a searchable historical record that I once signed up for something under a certain username. Also, it's important for password recovery and such (not a best practice to be sure, but not all sites support 2FA).

[leephillips]

You have a point there. But haven't they already sent you the confirmation email?

[marcosdumay]

I think the article's author didn't even think about separated onboarding and confirmation emails. He's just stating that you can use the confirmation one for onboarding too.

I have seen those separated emails. I agree that they add nothing, and I imagine their conversion is much lower than a single email (they don't bother me, I'll just ignore another message). I do agree that onboarding is best done on-channel, but adding an extra link on the email you are sending anyway can only help.

[coder543]

The welcome email in this context is the confirmation email.