If you only run one kind of marketing automation on your Shopify store, make it email. A small set of flows earns from every visitor you already paid to bring in, and most stores either don't have them or set them up once and never looked again.
The short answer
Every Shopify store needs four email flows: a welcome series, an abandoned checkout flow, a post-purchase flow and a winback flow. Build them in that order, write each one for the moment the customer is in, and review them every quarter, because a flow you never look at slowly stops earning.
What's actually going on
Each flow is triggered by something the customer does, and each has one job:
| Flow | Triggered by | Its job |
|---|---|---|
| Welcome | Someone subscribes | Turn a subscriber into a first order |
| Abandoned checkout | Someone starts checkout and doesn't finish | Recover the sale while intent is still high |
| Post-purchase | An order is placed | Set expectations, earn a review, start the second order |
| Winback | A customer goes quiet past your normal repurchase window | Bring them back before they're gone |
In Klaviyo, these flows hang off events that the Shopify integration sends, such as Started Checkout and Placed Order, plus list subscriptions (Klaviyo documents each one in its Shopify data reference). That's why the integration has to be right first: a flow triggered by a broken event sends at the wrong time, or not at all.
What to check first
- Are all four live? A flow in Draft or Manual status earns nothing. Check the status of each one.
- Are the events arriving? Open Klaviyo's activity for a recent order and confirm that Started Checkout and Placed Order are coming through from Shopify.
- Does the abandoned checkout flow stop for buyers? It should exit anyone who has placed an order since the flow started. Otherwise you are sending "you forgot something" to people who just paid.
- When was each flow last edited? Expired offers, dead links and last season's copy left running are common, and they cost trust.
- Do flows and campaigns collide? Someone in a welcome series can also receive your weekly campaign on the same day. Check that Smart Sending and your flow filters are set the way you intend.
The one fix to start with
Start with the welcome series, because it's the first thing every new subscriber sees, and write it from your reviews instead of your product descriptions. A structure I use:
- Email 1, right away: deliver what they signed up for, plus one reason to buy, in a customer's own words.
- Email 2, two days later: the biggest worry people have before buying, answered with a real review.
- Email 3, two days after that: proof and your best sellers, picked for the kind of customer who signed up.
- Email 4, a few days later: one last, clear reason to place the first order.
For the full copy and timing of every core flow, with Klaviyo and Omnisend setup notes, see the email flow library on Tilly. Tilly is the Shopify marketing app I built, and it can also draft all four flows from your own reviews and put them into Klaviyo as drafts, so nothing sends until you approve it.
The rest of the fix (and why it's a conversation)
The core four are the floor, not the ceiling. Here is some of what I would work through with you:
- Browse abandonment, replenishment and VIP flows, and when each one is worth adding
- Branching post-purchase flows by what the customer bought
- Adding SMS alongside email without double-messaging
- Testing subject lines and timing inside flows
- How revenue should split between flows and campaigns for your store
Want me to audit your flows? Book a free 30-minute call and bring your Klaviyo account.
Where this has worked
At Lina Lennox, I built welcome, abandoned cart, post-purchase and replenishment flows as part of a 60-day engagement that doubled sales. At Ruthi Human Hair, an automated welcome series, post-purchase follow-ups and VIP segments helped grow email revenue 183%, with a 42% average open rate. For more on how email fits with the rest of the system, see Shopify Marketing Automation: What to Automate First.
Book a call
This post gives you the first move. The right next ones depend on your store. In 30 minutes I'll look at your Shopify and Klaviyo numbers and give you a short list of priorities, whether or not we work together. If you want to see how I build these systems first, start with Shopify growth systems.