Email marketing automation is a powerful tool for ecommerce businesses using Shopify. Automated emails like abandoned cart recovery emails, welcome emails, and birthday discount emails allow you to engage customers in a personalized way. This helps recover lost sales, build loyalty, and grow your business.
One of the most popular and effective email automation platforms for Shopify is Klaviyo. Klaviyo integrates seamlessly with Shopify and makes it easy to create targeted email campaigns. In this article, we’ll walk through how to set up Klaviyo for email automation with Shopify.
Why Use Klaviyo for Shopify Email Automation?
Here are some of the key reasons Shopify merchants choose Klaviyo for automated email marketing:
- Easy integration with Shopify – Klaviyo offers a direct one-click integration with Shopify.
- Powerful segmentation – Klaviyo lets you divide contacts into targeted lists and segments for personalized messaging.
- Abandoned cart recovery – Send automated abandoned cart emails to recover lost sales.
- Detailed analytics – Track opens, clicks, unsubscribes, revenue, and more to optimize campaigns.
- Superior deliverability – Klaviyo has high inbox placement rates for more emails landing in the inbox.
- In-depth support – Get onboarding, ongoing support, and strategic guidance from Klaviyo’s team.
With Klaviyo’s platform, Shopify merchants see excellent results like 2-3x higher open rates, increased sales from abandoned carts, and improved customer engagement. Let’s look at how to get set up.
How to Connect Klaviyo & Shopify
The first step is to connect your Shopify store with your Klaviyo account. Here is the simple process to link them together:
- Sign up for a Klaviyo account if you don’t have one already.
- In your Shopify admin, go to Settings > Integrations.
- Under “Email Marketing”, click “Connect” next to Klaviyo.
- A popup will open where you can securely log into your Klaviyo account.
- That’s it! Your Shopify store is now connected to Klaviyo.
Once connected, customer data like email addresses, names, addresses, and purchases will automatically sync from Shopify to Klaviyo lists. This ensures your Klaviyo contacts stay up to date.
Set Up Abandoned Cart Emails
One of the most effective automations to set up first is abandoned cart recovery emails. According to Klaviyo, abandoned cart emails have 2-3x higher open rates compared to regular marketing emails. Recovering these lost sales significantly impacts your bottom line.
Follow these steps to create an automated abandoned cart email flow in Klaviyo:
- In Klaviyo, go to Automations and click “Create an Automation.”
- Select “Abandoned Cart” as the type of workflow.
- Name your automation like “Recover Abandoned Carts.”
- Set the “Cart abandoned” trigger to 1 hour after cart is abandoned.
- Add an “Email” action. Design and write your abandoned cart email.
- Set it to send immediately after the trigger.
- Click “Save & Activate Automation” to turn it on.
Now your automation will start sending abandoned cart emails to customers. Make sure to include a strong call to action to get them back to your site.
For best results, create multiple abandoned cart emails that go out over several days. This further nudges customers to return and complete their purchase.
Abandoned Cart Email Tips
Follow these tips when designing your abandoned cart emails for the highest impact:
- Send quickly – First email 1 hour after cart is abandoned.
- Offer a discount – Provide 10-15% off if they complete their purchase.
- Remind of benefits – Highlight key product features/benefits.
- Use urgency – “This discount won’t last long!”
- Make it visual – Show images of products left in the cart.
- Add social proof – “This is one of our best-sellers!”
Welcome Emails
The next powerful automation to set up is a welcome email when a customer first provides their email address. This could be when they create an account, sign up for your newsletter, or make a purchase.
Here are the steps to create a welcome email in Klaviyo:
- Go to Automations and click “Create an Automation.”
- Select “Welcome” as the workflow.
- Name it something like “Welcome Email.”
- Set the trigger to “Subscriber signs up.”
- Add an “Email” action and design your welcome email.
- Have it send immediately after the trigger event.
- Click “Save & Activate Automation” to turn it on.
The welcome email is a great opportunity to provide value, establish your brand, and start building the customer relationship. Include a discount code or free resource as an incentive for them to engage further.
Welcome Email Best Practices
Follow these best practices when creating effective welcome emails for your Shopify store:
- Send quickly after sign up – Within minutes is ideal.
- Use their first name for personalization.
- Offer an incentive like a discount or free gift.
- Showcase best-selling or new products.
- Add images and visuals related to your brand.
- Highlight your shipping and return policies.
Birthday Discount Emails
Birthday discounts are a great way to delight customers and increase sales. People are more likely to buy around their birthday. With Klaviyo, you can easily set up automated birthday emails.
Follow these steps:
- Create a new automation and select the “Subscriber Birthday” workflow.
- Name it something like “Happy Birthday Discount.”
- Set the date offset to send a few days before their birthday.
- Add an email action and create your birthday discount email.
- Make sure to include a special discount code.
- Activate the automation.
Your customers will love getting a personalized happy birthday message with an exclusive coupon code. This helps drive more sales around birthdays.
Birthday Email Tips
Use these tips to design birthday emails that customers look forward to each year:
- Send 2-3 days before their birthday.
- Use their first name for personalization.
- Offer 15-20% off coupons.
- Suggest relevant products as gifts.
- Add fun birthday imagery and graphics.
- Use urgency like “24-hour birthday code inside.”
Win Back Customers
One smart automation you can set up is to win back customers who haven’t purchased in a while. This is great for re-engaging old customers.
Here are the steps to create a win back campaign:
- Make a new automation and select “Customer Lifecycle.”
- Name it something like “Win Back Inactive Customers.”
- Set the trigger to inactive for a period of time, like 90 days.
- Add an email action and design your win back offer email.
- Be sure to include an incentive like a discount code or free gift.
- Activate the workflow.
Focus your win back email on showing the customer that you miss them and want to provide extra value if they purchase again. This helps reactivate churned customers.
Win Back Email Best Practices
Use these best practices when creating emails to win back inactive customers:
- Trigger after 90-180 days of no purchases.
- Address them directly by name.
- Offer a strong incentive – 20-30% off.
- Remind them of previous purchases.
- Suggest relevant best-sellers.
- Use urgency like “24 hours only.”
Post-Purchase Follow Up
You can also use Klaviyo email automations to follow up with customers after they make a purchase. This helps get product reviews, future reorders, and build loyalty.
Here is how to create post-purchase follow up emails:
- Make a new “Customer Lifecycle” automation.
- Name it something like “Post-Purchase Follow Up.”
- Set the trigger to 1-3 days after a purchase is made.
- Add an email action and design your follow up email.
- Ask for a product review or feedback.
- Promote other relevant products.
- Activate the automation.
Well-timed and relevant follow up emails show customers you care about their experience. This improves satisfaction and gets them buying again sooner.
Post-Purchase Follow Up Tips
Apply these tips for effective post-purchase follow up emails:
- Send 1-3 days after delivery.
- Ask for an online product review.
- Suggest complementary products.
- Remind of loyalty program perks.
- Provide helpful support resources.
- Use their name for personalization.
Browse Abandonment Emails
You can also set up automated emails if a customer browses a product but doesn’t add it to their cart. This helps capture more on-site traffic.
Here is how to create browse abandonment emails in Klaviyo:
- Make a new automation and select “Browse Abandonment.”
- Name it something like “Browse Abandonment Recovery.”
- Set the trigger to activating after someone views a product.
- Add an email action and create the browse abandonment email.
- Include a reminder, social proof, or offer.
- Activate the automation.
With browse abandonment emails, you can remind customers to come back and purchase after leaving your site. Use urgency and social proof to nudge them to buy.
Browse Abandonment Email Tips
Use these tips to create effective browse abandonment emails:
- Trigger email soon after leaving the site – within an hour.
- Remind them of the product they were viewing.
- Use social proof like “Our #1 best-seller!”
- Offer a small incentive to complete the purchase.
- Use urgency like “Just 24 hours left!”.
- Suggest related products they may also like.
Email Deliverability
Now that you’ve set up effective Shopify email automations in Klaviyo, it’s important to monitor email deliverability. You want your automated campaigns continually reaching the inbox and engaging customers.
Here are some key tips to maintain excellent email deliverability with Klaviyo and Shopify:
- Monitor spam testing – Use Klaviyo’s Spam Ratings tool to check inbox placement.
- Enable domain authentication – Turn on DMARC and SPF to authenticate your sender domain.
- Monitor bounce rates – Keep bounce rates under 2% to avoid red flags.
- List cleaning – Remove inactive subscribers and bad email addresses regularly.
- Segment targeting – Only send emails to engaged subscriber lists.
- Relevant content – Make sure your emails provide value to subscribers.
Following email deliverability best practices helps ensure the success of your Klaviyo email automation with Shopify. Monitor spam reports, bounce rates, and optimize based on email analytics.
Additional Shopify Email Automations
Here are some other powerful Shopify email automations you can create in Klaviyo:
- Cart Abandonment – Send a series of emails if a cart is abandoned.
- Product Reviews – Ask for reviews after the first purchase.
- Loyalty Rewards – Offer perks and rewards for repeat purchases.
- Limited-Time Sale – Promote sales and discounts to engage customers.
- Replenishment – Remind customers to reorder consumable products.
- Win Back – Special offers for inactive customers to re-engage them.
Let your email imagination run wild! Klaviyo makes it easy to create advanced automation recipes to turn emails into a revenue-driving sales machine.
Conclusion
Email automation is an extremely effective ecommerce marketing strategy. Platforms like Klaviyo integrate seamlessly with Shopify to help merchants create targeted, automated email campaigns.
Start by setting up key flows like abandoned cart, welcome emails, and browse abandonment. Monitor performance and continuously optimize your email automations. This helps you engage customers on a more personalized level to boost sales, loyalty, and grow your Shopify business.