Set up an abandoned cart flow

Around seven in ten carts are abandoned, and a well-timed email sequence recovers a meaningful share of them. This guide sets up the flow end to end.

Prerequisites

• A connected store: Shopify or the WooCommerce plugin (Integrations)
• A verified sending domain

Set up the flow

1. Create an automation with the Cart abandoned trigger
2. Set the abandonment time: how long a checkout must be untouched before it counts as abandoned. Any number of hours from 1 to 336 works; 1 to 4 hours is a good starting point for most stores (default is 24).
3. Add your emails with waits between them. A proven structure:
   • Email 1 right after abandonment: a helpful reminder, no discount
   • Wait 20 to 24 hours, Email 2: address hesitations (shipping, returns, sizing)
   • Wait 1 to 2 days, Email 3: optional incentive, ideally a unique coupon with an expiry

Show the cart in the email

Use the cart template variables to render what they left behind. In the HTML editor:

{% for item in line_items %}
  {% if item.image %}<img src="{{ item.image }}" width="90">{% endif %}
  {{ item.name }} × {{ item.quantity }} - {{ item.line_total }} {{currency}}
{% endfor %}

Add a button linking to {{cart_url}} so one click restores the checkout. Full syntax in the template syntax reference.

Built-in safety rails

• A purchase stops the flow. When an order comes in for the same email address (capitalization does not matter), the checkout is marked converted and remaining emails are skipped.
• Add the profile filter "placed order - zero times - since starting this flow" on the trigger as an extra guard.
• Re-entry defaults to once per subscriber; allow re-entry after X days if you want repeat abandoners to get the sequence again.
• Blocked enrollments (re-entry or filters) are retried on later runs rather than silently dropped.

Measuring

The canvas can show per-block statistics (how many are waiting at each step, went down each branch). Campaign-level revenue attribution shows orders connected to the flow.

For strategy and copy examples, read the blog guide: Abandoned cart email that recovers the checkout.