Shopify Email Marketing: 9 Flows That Outperform a $200k Klaviyo Build

Your store does not need more emails. It needs nine flows that catch buyers at the exact moment they almost bought, just bought, or are about to come back. Below is the smallest set of Shopify email flows that earn their keep, with the math, the order to build them, and where Hubi handles the boring half.

Key Takeaways

• Email is the highest-ROI channel a Shopify store owns. Klaviyo's 2024 benchmark report puts average email-driven revenue at 27% of total store revenue for top-performing accounts. (Klaviyo benchmarks)
• Nine flows do 90% of the work. Welcome, abandoned browse, abandoned cart, abandoned checkout, post-purchase, replenishment, winback, VIP, and product-back-in-stock. Skip the rest until those are live and tuned.
• Abandoned cart and checkout flows print money. Klaviyo's benchmarks show top-decile abandoned cart flows earn $28.89 per recipient; the average is $3.65. The gap is almost entirely about copy, timing, and segmentation. (Klaviyo abandoned cart benchmarks)
• Most stores ship 3 of 9 and stop. A welcome flow, a cart flow, and a monthly campaign. The other six are where the compounding revenue lives.
• Where Hubi fits: Hubi audits your Klaviyo or Shopify Email account, drafts the missing flows in your voice, ships them as drafts in Klaviyo for your review, then reports back in Slack. Hubi does not replace a brand designer for hero templates or run deliverability for you.

The actual job of Shopify email marketing

It is Tuesday. You have a Shopify store doing $40k a month. Your welcome flow has three emails and was written the week you launched. Your abandoned cart flow is the Klaviyo default. You send one campaign a month, on a Friday, because that is the day you have time.

This is the default state of Shopify email marketing in 2026. The tools are fine. Klaviyo, Omnisend, Shopify Email, Mailchimp, they all work. The bottleneck is the same one we hear on every call: nobody owns shipping the flows past the welcome, and the campaign calendar is whatever survives the week.

Email is the cheapest revenue your store will ever make. Top-performing Shopify stores route 25-35% of revenue through email, and Klaviyo's 2024 benchmark pins the average at roughly 27% for the top decile. (Klaviyo benchmarks) The bottleneck is not strategy. It is shipping nine specific flows and then tuning them.

The 9 flows that actually move revenue

Build them in this order. Each one stacks on the last. Do not skip ahead to VIP if your welcome flow is two emails and a coupon code.

1. Welcome flow (the entry point)

Five emails over seven days. Brand story, hero product education, social proof, soft offer, last-call offer.

The welcome flow is the only email a new subscriber actively expects. Open rates run 50-86% depending on the report, which is roughly 4-5x a normal campaign. (Omnisend email marketing statistics) Spending two hours on the copy here is the highest-ROI two hours you will spend in email all year.

2. Abandoned checkout flow

Three emails: 1 hour, 24 hours, 48 hours. This is the highest-revenue flow in the store.

Klaviyo's benchmark for the top 10% of abandoned cart flows is $28.89 per recipient. The bottom half of stores earn nothing because the flow stops after one generic reminder. (Klaviyo abandoned cart benchmarks)

The gap between $3.65 and $28.89 is almost entirely:

• A reason to come back (low stock, price holding, a question your support team can answer).
• A real product image, not a generic logo header.
• A subject line that names the product, not "You left something behind."

3. Abandoned cart flow

Different from checkout. The buyer added a product but never started checkout. Two emails: 4 hours and 24 hours. Lower urgency, higher curiosity.

This is where most stores skip the second email. Send it. The second email at 24 hours converts roughly half the revenue of the first one.

4. Abandoned browse flow

For identified subscribers who viewed a product but never added to cart. One email, 6-12 hours after the session ends. Mention the category, not the specific product. The catch: this flow only fires when the visitor is already a known subscriber (logged in, or cookied with an email on file). Anonymous browsers are not addressable, so volume here is a fraction of what cart and checkout flows see. Treat it as a small additive lift on warm traffic, not a flagship flow.

5. Post-purchase flow

Four to six emails over 30-45 days. Order confirmation, shipping confirmation, how to use it, care guide, soft cross-sell, review request.

This flow does two jobs: it cuts "where is my order" tickets by 30-50% on most stores, and it sets up the replenishment and cross-sell flows.

6. Replenishment flow

For consumables or wearables. One email at the expected reorder window (90 days for skincare, 45 days for coffee, six months for supplements). One reminder.

The quietest flow on this list. Also the highest-margin, because the buyer already trusts you.

7. Winback flow

Three emails over 30 days for buyers who have not opened or clicked in 90-180 days. The first email asks why. The second offers value (a guide, a content piece, not a discount). The third is the discount.

Discount-first winbacks train your list to wait for discounts. Lead with value.

8. VIP flow

For your top 5-10% of buyers by lifetime value. Early access to launches, behind-the-scenes content, a real reply-to address that goes to a human. Two emails a month is plenty.

9. Product back-in-stock flow

One email, sent immediately. Subject line names the product. Do not include other products. This is the highest-converting transactional email in your store after the order confirmation.

Quick reference: which flow does what

How Hubi runs Shopify email marketing

Hubi is an AI agent that lives in Slack and runs the flow stack above for your Shopify store. You brief it once on tone, products, and offer rules. After that, you message it like a teammate.

@Hubi audit our Klaviyo account against the 9-flow checklist.
Draft any flows we are missing, in our voice, using our top 10
products. Schedule them as drafts in Klaviyo for my review by Friday.
Report back in Slack with what is drafted and what is blocked.

Here is what Hubi does next:

• Audits your existing Klaviyo or Shopify Email setup and lists which of the nine flows are missing or under-built.
• Pulls your top products and recent orders from Shopify to ground the copy in real catalog data.
• Drafts each missing flow (subjects, preview text, body copy, fallback subject variants) in your brand voice.
• Pushes each flow into Klaviyo as a draft, never live, with your review required before send.
• Reports back in Slack with a checklist of what shipped, what is queued, and what needs your decision.

Honest caveat. Hubi drafts email copy, subject lines, segmentation rules, and flow logic. Hubi does not design custom HTML email templates from scratch (it uses your existing templates), warm up a new sending domain, manage your DKIM and SPF records, or replace a deliverability consultant if your sender reputation is already damaged. If those matter this quarter, hire for them. Hubi will run the copy and shipping work underneath so you have time to fix the rest.

The numbers you can expect (and what to ignore)

Most benchmark posts quote averages. Averages are useless. Use these instead.

Sources: Klaviyo 2024 benchmark report (general, abandoned cart). The top-decile column is what a tuned Shopify store can actually reach in 90 days of focused work.

When not to invest in Shopify email marketing yet

Email compounds, but only if the rest of the store works. Do not invest in flows today if any of these are true:

• Your product photography is so bad it hurts the brand to email it. Fix the photos first.
• Your fulfilment is broken and shipping times are unpredictable. Email cannot save a delivery experience.
• You have fewer than 200 subscribers and no plan to grow the list. A welcome flow with no welcome subscribers earns nothing.
• Your store sells one $9 product. Email economics need a basket of products or a repeat purchase pattern.

Fix those first. Then come back to this article.

How to start in the next 7 days (with Hubi running point)

The old plan was a fortnight. With Hubi shipping drafts overnight, a tuned store can ship the full 9-flow stack in a week. Run it like this:

1. Day 1, Monday - @Hubi audit our Klaviyo against the 9-flow checklist and post a gap report in Slack. You get a live, partial, missing breakdown by lunchtime.
2. Day 2, Tuesday - @Hubi draft the welcome flow, 5 emails over 7 days, using our top 10 products. You review the drafts in Klaviyo at end of day.
3. Day 3, Wednesday - @Hubi draft the abandoned checkout flow, 3 emails at 1h / 24h / 48h, in our voice. Review and tweak in Klaviyo.
4. Day 4, Thursday - @Hubi draft the abandoned cart flow (2 emails) and the abandoned browse flow (1 email, identified subscribers only). Review in Klaviyo.
5. Day 5, Friday - @Hubi draft the post-purchase flow, 4 to 6 emails over 30 to 45 days, focused on cutting WISMO and teeing up replenishment. Review.
6. Day 6, Saturday - @Hubi queue drafts for replenishment, winback, VIP, and back-in-stock. Hubi posts each one back to Slack as it lands in Klaviyo.
7. Day 7, Sunday - You review the final four in Klaviyo, approve, schedule. Monday morning the full nine-flow stack is live.

Without an owner (you, a teammate, or Hubi), nothing ships. With Hubi running point, the owner cost drops to your review time.

FAQ

Is Shopify Email good enough, or do I need Klaviyo?

Shopify Email is fine up to roughly $1M in revenue if you only need basic flows and segmentation. Above that, Klaviyo's segmentation and reporting earn back the higher cost.

How often should I send campaign emails on top of the flows?

One to two campaigns per week for most Shopify stores. Less than one and you train the list to forget you. More than three and you train them to ignore you.

What is a good email revenue percentage for a Shopify store?

10-15% if your flows are basic, 27-35% if your flows are tuned. Anything under 10% means your flows are missing or your list is dead.

Should welcome flow discounts be a percentage or a fixed amount?

Fixed amounts work better for stores with average order values above $80. Percentages work better below that. Either way, test with one variant per quarter, not one per email.

How long should an abandoned cart sequence be?

Two to three emails over 24-48 hours for cart, three emails over 48 hours for checkout. Anything beyond 72 hours converts at near zero.

Do I need separate flows for SMS, or can I run everything in email?

Start with email. Add SMS only after the email flows are tuned and you have at least 1,000 SMS subscribers with explicit opt-in. Mixing the two too early dilutes both.

What about Shopify Email versus Klaviyo for a smaller store?

Shopify Email is sufficient under $500k a year if your needs are straightforward. The moment you want behavioral segmentation, advanced flows, or proper reporting, Klaviyo earns its monthly cost back in a few weeks.

The takeaway

Shopify email marketing is not about sending more. It is about building the nine flows that catch buyers at the right moment, then tuning them every quarter. Three flows ship in most stores. Six more is where the revenue lives.

Hubi is an AI agent that lives in Slack and ships email flows and campaigns for your Shopify store. Start free at gethubi.ai, no card required.

Sources

1. Klaviyo, Email Marketing Benchmarks (2024) - https://www.klaviyo.com/blog/email-benchmarks
2. Klaviyo, Abandoned Cart Benchmark Report: Rates & Statistics - https://www.klaviyo.com/blog/abandoned-cart-benchmarks
3. Omnisend, Email Marketing Statistics for Ecommerce (2024) - https://www.omnisend.com/blog/email-marketing-statistics/