The Klaviyo flows every store should have running

A Klaviyo flow is a sequence of emails that sends on its own when a customer does something, or stops doing it. A store needs eight, in two waves: welcome, abandoned cart, abandoned checkout and post-purchase from day one, then winback, browse abandonment, back in stock and sunset once those four are running.

Most guides list fifteen flows and stop there. This is the map we build in every account: which trigger to pick, how many emails, over what window and where the discount goes.

The whole map in one table

Highlighted rows are the day one flows. The rest are the second wave.

Klaviyo has five kinds of trigger: being added to a list, entering a segment, a metric (an action such as placing an order), a date property such as a birthday, and a price drop. Every flow on this map uses one of the first three.

The four flows to switch on from day one

They cover the moments when someone is closest to buying. Without them, every other effort leaks.

Welcome

It turns a new subscriber into a first order and delivers what the sign-up form promised. It starts with Added to list, the list your pop-up feeds. Klaviyo's template sends three emails over a week. We build three or four on the same seven days:

1. Immediately: the incentive, the brand in three sentences, the best sellers. One button.
2. Day 2: why the brand exists and how the product is made. It teaches, it does not sell.
3. Day 4: best sellers with real reviews.
4. Day 7: a soft reminder that the code expires.

Whoever buys leaves the flow, and a split on "Has Placed Order at least once over all time" keeps existing customers away from a first-order discount.

Abandoned cart and abandoned checkout

They look like one flow and they are two. The cart flow starts with Added to Cart, when someone adds a product and leaves before checkout. The checkout flow starts with Started Checkout, when someone reaches payment and does not finish. Watch out: Klaviyo's standard abandoned cart flow is triggered by Started Checkout, so on its own it never reaches people who leave before checkout.

Both run three emails over 48 hours, with the discount only in the last one. The checkout flow changes the tone: whoever got to payment had already decided, so we assume something went wrong and offer help. Emails, timings and Shopify settings are in our abandoned cart email guide.

Post-purchase

It keeps the first order from being the last. It starts with Placed Order, and we build three or four emails:

1. A day after delivery: how to use and look after the product.
2. About day 5: an idea to get more out of the purchase.
3. About day 10: the review request, with a direct link.
4. About day 21: a cross-sell based on what they bought.

No discount. Someone who has just paid does not need one. On consumables, time the last email to the real reorder cycle, not to a round number.

The second wave

Add these once the first four are live and sending. They need more traffic or a list with some history.

Winback

It goes after customers who bought and then stopped. It uses Placed Order with a long first delay, a little longer than your average buying cycle, as Klaviyo puts it. We start at 60 days when there is no better data and adjust once we know the cycle.

Three emails: a reminder with no code, then the highest incentive of any flow with an expiry date, then a last call with an easy way out. Klaviyo's template puts the incentive in email 1. We hold it back so customers who would have returned anyway do not get it for free.

Browse abandonment

It reaches someone who viewed a product and did not add it to the cart. The trigger is Viewed Product, and it only works for visitors Klaviyo can identify. Two emails in 24 hours: the product with a few related ones, then a review and the shipping terms.

Keep Klaviyo's recommended filters: no order, checkout or cart since entering, and not in this flow in the last 30 days. And set expectations. It is the flow that opens well and sells least, so we never pitch it as a revenue flow.

Back in stock

One email the moment a product the customer asked for is back. It starts with Subscribed to Back in Stock, recorded when someone signs up on a sold-out product page. We run it in Klaviyo rather than a separate app. The flow must be Live or Manual for anyone to join the waiting list, and Klaviyo cannot check stock again before a second message, which is why we send only one.

Sunset

It removes people who have not opened or clicked in months, because sending to inboxes nobody reads hurts deliverability. The trigger is entering a segment of unengaged profiles; we use 90 days with no opens or clicks. Two emails over seven days: "this is our last email", then the exit. Klaviyo cannot suppress a profile as a flow action, so the last step tags it and a separate segment handles the suppression.

Do not switch it on in a young account: there is nobody to sunset yet. If you think you are already landing in spam, run your domain through our deliverability checker first.

Rules that apply to every flow

• The discount goes at the end, never at the start. Whoever gets a code straight away learns to wait for it.
• The colder the contact, the bigger the incentive. Winback gets the largest, post-purchase none.
• One call to action per email. One button, one destination.
• Whoever buys, leaves. Every conversion flow needs "Placed Order zero times since starting this flow".
• Review flows when the catalogue changes. A live flow showing a discontinued product is the quietest expensive mistake.

How to tell if a flow is working

Look at revenue per recipient, not total revenue. A flow with a lot of revenue may just have a lot of traffic; revenue per recipient shows whether each email earns its place.

And check that every flow is actually sending. A live flow that has sent nothing in weeks is not a bad flow, it is a broken one: a trigger on the wrong list, tracking switched off, a message left in Draft. Fix that before you rewrite a line. If you would rather go through yours with someone, book a call.

Sources

Checked on October 5, 2026.

• Klaviyo: getting started with flows
• Klaviyo: how to create an email welcome series
• Klaviyo: how to create an abandoned cart flow
• Klaviyo: abandoned Added to Cart flow for Shopify
• Klaviyo: how to create a post-purchase flow
• Klaviyo: how to create a winback flow
• Klaviyo: how to create a browse abandonment flow
• Klaviyo: understanding how back in stock flows work
• Klaviyo: how to create a sunset flow
• Klaviyo pricing