Hey, Scott Austin here.

Email is arguably the most valuable marketing channel for a brand.  You see, the average established brand is getting 1/4th to 1/3rd of its revenue through email.  Now that's the average.  Some brands are doing better than that.

Now, as most of you know, I'm a big fan of using Klaviyo for email.  It couples really well with Shopify and other apps that you may use in your Shopify store.  So I'm going to be using Klaviyo terminology in this conversation.  But the ideas apply to any platform.  And if you don't yet have Klaviyo, you can support this podcast by using my affiliate link in the show notes.

There's a flow that is frequently overlooked by brands setting up their Klaviyo and that flow is browse abandonment.  Browse abandonment occurs when a visitor views products on your store.  Klaviyo is tracking this for you and adding events to your customers' profiles.  As the customer is on the product page, they are not as far down the funnel as an abandoned cart. The goal of a browse abandonment flow is to re-engage these visitors and encourage them to return to your store to complete their shopping experience and make a purchase.  As we all know, life is distracting.  So the browse abandonment flow is your tool to help remind the abandoning customer that your brand exists and invite them back to your store.

Klaviyo says that Browse abandonment emails drive conversions at a rate of 0.96%, compared to the 0.10% conversion rate of the average email campaign.  In the brand's that I work with, the Browse Abandonment flow isn't a top performer - it's usually in the middle of the flows.  I'm measuring this performance as revenue produced.  The reason the conversion can be good and revenue is just okay is due to the low volume that goes through the Browse Abandonment.  You see your browsing customers have to have their Klaviyo cookie set in order to track them.  This is going to be true for customers that have opted in for email marketing and customers that have placed an order.  And that's not going to be a bulk of your customers, but it will be a bulk of your valuable customers. In the end, the flow is easy to set up and once its set, it's going to provide returns forever.  So it's worth the effort.

In my experience, a nuanced Browse Abandonment will perform better than a direct sales upsell.  What I mean by a direct sales upsell is a flow that offers a coupon code for the product that the customer abandoned.  But customers, in my experience, don't like the big brother nature of getting an email that knows the customer was on a specific page.  So, to not give the big brother vibes, I set up a more nuanced flow.  And it will be structured differently for each brand as each brand is different.  Here's the thought process that I'll go through to determine the structure of the flow.

You want to make decisions on if you'll be forking the flow and for what segments.  Here are some typical conditional splits that I'll put into Browse Abandonments:

1. Split between purchasers and those that have not purchased from your store.  The messaging to these two groups can be very different.  For non-purchasers, you'll want to address their potential high-level objections like shipping and return policies.  For repeat customers, you may want to reinforce their past positive experience by showing customer reviews.  Or you could build awareness of your subscription program, if you have one, and the customer benefits it provides.  I find that most brands will benefit from splitting between purchasers and non-customers.
2. Domestic versus international customers.  Some brands have very different customer objections for their domestic and international audiences.  This could be because of import duties, shipping costs or other reasons.  I recommend that if you have split your Abandoned Cart flow between domestic and international, then you should do the same split in your Browse Abandonment flow.
3. Product or product type specific content.  If your products vary greatly, you may want different content for different content types.  For example, different content for women's clothing and men's clothing.
4. Varying content based on the number of products viewed.  If someone has viewed several products on your site, they may be having difficulties picking the best one for them.  But if they've only viewed one product, they may be comparing you to other stores.  As such, your flow can provide different messages to these groups.

Once you've decided how you will fork your flow, it's time to decide what the content of each email will be.  I recommend sending multiple emails to a customer and try to have 2 or 3 for each recipient.  Think about the particular customer segment you are designing for and create a flow that tells a story to them.  For example, let's say that the segment is for a non-purchaser that viewed multiple products.  Email #1 could be a friendly reminder to bring your store back to the top of their mind.  It could show your top selling products.  Email #2 could highlight a buyer's guide that you provide for the product category they were looking at.  And email #3 could let the customer know that your support team is always available to answer any questions that they have.  Putting this content in this order is a logical sequencing of escalating education or support for the customer.

Here are some examples of the content that you could include in your Browse Abandonment flow.  I prefer to have a single content focus and call to action in each mail.

1. Popular products.  Show the customer the top selling products in your store or in the category they were browsing.  I add the products the customer was viewing to the products shown which is easy to do in Klaviyo.  That way, your customer is getting positive social proof about the products they are interested in.
2. Product education.  Provide in depth information on your products.
3. Customer reviews.  Provide customers reviews that address common concerns or questions that customers have.
4. Buyer's Guides or Quizzes.  If you have them, buyer's guide and quizzes can help customers navigate the choices they need to make to find the best product for them.
5. Bust objections.  If you know the common objections that customers have when shopping your store, bust them for those customers that have not purchased from you before.  Examples of content in this email type include talking about your no questions asked return policy.  Or talking about the ethical sourcing of your products and materials.
6. Awards.  Let customers know about any industry awards that your brand has won.
7. Offer help.  Let customers know the ways they can engage customer support if they have any questions.  I've worked with brands that even offer a free online consult.
8. Compare your product or brand to competitors.  Let the customer know about your differentiators versus your competitors.
9. Press.  Show press coverage of your brand or products.
10. Subscription awareness.  Let past-purchasers know about your subscription program if you have one and the savings and benefits that it provides.
11. Loyalty awareness.  Let past-purchasers know about your loyalty program if you one and the savings and benefits that it provides. 

Those are some common email content topics that I use when building out Browse Abandonment flows.  But this list is not exhaustive.  If you have a different idea for your brand, then by all means, use it.  You know your brand and customers best.

Here are some best practices for you to think about when building out your flow.

1. When creating your flow, use the default Browse Abandonment flow in Klaviyo.  It will set up the right trigger and filters for you as a starting point.  I then usually delete the email they create and add my own emails.
2. Have smart sending turned on.  Your Browse Abandonment flow should have some of the least aggressive marketing that you are doing.  By turning smart sending on, these email won't be sent if you've recently sent a more aggressive marketing flow or campaign.  By not sending this one, the customer can focus on the other emails.
3. Filter out people in country's that you do not ship to.  I would only do this if you are getting a lot of browse abandonment events from countries that you don't ship to. 
4. Control the frequency that customers get put into the flow.  I usually set it so a customer will only go through the flow once ever 6 months.  In Klaviyo you do that by adding a profile filter in the flow trigger.  There's a filter for 'has not been in this flow' that you can set to 6 months or whatever frequency cap is best for your brand.
5. Do not send to recent purchasers as they may just be looking for product information on their purchase.
6. Each email should have a single, clear call to action.  That call to action should take them to your store to a page that will engage in them in a shopping experience.
7. Timing.  I like to send the first email out 24 hours after the event trigger.  And then I space the second and subsequent emails out by several days.  Usually 4 to 7 days apart.

So here's the summary of this episode:

1. Email is a significant revenue driver.  Implement it if you haven't done so already.
2. Browse Abandonment is often overlooked flow that you should implement if you haven't done so already.
3. For your flow, you'll need to decide if you'll fork the flow for different segments.
4. Create email content for each of the segments.  Put yourself in the mindset of that segment when you create your content.
5. Each segment should get 2 to 3 emails in the flow.

I hope that this episode gives you the information that you need to create a Browse Abandonment flow that adds revenue to your brand.

Thanks for listening.