Abandoned cart emails: components and best practices, with 7 examples

---

Abandoned carts are an inevitable part of running a B2C brand.

70% of online shopping carts are abandoned, according to a meta-analysis by the Baymard Institute.

That means no matter how attractive your shop or how flawless your product, the majority of your customers will likely abandon their online shopping carts.

There are many reasons for this, some within your control—delivery charges, website errors, but some are not—readiness to buy, economic conditions, everyday distractions.

Here, we walk you through the essentials of the abandoned cart—why people don’t complete a purchase, the importance of abandoned cart emails, and how each part of these emails works to nudge people towards a sale.

If you already have a basic understanding of abandoned carts, skip to the end to explore some best practices, illustrated with real-world examples.

What is an abandoned cart email?

An abandoned cart email is an automated message triggered when an online shopper places an item in their cart but doesn’t complete a purchase. It re-engages shoppers by reminding them about the items in their cart and encourages them to complete their purchase. You can send one-off abandoned cart emails or create a series of automated emails.

Customers often visit online shops and browse items they like. But when they add a product to their cart, they show a genuine intent to buy it.

This is extremely valuable information for brands. When you know someone is close to buying, you can not only send them an abandoned cart flow, but also include them in a highly engaged audience segment. If they don’t end up buying from your abandoned cart email, you’ll still know they’re close to buying, which means you can send them other offers and promotions in future.

Abandoned cart emails and data privacy

A common misconception about abandoned cart emails is that they’re illegal and not compliant with data privacy regulations.

But instead of third-party data—customer information you collect indirectly from various sources, such as marketplaces and ad networks—abandoned cart emails use first-party data: online behavioural data you observe after someone has given you permission to contact them via email or SMS.

Marketing to customers using data you collect with their explicit consent, such as the information they provide when signing up to your mailing list, is legal and compliant with data privacy requirements.

Why do people abandon their shopping carts?

The meta-analysis by the Baymard Institute found that nearly 43% of shoppers abandon carts because they’re either “just browsing” or “not ready to buy”. But when they excluded this group, Baymard also found that people don’t buy because:

Shipping and other fees are too high

Online shopping doesn’t go hand-in-hand with the unexpected—if delivery or other charges are too high, it’s a surprise that prompts extra consideration.

When high delivery and handling charges significantly increase the overall cost of an online purchase, customers may see the final price as too expensive compared to the product’s original cost. This causes hesitation, which often leads to cart abandonment.

To prevent this, offer free delivery thresholds or simply include delivery costs in the product’s price. If delivery charges are a key reason people are abandoning your carts, consider offering free delivery as an incentive in your abandoned cart email.

The product delivery estimate is too slow

Blame Amazon—people want their products quickly. You don’t necessarily need to offer same-day delivery to keep abandoned cart rates low, but your delivery estimates do need to be timely so more people finish their purchases.

A slow delivery estimate can outweigh someone’s immediate desire for the item—and as a result, shoppers will seek out alternatives that can deliver more quickly.

To prevent this, offer a range of delivery options—including, most importantly, express services. Sometimes people are prepared to pay more for faster delivery, and if they aren’t, you can offer these incentives for free in your abandoned cart email for high-value carts.

They don’t trust the website with their card information

Card scams are on the rise. According to The Motley Fool, there were 65% more reported cases of credit card fraud in 2024 than in 2019.

Many people are sensitive to this and are constantly on the lookout for scams that could compromise their cards. If a website appears to lack security measures, such as SSL certificates or trust badges, customers may feel their sensitive information is at risk, leading them to leave without completing their purchase.

Here are a few ways to minimise this type of cart abandonment:

• Ensure robust card encryption, such as requiring the CVV number.
• Display security certifications prominently.
• Provide clear information on privacy policies and data handling practices.

The returns policy isn’t satisfactory

Just like cart abandonment, returns are inevitable in ecommerce. According to data gathered by Invesp, at least 30% of all items ordered online are returned, compared to 8.89% in physical shops.

But here’s why you should make that process as easy as possible: according to Klaviyo’s 2025 future of consumer marketing report, 50% of consumers are convinced to give a brand a second chance after a negative experience if they’re offered compensation such as a refund, discount, or replacement.

Before they even buy, people will abandon their carts in the face of an unclear or restrictive returns policy. Half the battle of persuading someone to buy from your brand is reassurance—and a lack of reassurance that people can return products easily leads to hesitation at checkout.

While your website should feature transparent language about your returns policy, your abandoned cart email can also reinforce a smooth process for returns if you see this as a major reason people abandon their carts.

There aren’t enough payment methods

If someone can’t find their preferred method of payment, they’re much more likely to abandon their purchase.

Especially now, with so many convenient payment options—many of which don’t require much more than a CVV number entry and a click—it’s standard practice to offer a range of payment methods, such as:

• PayPal
• Apple Pay
• Venmo
• Google Pay
• Amazon Pay

Online retailers should integrate multiple payment solutions, including credit cards, digital wallets, and alternative payment methods, for a seamless and inclusive shopping experience.

Components of an effective abandoned cart email

Attention-grabbing subject line

The easiest way to grab attention is by personalising subject lines using customer profile properties like someone’s name, the products they left in their cart, or an offer tailored to any past browsing behaviour.

You may want to go with something simple like, “Alex, run faster with the shoes you left behind”, but someone’s browsing behaviour may indicate they’re shopping an entire category – in that case, something like, “Here’s 10% off all running apparel” may be the nudge someone needs to make a final decision to buy.

Product details

Product details about the item someone left behind should make up the bulk of your email copy. List key details like price, size, and colour, and always include an image of the product.

Personalisation

True personalisation goes beyond featuring the recipient’s name and their specific abandoned items. Today, that’s the bare minimum.

With a B2C CRM like Klaviyo, you can take personalisation to the next level by combining multiple data sources to create a hyper-relevant abandoned cart email experience. Personalise your incentives and offers based on factors like:

• cart value: Offer incentives only for high-value carts.
• Browse abandonment or previous purchase history: Include additional product recommendations based on the product pages someone’s viewed or the products they’ve purchased.
• Loyalty or rewards points: Include someone’s unique points number or tier in the email and encourage them to use their rewards on their purchase.
• Customer support interactions: Exclude customers with open tickets from receiving an abandoned cart email.

Call to action (CTA)

A clear and compelling CTA is what leads the recipient back to their cart on your website to complete the purchase. It should be prominent, using a distinct colour and action-focused language, such as “Complete Your Purchase”, “Return to cart”, or perhaps “Claim Your Offer” if you’re providing a strong incentive.

Incentives and offers

Discounts, free delivery, or a limited-time offer are often the prompt a customer needs to follow through with their purchase. Your incentives should address your brand’s most common barriers to completing a sale, such as cost of the product or delivery charges.

If it doesn’t make sense for your brand’s economics to offer an incentive for every abandoned cart, consider segmenting high-value carts and only offering an incentive where a single purchase is worth significantly more.

Social proof

User-generated content such as customer testimonials, reviews, or ratings can build trust and ease concerns. Alongside a strong product image with detailed information, social proof is an excellent way to tip the balance towards a sale.

Urgency or scarcity

Urgency is a powerful way to encourage people to buy. Consider making your incentives time-limited by offering a personalised discount code, and include a countdown timer indicating when it expires.

Alternative product recommendations

If someone doesn’t complete a purchase, it might simply be that they need to see alternatives before deciding. Suggest related products, or showcase similar items that other shoppers have purchased, to provide a broader selection.

12 abandoned cart email best practices, with examples

1. Start by understanding why your customers abandon their carts

Think carefully about your customer’s experience. When they’re shopping on your website, what’s the most likely reason they abandon their cart?

Earlier we mentioned some of the most common reasons people abandon their carts. You can determine whether these apply by using a website heatmap tool like Hotjar, which allows you to observe user interactions on checkout pages. You might also consider testing a survey within your abandoned cart journey, and see if you can diagnose abandonment that way.

Another option is to run A/B tests on your checkout pages as a diagnostic tool. If you do, be sure to make only one change at a time. Changing too many elements at once can obscure the results, and you want to see a clear increase or decrease in completed purchases as you test different theories.

2. Personalise abandoned cart emails based on purchase history, cart size, and product preferences

Before you begin crafting your abandoned cart email content, ensure you understand and use trigger splits and conditional splits.

Much like customer segmentation, adding splits to your flows enables you to tailor your abandoned cart email messaging according to event and profile data such as purchase history, cart size, and product preferences.

“Sometimes, the best way to turn a missed sale into a conversion is by highlighting items a shopper may have overlooked,” says Sharon Goldstein, former CEO of LimeSpot.

“Including personalised product recommendations in an abandoned cart email can catch attention and generate much higher click-through rates as shoppers investigate new items that suit their interests,” Goldstein adds.

In this abandoned cart email, DTC grooming brand Beardbrand does an excellent job of following this guidance. Notice how they use not only personalised copy and a friendly tone to inspire customers to “reclaim” their cart, but also keep the product in focus, with distinct CTAs to attract the recipient’s attention.

Source: Really Good Emails

The challenge with abandoned cart personalisation is that there’s no one-size-fits-all strategy. Analyse your performance periodically to find the best approach.

It’s also important to filter out everyone who has abandoned a cart recently. Hitting these inboxes too frequently can annoy subscribers and increase unsubscribe rates.

3. Write a subject line that stands out in the inbox

A shopper can’t click on your email if they don’t open it. And they’re more likely to open it if the subject line speaks to them.

Grab attention in crowded inboxes with smart, punchy subject lines. Abandoned cart emails are a great place to experiment with clever copy and tone—as long as it fits your brand. Here, watch how drinks brand Liquid Death gets a shopper’s attention with dark humour.

Image source: Really Good Emails

4. Match your email copy to your brand voice

The aim of an abandoned cart email is to encourage shoppers to complete their purchase. Keep your email copy concise and minimal on punctuation, but don’t shy away from your brand’s tone and personality so that customers get to know you through your abandoned cart email.

In this abandoned cart example, sustainable activewear brand Girlfriend Collective uses a minimalist email template with clever copy: “Looks like you left something cute and sustainable in your cart. Don’t worry, we saved it for you.”

Image source: Girlfriend Collective

“This abandoned cart email from Girlfriend Collective is *chef’s kiss,*” says Alex McPeak, content marketing lead at Klaviyo. “I love the departure from ‘you forgot something/left something behind’ with ‘you dropped this’ and how they underscore the sustainability aspect, which is central to their brand.”

5. Feature high-quality product images of the abandoned item

By the time shoppers see your email, a thousand other thoughts could be occupying their mind—and your product is unlikely to be top of mind. To entice recipients to return to your product page, you’ll need to make it look really good with a high-quality product photo.

In this cart abandonment email, fashion brand Alex Mill uses most of the available space to highlight abandoned items with high-quality product images, then complements those with an appealing discount to encourage conversions.

Image source: Alex Mill

6. Mix in some social proof

Social proof can influence buying decisions by communicating the value of your products. More importantly, it can help you earn the trust of shoppers who are unfamiliar with your brand—according to Klaviyo’s future of consumer marketing report, customer reviews are the most influential factor when someone is making a first purchase with a brand.

You can also include star ratings and even social media mentions to convey authenticity and build trust. This cart abandonment email from Kim Kardashian’s shapewear brand, SKIMS, uses both star ratings and customer reviews.

Image source: SKIMS

7. Offer discount codes…

Personalised and limited-time discounts are a timeless strategy for creating a sense of urgency and increasing conversions in an abandoned cart flow. And in the face of economic volatility, they’re more important than ever—according to Klaviyo’s future of consumer marketing report, economic conditions have led 37% of consumers to seek out discounts and promotions from retail and ecommerce brands in the last 6 months.

The added benefit of offering a voucher code to abandoners is that it doesn’t reduce the value of your brand upfront.

A word of caution: Offering discounts to repeat cart abandoners can work against you by training them to wait for a discount before purchasing. One way to overcome that is by providing one-off discounts, like health and beauty brand Golde does here for new customers.

Image source: Golde

And if it really doesn’t make sense for your business economics to be handing out voucher codes for every abandoned cart, consider segmenting high-value carts and only offering an incentive on those where you stand to make more revenue from a single purchase.

8. …or consider offering free delivery instead

According to Baymard, 39% of cart abandoners walk away because extra costs, such as delivery, are too expensive. It stands to reason, then, that offering free delivery may persuade them to go ahead with their purchase.

Belle Murray, former ecommerce senior strategist at SmartBug Media, suggests this strategy as a way to do more than simply remind your customers that they left without buying: ‘Introduce a free delivery offer towards the end of your abandoned cart automation.’

‘Delivery cost is a very common reason customers leave before completing their purchase,’ says Murray. ‘A one-time free delivery offer is a great way to give them a nudge to place their first order. Keeping it at the end of your automation with engagement filters will help target engaged subscribers who are still on the fence about purchasing.’

Here, hair and body care brand Rudy’s offers free delivery to cart abandoners, highlights the offer at the very top, and includes a clear message about the offer’s urgency.

Image source: ReallyGoodEmails

9. Use a convincing CTA

The call to action (CTA) is one of the most important parts of your cart abandonment email. It gives your customers clear instructions about what they need to do next—return to their cart and complete their purchase.

Some traditional, clear CTAs for abandoned cart emails include:

• Buy now
• Shop now
• Keep shopping
• Return to cart
• Proceed to checkout
• Finish checking out
• Check out now
• Complete your order

If you’re offering a discount or free delivery to encourage someone to return to their cart, consider making that the CTA:

• Activate free delivery
• Get my 10% off
• Reveal new price

If your brand wants to come across a little softer, consider a less forceful CTA for your abandoned cart email:

• Take a closer look
• View cart
• Take another look

If your brand’s voice is cheeky or conversational, now is a great time to have fun with the CTA:

• Let’s do this
• Finish the job
• Seal the deal
• Treat yourself

10. Send multiple emails as part of an abandoned cart flow—but test it first

An abandoned cart email doesn’t have to be a one-off message. You can also create an abandoned cart series.

A simple abandoned cart email sequence might look something like this:

• Email 1: Remind customers about the items in their cart.
• Email 2: Send a follow-up message with a discount.
• Email 3: Share a product recommendation.

Email marketing expert Chase Dimond shares that in his experience, “having multiple abandoned cart emails results in 69% more orders than a single abandoned cart email.” But every brand is different, so always A/B test this for yourself.

11. Send your first email 2–4 hours post-abandonment

Timing your emails correctly is crucial to success—and nowhere is that more true than with the abandoned cart flow.

Don’t send an email too soon after your customer abandons their cart. Whatever distracted them from finishing their purchase may still be going on. And if it is, your email could be buried in their inbox or deleted entirely.

Send your first reminder 2–4 hours after abandonment, and keep it simple. You want it to feel natural and friendly.

If your customers don’t engage with your first email, consider sending another reminder 24–48 hours later. You can make the second reminder a bit more persuasive, or include a personalised offer to boost its impact.

If shoppers don’t respond to 2–3 emails, they’ve likely made their purchase somewhere else or abandoned it altogether.

At this stage, sending a third sales-driven email might not help. Instead, send an exploration email to suggest popular or related items and pave the way for a future sale.

12. Add SMS to your abandoned cart flows

For a flow with high purchase intent such as an abandoned cart, SMS is often an excellent channel for adding urgency to your messages. You can supplement your abandoned cart flow with SMS to make sure you’re communicating on your audience’s preferred channel.

If you’ve collected your customers’ mobile numbers and SMS consent, send a quick text reminding them about the items they left in their cart. That could be just the nudge they need to complete their purchase.

Important note: if you’re sending abandoned cart texts to US recipients, you must observe the following requirements:

• Use double opt-in when collecting SMS permissions.
• Only send one text per recipient.
• Send the text within 48 hours of someone abandoning a cart.

Learn how to set up an abandoned cart flow in minutes

One of the best things about abandoned cart flows is that they’re automated. That means when someone abandons a cart on your website, you don’t need to send an email manually.

Learn how to set up an abandoned cart flow in Klaviyo with dynamic content blocks, time delays, templates, and even SMS.

These abandoned cart flows are able to work the way they do because they draw from customer data housed in Klaviyo B2C CRM—the only CRM built for the unique needs of B2C businesses. When you combine customer data, marketing, service, and analytics all in one platform, you can:

• Segment high-value carts from low-value carts for a more cost-effective discount strategy.
• Leverage other browsing behaviour for more targeted—and more profitable—product recommendations.
• Equip your customer service team with more comprehensive customer knowledge, so their interactions are informed by past behaviours such as abandoned carts.