Abandoned Cart Email Ideas for Shopify Retail Merchant

You might not be able to get all cart-abandoners to finish the checkout process and triple your sales, but a nice try can change everyone’s mind. 

Some customers may have never planned to buy in the first place, but it’s still worth your time to get rid of as many lingering doubts as you can because many of them can be convinced.

Abandoned cart emails are easy to make and can do a lot to bring back customers who were on the fence. Every email about an abandoned cart must have two things:

1. Something to remind them of what they’ve given up

Your customers may decide to buy from you again after some time has passed. It could take a few hours for them to remember what they liked about the things in the first place. 

This is a warm lead, not a cold reach out like a standard business email.

Take this example from Hello Merch as an example. It’s a very simple message that says what the customer has given up. 

It gives me a link to quickly get back to their cart, skipping the registration page so they don’t have to fill out all of their information again.

2. Excellent copy

How do you put together a good marketing email? It’s important to have a great subject line, great copy, and good images. The next few emails are great at least one of these things.

TIPS AND TRICKS (email ideas)

Every email about an abandoned cart needs to have a catchy subject line and an easy way to get back to the cart or, at the very least, show the items that were left behind. 

The following things aren’t necessary, but they’re nice to have if you can.

Offer a discount

Most people abandon their carts when they see that the final price is higher than expected.

When people think about how much they’re going to pay, they usually add up the prices of each item they put in the cart. 

They don’t always take taxes or shipping into account, and when they do, they often give low estimates.

This is why prices are three of the top four reasons people leave their carts.

And it’s easy to win back customers who were scared of the final price: give them a discount.

It’s easy to give discounts. Please choose how much you want to share, make a discount code, and leave it in the email for an abandoned cart.

Now you have to consider whether discounts make sense for your business carefully. You know that many people leave their carts behind, but no two stores have the same mix of reasons. 

You have a good chance of getting people to buy after offering a discount, but you don’t want to lose too much money.

You have to walk a fine line and decide if and how you want to offer discounts. There is no right answer. 

Your customers may back out of deals because of prices or reasons that have nothing to do with them. You have to figure out how they act.

HTML

If you know a little HTML or can tweak existing graphics, it’s a good idea to make some interesting visuals.

We all know how important it is to make websites with beautiful themes. We also know that good photos of products sell more of them.

Again, think of emails about carts that were left empty as another way to market. If all of your other emails are very pretty, so should this one be.

It has bright colors, text that looks like bubbles, and many links that take you all over Urban Outfitters. There is a dog, but only because it came with the product we chose.

The email from Fifty Three, which was already shown above, is simple and classy. Even though it’s mostly about the text, that doesn’t mean the text should be plain.

If making great visuals is hard for you, don’t worry about it. Instead, focus on writing a copy that makes people want to read more. 

HTML is a nice-to-have but not a must-have because the difference between having great visuals and not having them is not as big as having an email and not having one.

Reserve the items in the cart

There’s another way to use the scarcity effect to your advantage.

Your customers may be more likely to check out if you promise to hold their items for a certain but limited amount of time.

Customers know that popular items often sell out in small stores that don’t have very sophisticated supply chains. If they know sellers will keep the things, they may be more likely to buy.

We put “reserve the items” in the “nice-to-have” category instead of the “must-have” category because we know you want to ship to customers who have already paid in case you run out of stock. And you should check for sure. 

So, only let people reserve the cart if you have a lot of stock and can afford to hold items for many people who might not pay.

One final email

Almost everything we’ve talked about here can be put into one email. Its design is more practical than flashy, but it makes up for that in other ways.

Are you taking notes?

The Talking Friends Shop gives a 10 percent discount as soon as a customer walks in.

Then it indicates that their shopping cart will be held for three days and gives a link to go there right away.

It also gives a number to call and an email address if they need help. It’s not directly to the person who can answer the question.

Lastly, it really want to know why people don’t finish their purchases. So it did a quick survey for customers and put a link to it on the site. 

We’ve seen 30 emails, but this is the only one that asks customers who leave their carts without buying anything to fill out a survey.

Now that’s a dedication to finding out why their carts get left behind and what could be done to stop it.

So when is the right time to send these emails? 

When you send emails can make a big difference in how well they work. There is no right or wrong answer, but your email should arrive while the shopper is still thinking about buying. Knowing when most people shop online can also help you figure out the best time to send emails to people who have left items in their carts.

There’s also the question of whether or not they still need the product, which can change depending on the type of purchase.

Based on what we’ve learned from our clients’ data, abandonment emails work best when sent within or around an hour of the abandonment.

But this is just an example, and the same might not be true in all industries or price ranges. 

For example, shoppers may need to think more about items with a higher average order value, and sending within an hour may be too soon.

The only way to know for sure is to try out different send times to see which works best for your target customers.

Conclusion

You see, it’s easy to set up emails for carts that have been left empty, and everyone should do it since so many people do it. Learn from the experts above, and start making up lost sales immediately.