The 7 Email Flows Every Canadian Shopify Store Needs Running Right Now

Automated email flows are the closest thing to a revenue machine that e-commerce offers. Once built and activated, they run continuously — triggering based on customer behaviour, sending at exactly the right moment, and generating revenue with no ongoing effort.

Most Canadian Shopify brands have one or two flows active. The brands generating 30–40% of revenue from email have all seven — and they’re CASL compliant from the ground up.

This post covers each of the seven flows, how they work, how to build them, and what CASL compliance looks like within each.

Before You Build: CASL Compliance in Automated Flows

Every automated email that constitutes a Commercial Electronic Message (CEM) under CASL must meet three conditions:

Consent: The recipient must have express or implied consent
Identification: Your business name and physical address in every email
Unsubscribe: A functional unsubscribe link in every email, processed within 10 business days

For Shopify flows, consent is handled at the flow trigger level — you should filter each flow to send only to consented contacts. How you implement this depends on your ESP:

Klaviyo: Use flow filters to restrict sends to “Accepts Marketing = true” or contacts within your implied consent window (3 years from last purchase date for existing customers)
ActiveCampaign: Use list membership or tag conditions to ensure only consented contacts receive automated CEMs
HubSpot: Use consent properties to filter automated enrollment

Ensure every flow email template includes your business name, physical mailing address, and unsubscribe link.

Flow 1: Welcome Series

Trigger: New subscriber joins your marketing list (checkout opt-in, website form, pop-up)

Why it matters: New subscribers are at peak engagement. They’ve just chosen to hear from you. Capitalise on that attention with a series that builds brand trust, showcases your products, and guides them toward a first purchase.

Structure (7 emails over 21 days):

Email 1 (immediate): Welcome — deliver the promise of what they signed up for. Brand story, compelling imagery, your unique value proposition.
Email 2 (day 2): Your products — hero products, bestsellers, what makes them different.
Email 3 (day 4): Social proof — reviews, press, customer testimonials, user-generated content.
Email 4 (day 7): Education or values — what your brand stands for, how your products are made, your commitment to quality.
Email 5 (day 10): Solve a specific customer problem — “Still looking for the right [product]?” with a helpful guide.
Email 6 (day 14): Incentive email — if you’re using a discount, this is where it typically goes. Make it time-limited.
Email 7 (day 21): Final conversion email — last call before moving them to your standard campaign cadence.

CASL note: This flow only sends to express consent subscribers (those who actively opted in). Implied consent from a purchase without an explicit marketing opt-in should not trigger this flow — use the post-purchase flow instead.

Platforms: Buildable on Klaviyo, ActiveCampaign, HubSpot, Campaign Monitor, and Mailchimp.

Flow 2: Abandoned Cart

Trigger: Customer starts checkout but doesn’t complete purchase (Shopify abandoned checkout event)

Why it matters: Around 70% of Canadian e-commerce checkouts are abandoned. Recovering even 10–15% of these represents significant revenue for most brands.

Structure (3 emails):

Email 1 (1 hour post-abandonment): Gentle reminder — product imagery, key benefits, easy return-to-cart button. No urgency at this point.
Email 2 (24 hours): Reinforce the decision — product reviews, social proof specific to the abandoned products, answer likely objections.
Email 3 (72 hours): Conditional incentive — offer a discount or free shipping for first-time abandoners (suppress for returning customers to protect margin).

Segmentation within the flow:

First-time abandoners: Deliver incentive in Email 3
Returning abandoners: Skip incentive — focus on brand value and urgency

CASL note: Canadian customers who reach checkout have an existing business relationship (they’re a customer) or are in a prospective business relationship (they’ve engaged with your store). This flow applies to implied consent contacts. Filter to ensure you’re not sending to contacts who have unsubscribed.

Platforms: All major ESPs support this flow with Shopify integration. Klaviyo has the most native integration.

Flow 3: Browse Abandonment

Trigger: Customer views a product page but doesn’t add to cart (Shopify product view event)

Why it matters: More visitors browse without adding to cart than actually start checkout. Browse abandonment flows reach these earlier-stage intent signals and can generate as much revenue as abandoned cart flows.

Structure (2 emails):

Email 1 (30–60 minutes post-browse): “Still thinking about it?” — feature the viewed product with full product details, key benefits, and a clear call to action.
Email 2 (48 hours): Alternative products or a “why customers love this” email featuring reviews and social proof.

Important: Only send this flow if the contact viewed a product but did NOT start checkout — use flow filters to exclude contacts who progressed to cart (those should be in the abandoned cart flow).

CASL note: Same implied consent consideration as abandoned cart. Also note: browse abandonment relies on identifying the visitor — they must be a known subscriber, not an anonymous browser.

Platforms: Klaviyo is the primary platform for this flow on Shopify — it captures real-time product view events natively. ActiveCampaign can do this with additional site tracking setup. Other ESPs typically require third-party tools.

Flow 4: Post-Purchase Series

Trigger: Customer places an order (Shopify order placed event)

Why it matters: Post-purchase is when customer engagement is highest. The post-purchase series converts one-time buyers into repeat customers and dramatically improves LTV.

Structure (6 emails over 90 days):

Order confirmation (immediate, transactional): Order summary, payment confirmation, delivery estimate. No marketing content — keep this transactional.
Shipping confirmation (on dispatch, transactional): Tracking link, estimated arrival. Again, purely transactional.
Email 1 (3 days post-delivery): Product tips and usage guide — help them get the most from their purchase.
Email 2 (10 days): Review request — well-timed review requests generate higher response rates and better quality reviews.
Email 3 (21 days): Community/brand content — deepen the relationship with content aligned to your brand values.
Email 4 (45 days): Cross-sell — recommendations based on what they purchased.
Email 5 (75 days): Replenishment prompt (if applicable to the product category) or soft win-back nudge.

CASL note: Post-purchase transactional emails are not CEMs and don’t require consent. Marketing emails in the post-purchase series (Emails 1–5) are CEMs and require consent — typically satisfied by the implied consent from the existing business relationship.

Platforms: All major ESPs. Klaviyo enables product-personalised post-purchase emails using Shopify order data.

Flow 5: Win-Back Flow

Trigger: Customer has not purchased in X days (varies by category — typically 90–180 days)

Why it matters: Lapsed customers are your warmest acquisition prospects. They know your brand, they’ve bought from you once, and they may have simply drifted away. A targeted win-back campaign re-engages a meaningful percentage at near-zero incremental cost.

Structure (3 emails over 30 days):

Email 1 (day 0): “We miss you” — curated new arrivals or product highlights relevant to their previous purchase history.
Email 2 (day 10): Incentive — a modest discount or free shipping offer to come back.
Email 3 (day 21): Last call — if no engagement after this, move to suppression.

Setting the trigger timing:

Fashion, apparel, lifestyle: 90–120 days (seasonal buyers)
Beauty, skincare, supplements: 60–90 days (replenishment categories)
Home goods, outdoor gear: 120–180 days (longer purchase cycles)

CASL note: Win-back flows must verify the contact is still within their implied consent window. If a customer last purchased more than 3 years ago and has no express consent on file, they are outside implied consent and should not receive CEMs. Build a filter for this.

Platforms: All major ESPs support win-back flows with Shopify purchase date data.

Flow 6: VIP / Loyalty Flow

Trigger: Customer reaches a purchase frequency or spend threshold (e.g., 3rd purchase, $500 CAD cumulative spend)

Why it matters: VIP customers generate disproportionate revenue. Recognising and rewarding them builds loyalty that retains them for years. Ignoring them risks losing your highest-value customers to competitors.

Structure (ongoing, event-triggered):

VIP threshold email: Acknowledge their loyalty — personalise this with their name and purchase history. Make them feel genuinely seen.
VIP benefits communication: Explain what their VIP status means — early access, special pricing, exclusive products.
VIP-only campaign cadence: Create a separate VIP segment for campaigns. Give VIPs early access to new arrivals, sale periods, and exclusive content.

Anniversary email: Triggered annually from their first purchase date — “You’ve been with us for [X] year(s)” is a powerful loyalty touchpoint that requires almost no effort.

CASL note: VIP emails are CEMs. Consent requirements apply — same as standard post-purchase flows, typically satisfied by implied consent from ongoing purchases.

Platforms: Klaviyo handles this elegantly with predictive analytics and custom metric conditions. ActiveCampaign and HubSpot support it through custom scoring.

Flow 7: Sunset / Suppression Flow

Trigger: Subscriber has not opened or clicked any email in 180+ days

Why it matters: Sending to unengaged subscribers:

Damages your sender reputation and deliverability for everyone on your list
Inflates your ESP subscriber count and cost
Generates spam complaints that compound over time

A sunset flow makes a final attempt to re-engage the subscriber and, if unsuccessful, suppresses them from future sends.

Structure (3 emails over 21 days):

Email 1: “Are you still there?” — plain text style, no graphics, genuine tone. “We haven’t seen you open our emails in a while — are you still interested in hearing from us?”
Email 2 (7 days): Last chance — “We’ll remove you from our list unless you want to stay” with a simple “Keep me subscribed” button.
Email 3 (14 days): Removal notice — “We’ve removed you from our email list. You can resubscribe any time at [link].”

Suppress all contacts who do not engage with these three emails.

CASL note: Suppressing a contact is not the same as processing an unsubscribe. A suppressed contact can resubscribe if they choose. Do not automatically re-add suppressed contacts — that would violate CASL.

Platforms: All major ESPs support sunset flows with engagement-based triggers.

Building All 7 Flows: Time Investment and Returns

A complete 7-flow stack typically requires:

3–6 weeks of build time
25–40 emails written, designed, and deployed
Integration configuration and testing

Once built, these flows run continuously with minimal maintenance. For a Canadian Shopify brand generating $1.5 million CAD annually, a full flow stack typically adds $400K–$700K CAD in incremental annual email revenue.

How Excelohunt Builds Canadian Shopify Flow Stacks

Excelohunt builds complete 7-flow stacks for Canadian Shopify brands — strategy, design, copy, build, deployment, and testing all included. We implement CASL compliance within every flow and work across Klaviyo, ActiveCampaign, HubSpot, Campaign Monitor, and Mailchimp.

Our Canadian brand clients typically see full build deployment within 4–6 weeks and are generating incremental revenue from flows within days of launch.

Ready to Build Your Complete Flow Stack?

Our free audit identifies which flows you’re running, which are missing, and estimates the revenue impact.

Book your free email marketing audit and let’s build the automation stack your Canadian Shopify store needs.