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Problem Solver II
July 6, 2021
Solved

Abandoned Cart vs Checkout Started

  • July 6, 2021
  • 20 replies
  • 14305 views

Is it general practices to have both abandoned cart flows flows going at the same time where one triggers Added to Cart and another triggers the Checkout Started or is one preferred over the other?

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Best answer by elisegaines

    Hi @jmacman! Great question. We do recommend using two flows, one with each trigger you mentioned. The Add to Cart flow captures browsers who may not make it to the checkout page, while the Started Checkout flow captures those who start a checkout but don’t finish it. 

    The Started Checkout event shows a higher degree of intention than the Add to Cart event, so you can tailor the two flows accordingly. Just make sure to add this filter to the “Add to Cart” flow: 

    What someone has done > Started Checkout > zero times since joining this flow 

    That way, your customers won’t get both flows at the same time :) 

     

    I hope this helps! 

    Elise

    20 replies

    Dov
    Klaviyo Alum
    November 10, 2022

    Hi @Joe B,

    Thanks for sharing this with us.

    You are correct, Shopify won’t store the entire cart based on Added to Cart, this will only “capture” the single item that was added to the cart at that time.

    To do this, you can use the default Abandoned Cart flow (using the Added to Cart trigger) within the Flows Library. This default flow will include the button with the correct tag needed to re-direct back to the item they added to their cart. For Shopify, the tag will be 

    {{ event.URL }}

    In order to re-direct a user back to their entire cart, you’ll need to trigger an Abandoned Cart flow using the Started Checkout event using

    {{ event.extra.responsive_checkout_url }}

    I hope that’s helpful.

     

    DD
    Contributor I
    December 20, 2022

    Hello everyone,

     

    I’ve set up 3 flows, a Browse Abandonement flow, a Cart Abandonement flow linked to the Add to Cart event, and finally a Cart Abandonement flow linked to the Checked Out Event.

    Since the Check Out is the event closest to a purchase and its flow is therefore the most consistent one, here are the filters that I’ve added to each (besides the one that excludes all the users who have placed an order since the flow has started):

    • Browse Abandonement flow: filter including only users that have added to cart 0 times before the flow has started + checked out 0 times before the flow has started
    • Cart Abandonement (Add to Cart): filter including only users that have checked out 0 times before the flow has started
    • Cart Abandonement (Checked out): none

    Is that correct?

    Thank you,

     

    Giulio

    Dov
    Klaviyo Alum
    December 21, 2022

    Hi @Giulio Lorenzini,

    Thanks for sharing this with our community.

    That all looks good. In addition, I would also add in “skip anyone who has been in this flow” in the last 30 days for the browse abandonment and cart abandonment (add to cart) because these flows will fire each time a user views an item or adds an item to their cart. If the user is adding multiple items this will prevent them from getting multiple emails. Aside from that, everything looks good!

    Thanks for being a community member.

    DD
    Contributor I
    December 21, 2022

    Hi @Giulio Lorenzini,

    Thanks for sharing this with our community.

    That all looks good. In addition, I would also add in “skip anyone who has been in this flow” in the last 30 days for the browse abandonment and cart abandonment (add to cart) because these flows will fire each time a user views an item or adds an item to their cart. If the user is adding multiple items this will prevent them from getting multiple emails. Aside from that, everything looks good!

    Thanks for being a community member.

    Hi @Dov ,

    Thank you very much for your confirmation and for the additional information.
    Just to understand, why shouldn’t I “skip anyone who has been in this flow” for the cart abandonment (check-out)?
    Thank you,

    Giulio

    Dov
    Klaviyo Alum
    December 22, 2022

    Hi @Giulio Lorenzini,

    Thank you for your follow-up note.

    Hi @Giulio Lorenzini,

    Thanks for sharing this with our community.

    That all looks good. In addition, I would also add in “skip anyone who has been in this flow” in the last 30 days for the browse abandonment and cart abandonment (add to cart) because these flows will fire each time a user views an item or adds an item to their cart. If the user is adding multiple items this will prevent them from getting multiple emails. Aside from that, everything looks good!

    Thanks for being a community member.

    Hi @Dov ,

    Thank you very much for your confirmation and for the additional information.
    Just to understand, why shouldn’t I “skip anyone who has been in this flow” for the cart abandonment (check-out)?
    Thank you,

    Giulio

    Unlike the other two flows which only store a single item per event, the Abandoned Cart flow using Checkout Started will store the user’s entire cart in a single event. Therefore, the Abandoned Cart flow using Checkout Started is much less likely to fire multiple events (which would trigger a flow multiple times) during a single site visit by the customer. This means the “skip anyone” filter is not necessary for that flow.

     

    DD
    Contributor I
    December 22, 2022

    Hi @Dov ,

    Thank you, all very clear.

    In terms of days, I’ve set 7 days for the Abandoned Cart flow using Added to Cart and 15 days for the Browse Abandonement flow.

    Does that look good to you?

    Thank you,

     

    Giulio

    Dov
    Klaviyo Alum
    December 23, 2022

    Hi @Giulio Lorenzini,

    I’m happy to hear it!

    Our default flows use a longer time frame but it really depends on site traffic. If you have a lot of users checking out frequently I don’t see an issue with using 7 or 15 days. You can always change things up to experiment with shorter or longer time frames.

    Thanks for being a community member.

    DD
    Problem Solver I
    March 11, 2023

    I’ve noticed a user can have Check Out Started but not Add To Cart events. It means your ATC flow will never get triggered. 

    You definitely need both flows for this reason!

    My concern is that I don’t want to annoy people getting both emails. I’ve configured it like so.

    ATC trigger flow:

    1. Checkout started zero times
    2. Placed order zero times
    3. ATC zero times

     

    Checkout Started trigger flow:

    1. Placed order zero times
    2. ATC zero times

    Is this the correct setup?

    Contributor I
    March 8, 2024

    This is great info… Dumb question. 

    Obviously the customers who are in these flows need to have an email on file.  The only way to get an email on file is by going through the checkout flow, or signing up for our eNewsletter.   Does Klaviyo have other methods in capturing emails?  If a customers not logged in, will Klaviyo still be able to identify the customer’s email (in the case for browse and add to cart flows) based on session matching?   

    We use Shopify.  We have high value items and not a lot of orders / month.  We have a browse and check out abandonment set up, but not add to cart.  Trying to figure out if adding an add to cart will move the needle. 

     

    Thanks!
    Jeff

     

    Contributor I
    March 19, 2024

    This Can’t be right!
    How this is possible? I want to make a checkout flow.
    the “checkout started” should be at least one. no?