What is abandoned cart recovery?
Abandoned cart recovery is the lifecycle flow that starts when a shopper the store can identify, because they are logged in, have entered an email at checkout, or are a known subscriber, adds items to a cart and does not place an order within a delay the store sets. The flow sends a short series of messages by email or SMS with the cart contents and a path back to checkout, and it ends when the shopper buys or the series completes.
It is the flow most stores build first and the one most often left running badly: too many messages, no exit on purchase, and a discount in the first message that teaches shoppers to abandon on purpose.
What should trigger it, and when?
The trigger should be a cart with items and no order after a delay long enough that ordinary hesitation has passed but short enough that the intent is still warm; many stores use an hour or a few hours, and the right delay is read from how long this store's shoppers typically take between adding to cart and ordering. The Retention FTE reads that gap from the store's own sessions and orders and proposes the delay from it.
Only identified shoppers can be messaged. A cart from an anonymous session has no address to send to; recovery for those shoppers is a job for on-site messaging and the Conversion FTE's checkout work, not for email.
How many messages, and what should each one do?
A recovery series should be short and each message should do one thing. The first reminds: here is your cart, here is the way back. The second answers the likely objection: shipping cost, returns, sizing, delivery time, drawn from the questions the help desk sees most. A third, if the store sends one, closes the series, and it is the only place a discount belongs if the store's rules allow one at all. After that the flow stops; the shopper has decided.
- Message one: the cart, the path back, no pressure.
- Message two: the objection answered from real policy: shipping, returns, sizing or delivery.
- Message three: the close, with an incentive only where the owner's discount rules permit it for that segment.
Why is the exit condition the most important setting?
The exit condition is the most important setting because a recovery message that arrives after the purchase is the fastest way to look careless and to earn an unsubscribe. The flow must check for an order before every send and remove the shopper the moment one exists, including an order placed through another channel or for a different cart. It must also exit when the cart is emptied, and when the shopper unsubscribes.
The Retention FTE's flow audit tests the exit with a purchase mid-flow, and the same check runs daily so a platform change that breaks the exit is caught the next morning.
When should a recovery flow discount, if ever?
A recovery flow should discount rarely and late, if at all, because a discount in the first message teaches shoppers that abandoning the cart is the way to get a lower price. Stores that discount every abandon see abandonment rise. The Retention FTE offers an incentive only where the owner's rules allow it for that segment, only in the closing message, and never to shoppers whose order history shows they buy at full price.
The honest alternative to a discount is an answer. Most abandons are about shipping cost or uncertainty, and a message that states the policy plainly recovers many of those without training anyone.
How is recovery measured honestly?
Recovery is measured honestly by comparing purchases between shoppers who received the flow and a holdout who did not, over the same horizon, because a large share of abandoned carts complete on their own. Attributed recovered revenue counts all of those as recovered. The Retention FTE reports recovered revenue against the attribution window printed on the report, proposes a holdout on the flow, and reports the difference when the holdout has run.
It also reports the cost side: unsubscribes and complaints from the flow, so a series that recovers a little and erodes a lot is visible as such.
What does the Retention FTE do with this flow?
The Retention FTE on ftes.ai builds or repairs the recovery flow from the store's own data: the delay from the add-to-order gap, the objection message from the help desk's most common pre-purchase questions, the discount rule from the owner's remit, the exit tested and rechecked daily. Every message is previewed and approved, the cap and suppression list apply, and the report prints its window and its holdout.
It does not decide the discount policy. That stays with the owner, and the flow works inside it.