Email Marketing for WooCommerce: Best Plugins and Strategies
Email marketing remains the highest-ROI channel for ecommerce. According to Litmus, email generates $36 for every $1 spent, and that figure is even higher for WooCommerce stores that put transactional email touchpoints to work. Every order confirmation, shipping notification, and abandoned cart reminder is an opportunity to drive repeat purchases.
Yet most WooCommerce store owners treat email as an afterthought. They install a basic SMTP plugin, leave the default WooCommerce emails untouched, and wonder why customers never come back. This guide covers the best email marketing plugins for WooCommerce, the automation flows that actually drive revenue, and how to build an email strategy that turns one-time buyers into repeat customers. For strategies to recover lost sales before they even leave, see our guide on abandoned cart recovery strategies.
The 5 Best Email Marketing Plugins for WooCommerce
1. MailPoet, Best All-in-One Solution
MailPoet is a WordPress-native email marketing plugin that handles both transactional and marketing emails from inside your dashboard. No external platform needed.
Its WooCommerce integration provides automatic customer segmentation by purchase history, product category, lifetime value, and order count. The email builder is a drag-and-drop editor with WooCommerce-specific blocks (product recommendations, abandoned cart content, order details). Automation covers pre-built flows for welcome series, post-purchase follow-ups, abandoned cart recovery, and win-back campaigns. Deliverability runs through the built-in MailPoet Sending Service, with strong inbox placement rates. Pricing is free up to 500 subscribers, with paid plans starting at $10 a month based on list size.
Best for small to mid-size WooCommerce stores that want everything in one WordPress plugin without external SaaS tools.
Every transactional email your WooCommerce store sends is a marketing opportunity in disguise. The stores that treat order confirmations and shipping notifications as touchpoints, not afterthoughts, consistently see higher customer lifetime value.
2. Klaviyo, Best for Data-Driven Stores
Klaviyo is the gold standard for ecommerce email marketing. Its deep WooCommerce integration syncs every customer action, page views, add-to-carts, purchases, refunds, into customer profiles that power hyper-targeted campaigns.
WooCommerce integration provides real-time sync of orders, products, customer data, and browsing behavior via the official plugin. Segmentation includes predictive analytics like expected next order date, churn risk score, and predicted lifetime value. Automation runs through a visual flow builder with conditional splits, A/B testing, and time delays. SMS is included too, combining email and SMS marketing in one platform. Pricing is free up to 250 contacts and 500 email sends, with paid plans starting at $20 a month.
Best for growing stores that want advanced segmentation, predictive analytics, and combined email plus SMS capabilities.
3. AutomateWoo, Best for WooCommerce-Native Automation
AutomateWoo ($99 a year) is built specifically for WooCommerce automation. It doesn’t try to be a full email marketing platform; instead, it focuses on triggered workflows that respond to customer behavior.
Triggers cover abandoned cart, order status changes, subscription renewals, review requests, wishlist reminders, and custom date-based triggers. Actions include sending emails, applying coupons, adding tags, changing subscription status, sending SMS via Twilio, and triggering webhooks. Unique features include personalized coupon generation per customer, a refer-a-friend system, and automatic VIP tier assignment based on spend.
Best for stores already using an external ESP (like Mailchimp) that need WooCommerce-specific automation on top of their existing email setup.
4. Mailchimp for WooCommerce, Best for Beginners
Mailchimp needs no introduction. The official WooCommerce integration syncs customer and order data to Mailchimp for segmented campaigns, automated journeys, and landing pages.
WooCommerce integration handles automatic product sync, purchase tracking, and customer segmentation by purchase behavior. Templates include hundreds of pre-built email templates with product recommendation blocks. Automation covers customer journeys with pre-built flows for abandoned carts, post-purchase, and re-engagement. Extras include landing pages, social ads, postcards, and A/B testing. Pricing is free up to 500 contacts, with paid plans starting at $13 a month.
Best for beginners and small stores that want a familiar, well-documented platform with easy setup.
5. FluentCRM, Best Self-Hosted Alternative
FluentCRM runs entirely inside WordPress with no external dependencies. Your data stays on your server, there are no per-subscriber fees, and you control deliverability through your own SMTP.
WooCommerce integration covers order-based triggers, customer lifetime value tracking, and product-specific automation. The built-in CRM provides full customer profiles with purchase history, email engagement, and custom fields. Automation runs through a visual funnel builder with conditional logic, delays, and multi-step sequences. Pricing is $103 a year for a single site, with no per-subscriber fees regardless of list size.
Best for privacy-conscious stores, high-volume senders who want to avoid per-subscriber pricing, and stores with the technical capability to manage their own SMTP.
Plugin Comparison Table
| Plugin | Free Tier | Paid From | Best Feature | Hosting |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MailPoet | 500 subscribers | $10/mo | All-in-one WordPress native | Self-hosted |
| Klaviyo | 250 contacts | $20/mo | Predictive analytics | SaaS |
| AutomateWoo | No | $99/yr | WooCommerce triggers | Self-hosted |
| Mailchimp | 500 contacts | $13/mo | Ease of use | SaaS |
| FluentCRM | No | $103/yr | No per-subscriber fees | Self-hosted |
5 Email Automation Flows Every WooCommerce Store Needs
1. Welcome Series (3-5 Emails)
Triggered when a new customer creates an account or makes their first purchase. This is your chance to introduce your brand, set expectations, and encourage a second purchase.
Email 1, sent immediately, is a welcome plus thank you plus what to expect. Email 2, on day 2, shares your brand story or best-selling products. Email 3, on day 5, offers a first-time buyer discount, 10 to 15 percent off the next order. Email 4, on day 10, brings in social proof, reviews, testimonials, and community highlights.
Welcome series emails have 4x higher open rates than regular campaigns, according to Campaign Monitor. They set the tone for the entire customer relationship.
2. Abandoned Cart Recovery (3 Emails)
Sent when a customer adds items to their cart but doesn’t complete checkout.
Email 1, at 1 hour, is a friendly reminder with cart contents and a direct checkout link. Email 2, at 24 hours, addresses common objections, shipping info, return policy, customer support. Email 3, at 48 hours, is a final nudge with a small incentive, free shipping or 5 to 10 percent off.
Well-executed abandoned cart flows recover 5 to 15 percent of abandoned carts, which for most stores translates to thousands in recovered revenue per month.
3. Post-Purchase Follow-Up (2-3 Emails)
Sent after an order is delivered.
Email 1, 3 days after delivery, offers a how-to guide or usage tips for the purchased product. Email 2, at 7 days, requests a review with a direct link to the review form. Email 3, at 14 days, cross-sells complementary products based on what they bought.
4. Win-Back Campaign (2-3 Emails)
Triggered when a customer hasn’t purchased in 60 to 90 days.
Email 1 is a “we miss you” message with new arrivals or best sellers. Email 2, 7 days later, offers an exclusive comeback discount of 15 to 20 percent off. Email 3, 14 days later, is a last chance with urgency, the discount is expiring.
Win-back campaigns can reactivate 3 to 5 percent of lapsed customers, which is significantly cheaper than acquiring new ones.
5. Review and Referral Request
After a customer has received their order and had time to use it, ask for a review and offer a referral incentive.
The review request should include a direct link to leave a review, with a small thank-you incentive like loyalty points or a future discount. The referral program can run as a “give $10, get $10” style referral with a shareable link.
Reviews improve conversion rates by 270 percent, according to the Spiegel Research Center. Referral programs deliver a 16 percent higher lifetime value for referred customers versus non-referred, according to the Wharton School of Business.
Email Deliverability: The Foundation
None of these strategies matter if your emails land in spam. WooCommerce sends emails through PHP’s wp_mail() function by default, which has poor deliverability. You need a proper SMTP solution.
WP Mail SMTP is a free plugin that routes emails through Gmail, SendGrid, Amazon SES, or any SMTP provider. MailPoet Sending Service is built in if you use MailPoet, with optimized deliverability. Amazon SES costs $0.10 per 1,000 emails, the most cost-effective option for high-volume stores. SendGrid offers a free tier of 100 emails a day, strong deliverability, and detailed analytics.
Always set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records for your domain. These authentication protocols tell email providers that your emails are legitimate. Without them, even well-crafted emails may be filtered as spam, no matter how good the copy is.
Measuring Email Marketing Success
| Metric | Industry Average | Good WooCommerce Target |
|---|---|---|
| Open rate | 15-25% | 25-35% |
| Click rate | 2-5% | 5-8% |
| Revenue per email | $0.10-0.30 | $0.50+ |
| Cart recovery rate | 5-10% | 10-15% |
| Unsubscribe rate | 0.2-0.5% | Below 0.3% |
Track these metrics weekly and optimize based on the data. A/B test subject lines, send times, and call-to-action placement. Small improvements in open rates compound dramatically over time.
Segmentation Beyond the Basics
Most stores segment by purchase history and stop there, missing the segments that actually move revenue. Browse-but-never-bought segments, customers who visited product pages repeatedly but never checked out, respond well to a different message than abandoned cart recovery, often a trust-building sequence covering reviews and guarantees rather than a discount push. High-frequency, low-value customers, who order often but always at the minimum threshold, are prime targets for a bundle offer that increases average order value without a discount.
List hygiene matters as much as segmentation sophistication. A list full of subscribers who haven’t opened an email in six months drags down your sender reputation with every campaign you send, since inbox providers read low engagement as a signal your emails aren’t wanted. Run a re-engagement flow for inactive subscribers, then remove anyone who doesn’t respond after two or three attempts. A smaller, engaged list consistently outperforms a large, stale one on every metric that matters, including deliverability for the emails that go to your active customers.
Writing Subject Lines That Actually Get Opened
Subject line testing gets treated as a minor optimization, but it’s frequently the single biggest lever on a campaign’s total revenue, since an email that doesn’t get opened never has a chance to convert regardless of how good the content inside is. Specific, concrete subject lines consistently beat vague, hype-driven ones for ecommerce audiences: “Your cart has 2 items waiting” outperforms “Don’t miss out!” because it tells the reader exactly what’s inside before they click, rather than asking them to trust a generic tease.
Personalization beyond a first name matters more than most stores use it for. Referencing the specific product left in a cart, or the specific category a customer browses most, in the subject line itself lifts open rates measurably over a generic “come back” message. Test one variable at a time, subject line length, personalization, or emoji use, rather than changing everything between sends, since testing multiple variables simultaneously makes it impossible to know which change actually drove the difference.
Mobile Rendering and Email Design
Over 60 percent of ecommerce emails get opened on a mobile device first, which makes mobile rendering a launch requirement, not a nice-to-have checked after the fact. Every plugin listed above provides responsive templates, but responsive doesn’t mean automatically correct; test every new template on an actual phone before sending to your full list, since a call-to-action button that looks fine on desktop can render off-screen or unclickable on a smaller viewport.
Keep the most important information, the offer, the product, the single call to action, above the fold on mobile specifically. A shopper scrolling through email on their phone between other tasks gives an email far less attention than someone reading on a desktop monitor, and an email that requires three scrolls to reach the point loses that attention before it ever gets there.
Common Setup Mistakes
The most damaging mistake is skipping SMTP setup entirely and relying on WooCommerce’s default wp_mail() function for everything, including marketing campaigns, not just transactional emails. Shared hosting IP addresses used by wp_mail() are frequently flagged by spam filters, and a store that never diagnoses why open rates sit at 8 percent instead of 25 percent is often looking at a deliverability problem, not a content problem.
Another common error is launching every automation flow simultaneously in the first week, welcome series, abandoned cart, post-purchase, and win-back all at once, without testing each one individually first. A single misconfigured trigger, like a win-back email firing for customers who purchased yesterday, damages trust fast and is hard to spot when five flows are running at once. Launch one flow, verify it triggers correctly and reads well, then add the next.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I use more than one email plugin at the same time on a WooCommerce store?
Technically yes, but it’s rarely a good idea. Running MailPoet and Klaviyo simultaneously, for example, risks duplicate emails to the same customer and conflicting data about who’s already been contacted. Choose one primary platform for marketing email and use a WooCommerce-native tool like AutomateWoo only for specific triggered actions the primary platform doesn’t handle well.
How many emails is too many for an abandoned cart sequence?
Beyond three emails, returns diminish sharply and unsubscribe risk climbs. Most successful sequences stop at three touches over 48 hours; a fourth email rarely recovers meaningfully more revenue and starts to read as pushy rather than helpful.
Should transactional emails (order confirmations, shipping notices) go through the same platform as marketing emails?
They can, and doing so through MailPoet or a similar all-in-one tool lets you add subtle marketing elements, a product recommendation block, a review request, to emails customers already expect and open at high rates. Just keep transactional content primary; an order confirmation stuffed with upsells reads as a bait-and-switch rather than a helpful receipt.
What’s a reasonable email marketing budget for a small WooCommerce store just starting out?
Under 500 subscribers, MailPoet or Mailchimp’s free tiers cover everything a new store needs at zero monthly cost. Budget for SMTP delivery separately if your host doesn’t include it, typically a few dollars a month through Amazon SES or SendGrid’s free tier. Reserve a paid platform upgrade for once your list crosses the free tier’s contact limit, which is a good problem to have.
Do I need separate email lists for customers and non-customer subscribers?
Yes, and most platforms make this easy through tags or segments rather than fully separate lists. Customers who’ve purchased should get post-purchase flows and win-back campaigns; newsletter-only subscribers who haven’t bought yet need nurture content aimed at their first purchase. Sending the same generic broadcast to both groups wastes the behavioral data you already have on each.
Final Thoughts
Email marketing is not a set-and-forget channel. But with the right WooCommerce plugin and a handful of automated flows, you can build a system that generates consistent revenue from your existing customer base. For broader strategies to grow your WooCommerce store across channels, explore our guide on multichannel selling software. Start with one plugin and two automation flows. Measure for 30 days. Then expand.
The stores that treat email as an afterthought are leaving the highest-ROI channel in ecommerce untouched. The setup takes an afternoon. The revenue it generates keeps compounding long after that afternoon is over.
