The Order to Build Your Klaviyo Flows
If you're starting from a mostly empty Klaviyo account, the question isn't which flows you need. It's which one to build first.
That order matters more than people expect. Build in the right sequence and each flow you add compounds on the last. Build in the wrong order and you spend weeks on something that earns a little while the highest-earning flow sits unbuilt.
Here's the order I recommend, and the reasoning behind each step, so you're building toward revenue instead of just building.
The principle: highest-leverage first
Every flow earns differently, and the gap is big. Some catch people at the exact moment they're ready to buy. Others nurture interest that may pay off later. When you're starting out, you build the high-intent, high-earning flows first, then work outward toward the ones that play a longer game.
That's the whole logic. Money first, nurture second. Here's how it plays out.
1. Welcome flow
Build this first, always.
The welcome flow catches people at the highest-intent moment they'll ever have with your brand. They just signed up. They're paying attention. They want to hear from you, which is rare enough that it's worth everything.
It's also the first impression of your entire email program. Every subscriber who joins from here forward goes through it, so it pays off on every signup, not just the ones who buy today. A welcome flow is the highest revenue-per-recipient flow most brands have, which is exactly why it goes first.
2. Abandoned cart flow
Next, the flow that catches people closest to buying.
Someone who added to cart and left has the highest purchase intent of anyone who didn't actually check out. They picked the product. They started the process. A well-built abandoned cart flow recovers a meaningful chunk of those sales, and it's catching people who were a click away from buying anyway.
High intent, high recovery, fast to build. This is your second flow because the revenue shows up quickly.
3. Post-purchase flow
Now turn first-time buyers into repeat customers.
The post-purchase flow runs after someone orders, and its job is to make the second purchase more likely. It reassures, it helps them succeed with what they bought, and it opens the door to the next order through cross-sell or replenishment.
This one goes third because it's where retention actually starts. The first two flows win the sale. This one starts building the relationship that makes a customer worth far more than a single order.
4. Browse abandonment flow
With the high-intent flows running, widen the net.
Browse abandonment catches people who looked at a product or category and left without adding to cart. Lower intent than an abandoned cart, but a much larger group of people, because far more visitors browse than ever add to cart.
It goes fourth because the intent is lower and the build is a little more nuanced. You want it nurturing interest, not pushing for a sale the person isn't ready to make yet. Worth building, but after the flows that catch people closer to the purchase.
5. Win-back flow
Finally, bring back the customers slipping away.
The win-back flow targets people who bought before and have gone quiet. They already know you. They already trusted you with a purchase. A win-back flow reminds them you're there and gives them a reason to return.
It goes last of the core five because it works a smaller, specific group, and because it's most effective once your other flows have had time to build up a base of customers worth winning back. Build it once you have lapsed customers to re-engage.
After the core five
Once those five are running, you've got a real retention system working around the clock. From there, the next builds depend on your business: replenishment flows for consumable products, a sunset flow for list health, VIP flows for your best customers, back-in-stock and price-drop flows if your catalog calls for them.
But the core five come first, in that order. They cover the full path from first signup to repeat customer to winning someone back, and they're the foundation everything else builds on.
Where most brands get stuck
The most common pattern I see is brands trying to build everything at once, getting overwhelmed, and ending up with five half-built flows and none of them live.
One flow, built well and turned on, beats five flows sitting in draft. Build the welcome flow. Get it live. Then the abandoned cart. Get it live. Move down the list. By the time you reach the win-back flow, you have a working retention system and the confidence that comes from having built it piece by piece.
If you want the build done with guidance, the exact structure for each flow, the timing, the segmentation, and the order mapped to where your specific account is today, that's what we work on together inside The Profitable Inbox™. You bring your account. I help you build the right flow next, and you get them live one at a time instead of stalling on all of them at once.
Email is a system, not a send.
— Alex