Abandoned Cart Sequence

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---
name: Abandoned Cart Sequence
description: Drafts a margin-aware 3-email cart-recovery sequence that reminds, handles objections, then incentivizes only as a last touch. Use when a checkout is started but not completed and you need cart-recovery (abandoned-cart) emails, when wiring an abandoned-cart flow in Shopify, Klaviyo, or similar, or when asked to recover lost carts without overspending on discounts.
---
# Abandoned Cart Sequence

Produce a three-email cart-recovery arc that recovers the sale while protecting margin: remind, then reassure, then incentivize only if needed.

## Workflow
1. Gather inputs before drafting: brand voice, average order value, margin floor (the discount level below which a sale loses money), whether free shipping is available, and the top one or two abandonment objections. If any are unknown, ask rather than guess.
2. Draft Email 1 — Helpful Reminder (send 1-4 hours after abandon, while intent is warm). Helpful tone, not salesy. Show cart contents with image and name, restate the core benefit in one line, one clear button back to the cart. No discount. Subject line names the product or gives a friendly nudge, not a generic "Did you forget something?".
3. Draft Email 2 — Objection Handler (send ~24 hours later). Surface trust signals (reviews, ratings, guarantee, easy returns, secure checkout), answer the top objection, add honest social proof ("4.8 stars from 2,000 buyers"). Still no discount — at most a free-shipping nudge if margins allow, since shipping cost is the most common abandonment cause. Use urgency claims ("items in your cart are popular") only when literally true.
4. Draft Email 3 — Incentive + Honest Urgency (send ~48-72 hours later). If and only if margin allows, offer one incentive framed as a thank-you, not a fire sale. State the code clearly and link to a pre-filled cart. This is the final touch; do not repeat the same incentive.
5. Apply incentive logic: discount last, never first. Prefer free shipping or a small gift over deep percentage cuts on low-margin items; use a fixed-dollar amount for high-AOV carts; never go below the margin floor.
6. Push back when the brief is self-defeating: if the brand wants a discount in Email 1, flag that it erodes margin and trains customers to abandon for a coupon; if AOV is low and margins thin, recommend a free-shipping threshold or no incentive instead of a percentage off.

## Quality bar
- Exactly three emails, each with a stated send delay, a distinct job (remind / reassure / incentivize), and a single primary CTA back to the cart.
- No discount appears before Email 3, and no incentive ever breaches the stated margin floor.
- Every urgency, stock, social-proof, and pricing claim is literally true and verifiable.
- Each email includes an unsubscribe link and respects reasonable frequency.

## Do NOT
- Do NOT use when the request is a general onboarding, activation, nurture, or lifecycle drip series — use email-drip-builder instead. This skill owns only the post-checkout cart-recovery sequence.
- Do NOT lead with a discount or repeat the same coupon across multiple emails.