Sales & Conversion
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
Last year, I was working on a complete website revamp for a Shopify e-commerce client. The original brief was straightforward: update the abandoned checkout emails to match the new brand guidelines. New colors, new fonts, done.
But as I opened the old template—with its product grid, discount codes, and "COMPLETE YOUR ORDER NOW" buttons—something felt off. This was exactly what every other e-commerce store was sending.
Here's what I discovered: the most effective "referral funnel" isn't actually a funnel at all—it's turning automated touchpoints into genuine conversations. While everyone obsesses over viral loops and complex referral mechanics, the real opportunity lies in making your existing automated communications feel human.
This approach works because in a world of templated, automated communications, the most powerful differentiation might just be sounding like an actual person who cares about solving problems—not just completing transactions.
Here's what you'll learn from this playbook:
Why traditional referral funnels fail (and what works instead)
The counter-intuitive email strategy that doubled my response rates
How to turn abandoned cart emails into customer service touchpoints
The framework I use to make automation feel personal
Why addressing real friction beats generic incentives
Check out my other insights on e-commerce optimization strategies and conversion-focused design.
Industry Reality
What everyone tells you about referral optimization
Walk into any marketing conference, and you'll hear the same referral funnel advice on repeat. The industry has settled on a standard playbook that sounds logical but misses the mark in practice.
The conventional wisdom says:
Build viral loops with points and rewards systems
Create templated email sequences that promote sharing
Use aggressive CTAs and urgency tactics
Focus on maximizing the K-factor through gamification
Automate everything to scale without human intervention
This approach exists because it's measurable, scalable, and feels "growth hacky." Marketing teams love it because they can build dashboards around it. VCs love it because viral growth sounds impressive in pitch decks.
But here's where it breaks down: Most businesses aren't viral by nature. When you force viral mechanics onto a product that doesn't naturally spread, you end up with complicated systems that feel inauthentic to users. Worse, you miss the real opportunity—turning your existing customer touchpoints into relationship-building moments.
The problem isn't that referral programs don't work. It's that most businesses skip the foundation: making customers genuinely happy to hear from you. When your automated emails feel like spam, adding a "refer a friend" button won't magically make them effective.
What if instead of building complex viral loops, we focused on making every automated touchpoint so helpful and human that customers actually want to share their experience?
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
When I took on this Shopify project, I was supposed to just update the visual branding of their abandoned cart email sequence. Standard stuff—match the new colors, update the fonts, keep the same structure.
But something about their existing emails bothered me. They had all the "best practices": product grids showing what was left behind, discount codes to incentivize completion, urgent language about limited stock. It looked exactly like every other abandoned cart email I'd ever received.
The client's context made this even more frustrating. They were selling products that required a bit of technical setup—customers often struggled with payment validation, especially with double authentication requirements. Yet their emails completely ignored this reality, focusing instead on pushing for the sale.
During our strategy session, the client mentioned something crucial: "We get a lot of support tickets about payment issues, but people don't always reach out. They just give up." That's when it clicked. Their biggest referral opportunity wasn't adding viral mechanics—it was actually helping customers complete their purchase in the first place.
Traditional marketing would say: optimize the checkout flow, add trust badges, reduce friction. But I had a different idea. What if we acknowledged the real problems customers were facing and actually helped them solve those problems through email?
Instead of treating abandoned cart emails as sales tools, what if we treated them as customer service opportunities? This felt risky—going against every "best practice" I'd learned about e-commerce email marketing.
But the client was frustrated with their current results, and I had a hypothesis: customers who successfully complete their purchase after getting genuine help are much more likely to tell others about their experience.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
Here's exactly what I implemented, step by step:
Step 1: Ditched the Corporate Template
I threw out the traditional e-commerce email design entirely. Instead, I created a newsletter-style template that felt like a personal note. No product grids, no aggressive CTAs—just clean, readable text that looked like it came from a real person.
Step 2: Changed the Messaging Framework
Instead of "You forgot something!" or "Complete your order," I changed the subject line to "You had started your order..." - much more human and less pushy. The email was written in first person, as if the business owner was reaching out directly.
Step 3: Addressed Real Friction Points
Here's the game-changer: I added a simple 3-point troubleshooting section based on the actual problems customers were experiencing:
Payment authentication timing out? Try again with your bank app already open
Card declined? Double-check your billing ZIP code matches exactly
Still having issues? Just reply to this email—I'll help you personally
Step 4: Made Email Replies Actually Work
This was crucial—I set up the emails to come from a monitored address where the client could actually respond. No more noreply@ emails. When customers replied with questions, they got real help from real people.
Step 5: Created a Conversation Loop
Instead of sending a series of increasingly desperate discount offers, we created a sequence that built trust:
Email 1: Helpful troubleshooting (sent 1 hour after abandonment)
Email 2: "Still stuck? Here's what usually works..." (sent 1 day later)
Email 3: Personal note offering direct help (sent 3 days later)
The Philosophy Behind It:
Instead of trying to create viral loops, I focused on creating memorable experiences. When customers feel genuinely helped rather than sold to, they naturally share that experience. The referral "funnel" became organic word-of-mouth driven by exceptional service moments.
This approach required more manual work initially, but it created a foundation where customers actually wanted to hear from the business. That's when real referrals happen—not through points and rewards, but through customers who are genuinely excited to share their discovery.
Real Problems
We solved actual customer friction instead of adding generic incentives
Personal Touch
Every email felt like it came from a human, not a marketing automation
Service First
We positioned emails as help, not sales pressure
Conversation Design
Made it easy for customers to reply and get real assistance
The results went beyond just recovered carts—though those improved too. What happened was more interesting: customers started replying to the emails asking questions, and many completed purchases after getting personalized help.
More importantly, we started seeing customers share their experience organically. When someone gets stuck with a payment issue and receives genuinely helpful guidance that solves their problem, they tell people about it. Not because they were incentivized to, but because it was genuinely worth sharing.
The email reply rate doubled compared to their previous sequence. But the bigger win was less measurable: customers began reaching out proactively when they had questions, rather than just abandoning their carts silently.
Some customers even shared screenshots of the helpful emails in social media posts about the brand. These weren't prompted or incentivized—they happened because the experience was genuinely different from what people expect from e-commerce emails.
The abandoned cart email became a customer service touchpoint that customers actually appreciated receiving. This created a foundation where any future referral initiatives would be much more effective, because customers already had positive associations with communications from the brand.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Here are the key lessons from this experience:
Address real problems before adding viral mechanics. No referral system works if customers aren't successfully using your product in the first place.
Automation doesn't have to feel automated. You can scale personal touch through thoughtful template design and genuine helpfulness.
Customer service is your best referral engine. Exceptional service moments get shared more than any points-based program.
Conversational email design works. When emails feel like personal notes rather than marketing campaigns, people actually engage with them.
Make replies actually work. If you're going to sound human, you need to be able to respond like a human when customers reach out.
Focus on memorable experiences over measuring viral coefficients. Word-of-mouth happens naturally when experiences are genuinely worth sharing.
Start with your existing touchpoints. Before building new referral systems, optimize the communications you're already sending.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS companies, focus on:
Turn trial expiration emails into helpful onboarding conversations
Address common setup issues proactively in automated sequences
Make feature announcement emails feel like personal recommendations
Enable email replies for customer success touchpoints
For your Ecommerce store
For e-commerce stores, implement:
Troubleshooting sections in abandoned cart emails
Personal tone in post-purchase follow-up sequences
Helpful shipping and delivery communications
Customer service integration in automated email workflows