I Audited 100 Klaviyo Accounts. Here Are the 5 Biggest Mistakes.

This post is the companion guide to our YouTube video. Everything covered on camera is here in written form with specifics you can reference while fixing your own account.

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[INTRO -- ON CAMERA]

Over the last four years, my team and I have audited well over 100 Klaviyo accounts. Health and wellness brands. Fashion. Beauty. Supplements. Pet products. Home goods. We've seen accounts doing $500 a month from email and accounts doing $1.6 million a month from email.

I'm Mark Cijo, founder of GOSH Digital. We're a Klaviyo Gold Partner, and across all the brands we've worked with, we've driven over $70 million in email and SMS revenue.

And here's the thing -- the brands making $500 a month from email and the brands making $1.6 million a month? The gap between them isn't talent. It's not budget. It's not list size. It's execution. Specifically, it's avoiding the five mistakes I'm about to show you.

These aren't obscure, edge-case problems. These are the same five mistakes I see in 70-80% of every account I audit. If your email revenue feels stuck, I can almost guarantee at least two of these are happening in your account right now.

Let's go through them.

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Mistake 1: Sending Every Campaign to the Full List

[SHOW SCREEN -- Klaviyo campaign audience selector]

This is the most common mistake I see. And it's the most expensive.

Here's what it looks like: a brand has 50,000 email subscribers. They send every campaign -- every sale announcement, every new product drop, every newsletter -- to all 50,000 people. Every time.

Why is this a problem?

Because at least 30-40% of that list hasn't opened an email in 90+ days. Some of them haven't opened in six months. Some signed up two years ago, bought once, and forgot your brand exists. And every time you send to those people, three things happen:

Your open rates tank. If 40% of your list is disengaged, your overall open rate gets dragged down dramatically. You might have 45% open rates from your engaged subscribers, but the disengaged people dilute it to 18%.

Inbox providers notice. Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook track your engagement ratios. If a huge chunk of your recipients never open your emails, these providers start routing your emails to the Promotions tab -- or worse, straight to spam. And that affects EVERYONE on your list, including the people who actually want your emails.

Your spam complaints increase. Disengaged subscribers who suddenly get an email from a brand they forgot about don't think "oh, how nice." They hit "Report Spam." And every spam complaint is a black mark on your sender reputation.

[CUT TO MARK]

Here's the fix, and it's simple:

For regular campaigns: Send only to your "Engaged 30 Days" segment (opened or clicked in last 30 days). This is your core audience. They're reading your emails. They want to hear from you.

For bigger campaigns (sales, launches): Expand to your "Engaged 90 Days" segment. This reaches more people while still keeping engagement rates healthy.

For your biggest sends of the year (BFCM, anniversary sale): You can go out to "Engaged 120 Days." But only for the absolute biggest events, and only a few times per year.

One of our clients -- a health and wellness brand -- was sending to their full list of 900,000+ subscribers. Their open rates had fallen to 14%. Spam complaints were at 364 in a single month. We tightened their sending to engagement-based segments, and within 3 months their open rates climbed to 39%. Same list. Same content. Just smarter targeting.

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Mistake 2: Default Flows That Nobody Has Touched

[SHOW SCREEN -- Klaviyo flow list showing default flows]

When you first set up Klaviyo, it offers to create some default flows for you. A welcome series. An abandoned cart flow. Maybe a post-purchase sequence. And most store owners say "great, that's done" and never look at those flows again.

The problem? Those default flows are... fine. They're generic. They use placeholder copy. They don't match your brand voice, they don't reference your products, and they have zero strategic thought behind the timing, the offers, or the segmentation.

Here's what I typically find during an audit:

Welcome flow: One email that says "Welcome to [Brand]!" with a generic discount code. That's it. One email. No brand story, no social proof, no product education, no follow-up. Just a single email that most subscribers ignore because it looks like every other welcome email from every other Shopify store.

Abandoned cart flow: One email, 4 hours after abandonment. "You left something in your cart!" No product images dynamically pulled in. No social proof. No urgency. No second or third follow-up.

Post-purchase flow: Doesn't exist. Or it's a single "thanks for your order" that's basically a duplicate of the Shopify transactional email.

Browse abandonment flow: Doesn't exist.

Win-back flow: Doesn't exist.

[CUT TO MARK]

I'm not being dramatic when I say this: those missing and broken flows are costing most brands $5,000-$50,000 per month in lost revenue. Flows are the backbone of email marketing. They run 24/7, they target people based on real behavior, and once they're built properly, they generate revenue on autopilot.

The fix: Treat your flows like a product launch. Dedicate a week to rebuilding every flow with:

• Custom copy that matches your brand voice
• Dynamic product blocks that show the actual items people browsed or carted
• A minimum of 3-4 emails per flow with strategic spacing
• Conditional splits that show different content to first-time buyers vs. repeat customers
• Social proof (reviews, star ratings, testimonial quotes) in at least one email per flow

If you don't have time to do this yourself, that's literally what we do. But even spending a weekend on it will 2-3x your flow revenue.

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Mistake 3: No Segmentation Beyond "All Subscribers"

[SHOW SCREEN -- Segment list showing only 1-2 segments]

This is related to Mistake 1, but it goes deeper than just campaign targeting.

I audit accounts where the entire segmentation strategy is: "All Subscribers" and maybe "Past Purchasers." That's it. Two segments.

No engagement-based segments. No RFM (recency, frequency, monetary) segments. No product-category segments. No lifecycle segments. Nothing.

This means every subscriber gets the same emails, regardless of whether they bought yesterday or two years ago. The person who's purchased five times gets the same "10% off your first order" popup that a brand-new subscriber sees. The person who only buys running shoes gets emails about dress shoes, hiking boots, and sandals.

It's the equivalent of a doctor prescribing the same medication to every patient regardless of their symptoms.

[CUT TO MARK]

Here's what proper segmentation looks like. And you don't need 50 segments. You need the right 8-10.

Engagement segments (3):

• Engaged 30 days
• Engaged 90 days
• Unengaged 120+ days

Purchase lifecycle segments (4):

• Never purchased (prospects)
• One-time buyers
• Repeat buyers (2-3 purchases)
• VIPs (4+ purchases or top 10% by revenue)

Behavioral segments (2-3):

• Browse abandoners (viewed product, didn't buy)
• Cart abandoners (added to cart, didn't buy)
• Product category affinity (bought or browsed running shoes, or skincare, etc.)

With just these segments, you can personalize nearly every email you send. VIPs get early access to new products. One-time buyers get a "complete the set" cross-sell campaign. Prospects get more social proof. Disengaged subscribers get a win-back sequence before they get suppressed.

The revenue difference between "send everything to everyone" and "send the right thing to the right person" is typically 30-50% more revenue from the same list size.

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Mistake 4: Ignoring Deliverability Until It's a Crisis

[SHOW SCREEN -- Deliverability metrics showing poor performance]

Nobody talks about deliverability until their emails stop reaching the inbox. And by that point, fixing it is a 3-6 month project instead of a 3-day project.

Here's what I mean. Deliverability is your ability to actually reach the inbox -- not the spam folder, not the Promotions tab, but the primary inbox. And it's determined by your sender reputation, which inbox providers calculate based on:

• Open rates
• Click rates
• Spam complaint rates
• Bounce rates
• Unsubscribe rates
• How quickly people engage after opening (do they delete immediately or do they read?)

When your deliverability degrades, it doesn't happen overnight. It's gradual. First, your emails start going to Promotions. Then some go to spam. Then more go to spam. Then Gmail starts throttling your sends entirely. By the time you notice "hey, our open rates dropped," the damage is 2-3 months deep.

[CUT TO MARK]

Here's what we look for in every audit:

Spam complaint rate over 0.1%. Klaviyo shows this in the deliverability tab. If it's over 0.1%, you're on borrowed time. Over 0.3% and you're actively damaging your sender reputation with every send.

No dedicated sending domain. I covered this in detail in our Klaviyo setup video, but if you're still sending from Klaviyo's shared domain, your reputation is tied to every other Klaviyo user. Set up a dedicated sending domain immediately.

No sunset flow. If you're not automatically suppressing disengaged subscribers, your list is accumulating dead weight that drags down your sender reputation.

The fix is a three-part system:

1. Prevention: Only send to engaged segments. Set up a sunset flow. Monitor your spam complaint rate weekly.
2. Monitoring: Check your deliverability metrics in Klaviyo monthly. Look at open rates by domain (Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook separately). If one domain drops, investigate immediately.
3. Recovery: If deliverability is already damaged, the recovery plan is: tighten segments dramatically (send only to 15-day engaged), slowly expand over 6-8 weeks, and re-verify your sending infrastructure (DKIM, SPF, DMARC).

We took one client from 364 spam complaints per month to under 30 in 90 days. Open rates went from 14% to 39%. But the recovery took three months of disciplined sending. It's far easier to prevent deliverability issues than to fix them.

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Mistake 5: No Campaign Calendar (Sending Whenever You "Feel Like It")

[SHOW SCREEN -- Klaviyo campaigns tab showing sporadic sends]

The last mistake is the least technical and the most damaging to long-term revenue.

I see this pattern constantly: a brand sends 3 campaigns one week, then nothing for two weeks, then 5 campaigns the next week, then one campaign over the following three weeks. There's no cadence. No rhythm. No plan.

This kills you in two ways:

First, it confuses inbox providers. Consistent sending volume builds a predictable pattern. Inbox providers like predictable. Erratic sending volume -- especially sudden spikes -- triggers spam filters. If you normally send 10,000 emails a week and then suddenly send 50,000 in a day, Gmail treats that spike as suspicious.

Second, it trains your subscribers to ignore you. When you show up inconsistently, subscribers stop expecting your emails. They stop looking for them. They stop engaging. And when engagement drops, deliverability drops. It's a vicious cycle.

[CUT TO MARK]

The fix is embarrassingly simple: create a campaign calendar and stick to it.

Here's what we recommend for most eCommerce brands:

Minimum: 2 campaigns per week. One value-driven (educational content, tips, behind-the-scenes) and one revenue-driven (product spotlight, sale, new arrival).

Ideal: 3-4 campaigns per week. Two value-driven, one-two revenue-driven.

Map it out monthly. We use a simple spreadsheet:

| Week | Tuesday | Thursday | Saturday | |---|---|---|---| | Week 1 | Blog content / tips | New arrival spotlight | Customer story | | Week 2 | Educational guide | Sale / promotion | UGC roundup | | Week 3 | Behind-the-scenes | Product comparison | Social proof | | Week 4 | Industry news / trends | Best sellers | Flash sale |

Does this seem boring? Good. Boring and consistent beats exciting and erratic every single time.

The brands that consistently email 3-4 times per week generate 40-60% more campaign revenue than brands that email sporadically -- even when the total number of emails sent per month is similar. It's the consistency that matters, not just the volume.

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The Compound Effect of Fixing All Five

[CUT TO MARK -- Final section]

Here's what happens when you fix all five of these:

You tighten your segments, so your engagement rates go up. Higher engagement means better deliverability. Better deliverability means more emails reach the inbox. More inbox placement means more revenue per send.

You rebuild your flows, so automated revenue goes from "a few hundred a month" to "a few thousand a month" -- or in the case of our bigger clients, from $50K to $200K+ per month.

You add real segmentation, so every email feels relevant. Relevant emails get opened. Opened emails get clicked. Clicked emails drive purchases.

You fix deliverability proactively, so you never have to spend 3-6 months clawing your way out of the spam folder.

You create a consistent campaign cadence, so your subscribers expect your emails, engage with them regularly, and your sender reputation stays strong.

It compounds. Each fix amplifies the others. And the brands that nail all five? They're pulling 30-45% of their total revenue from email. We've seen it happen over and over.

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Want Us to Audit Your Account?

If any of these mistakes sounded familiar, we offer a free Klaviyo audit. No pitch. No strings. We'll pull up your account, go through these five areas (and a dozen more we didn't have time to cover in this video), and give you a prioritized action plan.

Book a call here: https://cal.com/markcijo/gosh

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About the Author

Mark Cijo is the founder of GOSH Digital, a Klaviyo Gold Partner agency that has driven over $70M in revenue for eCommerce brands. GOSH Digital specializes in email/SMS marketing, paid media, SEO, and web development. Mark and his team work with brands that are serious about growth -- not vanity metrics.

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