Email + SMS + Retargeting: Creating a Cohesive Retention Engine

Introduction 

Many ecommerce brands still treat email, SMS and retargeting as three separate tactics living in different tools and dashboards. Customers do not experience them that way. To them, it is a single conversation that happens to show up in their inbox, on their phone and inside their social or display feed. When you coordinate these channels so they support each other instead of competing, the impact on retention and revenue can be dramatic. Studies on omnichannel campaigns show that brands using three or more channels in a coordinated way can achieve several times higher order rates than those relying on a single channel.

Email is your depth channel. It carries more content, visuals and storytelling. You use it for launches, education, recommendations and more complex offers.

SMS is your speed channel. Messages are short and usually read quickly, which makes SMS ideal for time sensitive nudges such as expiring offers, shipping alerts and important account updates. Open and response rates are typically higher than email, but you have much less space, so every word has to earn its place. 

Retargeting is your reminder channel. Ads follow customers who have browsed, added to cart or bought from you before and help bring them back when real life distractions or second thoughts get in the way. Research on retargeting shows strong uplift when it is focused on lower funnel actions such as cart abandonment, with significant improvements in purchase responses compared with doing nothing.

The goal is not to send more messages, but to let each channel do what it does best while telling one consistent story.

Designing a simple retention framework

Before you worry about tools, outline a few key moments you want to support. For most ecommerce brands, a practical retention framework covers at least these stages.

1. New subscriber and first purchase

2. Post purchase and onboarding

3. Ongoing engagement and loyalty

4. Reactivation for customers who have gone quiet

Within each stage, decide how email, SMS and retargeting should work together. For example, your new subscriber journey might start with a welcome email series that explains your brand, followed by a short SMS reminder near the end of the series and supportive retargeting ads that show bestsellers or social proof to people who clicked but did not purchase. Articles on combining email and SMS recommend this kind of shared journey design so the two channels feel coordinated rather than random.

Coordinating email and SMS without overwhelming customers

A common fear is that using both email and SMS will annoy people. The solution is coordination, not avoidance.

Set a clear hierarchy. For rich content, storytelling and product discovery, lead with email. Use SMS sparingly for moments where speed and urgency matter, such as a last day reminder, a low stock alert or a delivery update. Sources on combined email and SMS strategies emphasise that email should carry the detail while SMS amplifies key moments with concise prompts. 

Create rules that prevent duplicate messages. If someone clicks through from an email and makes a purchase, your automation should skip the planned follow up SMS for that campaign. If they respond to an SMS offer, suppress the equivalent email reminder. Many modern platforms or connected stacks can handle this with simple logic.

Respect preferences and consent. Make it easy for customers to choose the channels they want, and be very clear about when you will text them. Guides on email and SMS retention stress that strong performance depends on trust and compliance as much as creativity. 

Using retargeting to support your lifecycle messages

Retargeting works best when it echoes what you are already saying in email and SMS instead of starting a completely separate conversation. A few practical examples.

1. Browse abandonment. If someone looked at a category or product but did not add to cart, your email or SMS can highlight those items with more context while retargeting ads reinforce the same theme with visuals over the following days.

2. Cart abandonment. Cart abandoners are often your warmest leads. Retargeting ads that bring them back directly to their abandoned cart page can significantly boost recovery, especially when aligned with reminder emails and, where appropriate, a short SMS nudge near the end of the sequence. 

3. Post purchase. After an order, retargeting can shift from pushing the same product to highlighting complementary items or content that helps customers get more value from what they bought, while your post purchase emails and occasional SMS handle education, reviews and loyalty invites.

When ads, emails and texts tell the same story, customers are more likely to recognise your brand quickly and act on the message instead of tuning it out.

Example retention journey using all three channels

To make this more concrete, imagine a new customer who discovers your brand through an ad and joins your list with a discount. A simple integrated flow might look like this.

The customer receives a welcome email right away, explaining what your brand stands for and sharing a short list of popular products.

If they click through and browse but leave without purchasing, they see retargeting ads over the next few days that feature the same products or nearby alternatives.

If there is still no purchase after a few days, they get a follow up email that addresses common objections such as sizing, materials, shipping or returns, backed by reviews.

If they are opted in to SMS, you send a short reminder later in the week that references the welcome offer and links directly back to a curated collection rather than a generic homepage.

If they buy, automations shut off the prospecting retargeting and shift toward post purchase messages and relevant cross sell ads.

Campaigns that coordinate messages in this way tend to outperform isolated channel efforts. Industry statistics on omnichannel campaigns report that using three or more coordinated channels can multiply purchase rates compared with single channel campaigns.

Measuring your cohesive retention engine

To understand whether your integrated approach is working, look at performance at both channel and journey level.

At the channel level, track email open and click rates, SMS response and opt out rates, and retargeting click and conversion rates. At the journey level, compare revenue, repeat purchase rate and time between orders for customers who are on your combined email plus SMS plus retargeting flows versus those who only see one channel. Articles focused on multi channel and omnichannel strategies consistently find that customers who interact across more than one channel spend more, convert more often and have higher lifetime value than those who stay in a single channel. 

It is also important to monitor fatigue. Rising unsubscribe or opt out rates, high spam complaints or falling engagement are signals that you need to adjust frequency, timing or targeting. Use simple experiments to test different cadences and message sequences, then keep the versions that lift both engagement and revenue.

Conclusions

Email, SMS and retargeting are often managed separately, but your customers experience them as one continuous relationship with your brand. When you treat these channels as parts of a single retention engine, you can guide shoppers through discovery, purchase and repeat buying with far less friction. Email provides depth and storytelling, SMS delivers well timed nudges at key moments, and retargeting keeps your brand in view when customers drift away. Together, they can create a smoother path back to your store and a stronger reason for customers to stay with you over time.