SMS & RCS Abandoned Cart Campaigns to Bring Back Customers

70% of online shoppers abandon their cart, as Baymard Institute shows in their average calculation based on 49 different studies on ecommerce shopping cart abandonment. How can online shops tap into this potential and improve their sales?

There are of course various reasons for abandonment, e.g., window shopping or simple browsing or shoppers comparing prices, saving items for later or exploring different options. These could not be converted into sales, even if shoppers were retargeted and the shopping process improved. But according to Baymard Institute, about half of the shoppers (48%) that had serious intentions of buying stated that extra costs such as shipping, taxes, or fees were too high, a quarter of the respondents answered that they did not want to create an account (which was mandatory), and a quarter responded that they did not trust the site with their credit card information.

So if the checkout process has been simplified, design improvements have been implemented to make it more efficient for customers, etc. you should look into the potential of an abandoned cart campaign. Cart abandonment campaigns can include a variety of channels: email, SMS, RCS, in-app messaging, push notifications, and social ad retargeting. These can be combined in a multichannel approach using several steps. As email campaigns are the most widely used, we will discuss these first.

Email Campaign for Abandoned Carts

Email campaigns can be triggered by several user interactions, e.g., by users leaving the final checkout page, placing an item in the cart, or abandoning the purchasing process at any point. Email campaigns are currently the preferred channel for abandoned cart campaigns.

How are these abandonments detected? Ecommerce website builders often have inbuilt point-of-sale software with attribution reporting, and there are also ecommerce point-of-sale software platforms used for detection. This data needs to be linked to an email marketing service, of course, to then contact the users in the database.

How do email campaigns for cart abandonment work? Usually, users are not only reminded of their incomplete purchase processes, but incentivized to return to the checkout process. The most common incentives are discounts or offers for free shipping. Campaign messages should be personalized and include at least the brand name and a link to the abandoned cart, ideally combined with product images.

While email has been widely used for abandoned cart campaigns and other marketing campaigns, opening rates are currently below 50%: Email open rates for marketing campaigns are only at about 42% in 2025—and even as low as 22.6% for industries such as travel and transportation—which is why using more effective channels such as RCS and SMS is key to success.

RCS & SMS Campaigns for Abandoned Carts

If customers use their mobile devices for shopping, SMS campaigns and RCS campaigns can be a useful tool. In order to use email as well as RCS and SMS campaigns, you should give customers both options (email address and phone number) in sign-up forms.

As with email campaigns, abandoned shopping cart campaigns for SMS and RCS have to include the brand name, the shopper’s name, and a link to the abandoned cart. An abandoned cart campaign is usually deployed within 24 to 48 hours after abandonment, while users still have the items in mind.

The messages used in these campaigns usually create a sense of urgency, either by offering a limited time frame for a discount or free shipping or by reminding customers that an item is popular and might sell out soon. Another option for an RCS or SMS abandoned cart campaign is to offer help in case of technical issues or further questions, as some customers might have abandoned their cart due to technical problems.

As with all online campaigns, follow-up strategies are important: This might mean using a different channel after a message has been sent but not replied to or offering a different incentive in the next message. One example would be sending an SMS as a reminder if a campaign email has been opened but not responded to. To get the optimum return, testing by sending messages at different times or offering different incentives is key.

The Advantages of SMS Campaigns and RCS Campaigns

SMS offers simplicity and basic functionality and the messages support only text and links (images and gifs cannot be used). But the advantages by far outweigh the disadvantages.

Firstly, marketing SMS have an impressive opening rate of 98% compared to only about 40% for email. Another statistic from 2025 shows an even lower opening rate for email (28%) and compares CTR (click-through rate) as well, stating that the CTR for SMS is 10% and only 3,8% for email. Additionally, SMS can be instantly sent and received, allowing for contact in real time and they are more affordable than other communication channels. All of these advantages contribute to SMS being an effective communication channel for cart abandonment campaigns.

RCS campaigns also offer a lot of advantages. RCS messages have an impressive opening rate as well and in contrast to SMS, opening rates can even be tracked for RCS. They are 35 times more likely to be read than emails and customers are 74% more likely to engage with a brand through RCS.

RCS offers for example richer media (images, videos, and GIFs) and 1-click-upsell (a shortcut to a larger basket size). These options can be used for more fine-tuned abandoned cart campaigns that include carousels, upgrading options, additional items customers might have missed out on, as well as payment options like Apple Pay.