The Channel Stacking Playbook: How DTC Brands Can Use Klaviyo Email and SMS Flows to Build Retargeting Audiences That Amplify Paid ROAS | Loyal Send

You're spending $50 to acquire a customer. They buy once. And then? You never speak to them again.

No follow-up. No sequence. No retargeting through your own channels. Just silence—until you pay Zuckerberg another $50 to bring them back.

That's the trap most DTC brands are stuck in. You're renting every single customer, and the landlord keeps raising rent. CPMs climb. CPCs get brutal. Your paid acquisition costs eat deeper into margins while your email list—which could be reaching people for free—sits there with 12,000 subscribers and generates a fraction of what it could.

Meanwhile, brands that understand channel stacking are doing something different. They're layering Klaviyo email SMS flows with SMS marketing and paid retargeting to turn one-time buyers into subscribers they can reach forever. They're not choosing between email or SMS. They're stacking both to make every ad dollar worth more.

This playbook walks you through exactly how to do it—from your core automated flows to building retargeting audiences that amplify your paid ROAS. If you're done renting customers, keep reading.

Why Your Paid Acquisition Strategy Is Bleeding You Dry

The Dependency Trap Every DTC Brand Falls Into

You're paying to acquire every single customer. Every. Single. One.

Meta's CPMs keep climbing. Google's CPCs are brutal. TikTok's algorithm demands fresh creative or your costs explode.

Meanwhile, you're sending generic discount emails twice a month (if you're lucky) and calling it an email strategy.

Here's what happens: you hand Zuckerberg $50 to acquire a customer, they buy once, and you never talk to them again. That customer disappears into the void—unless you pay to bring them back.

You're renting customers. And the landlord keeps raising rent.

What Channel Stacking Actually Means for Your Profit Margins

Channel stacking means layering your owned channels (email, SMS) with paid to create a compounding effect. Instead of paying to acquire a one-time buyer, you're paying to acquire a subscriber. Someone you can reach for free, forever.

With the right Klaviyo email SMS flows—DTC email automation flows that trigger based on behavior, plus an SMS marketing retargeting strategy—you're not choosing between email OR SMS. You're stacking both against your paid spend.

The result? Lower CAC, higher LTV, and profit margins that actually make sense.

Klaviyo powers roughly 176,000 brands worldwide. The brands crushing it aren't splitting budget between channels. They're using channel stacking ecommerce to make every ad dollar worth more.

The 8 Core Klaviyo Flows Every DTC Brand Needs Running

Now that you understand why this matters, let's get into the actual machine. These 8 flows are how you stop paying for every touch and start monetizing the audience you already have.

Welcome and First Purchase Flows

This is where you make your first impression. Your welcome flow sets the tone, collects zero-party data through preferences, and offers a first-purchase incentive to turn browsers into buyers. It should fire the moment someone subscribes—not sit dormant for 14 days.

Abandoned Cart and Browse Abandonment Flows

Your abandoned cart flow is your highest-ROI play. When you layer email plus SMS, you recover carts that would otherwise vanish into the paid algorithm void. Browse abandonment catches shoppers who looked but didn't add anything—different intent, different message. This is the core of your SMS marketing retargeting strategy.

Post-Purchase and Customer Reactivation Flows

Don't let the customer forget you. Your post-purchase flow cross-sells, requests reviews, and builds loyalty before memory fades. Reactivation flows target lapsed buyers at the 30/60/90+ day marks—giving them a reason to come back instead of letting them rot in your database.

These 8 flows are the foundation of channel stacking ecommerce. They're how you stop paying Zuckerberg for every single touch and start monetizing the audience you already have.

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Email + SMS: Stop Choosing, Start Stacking

Here's where most brands make a critical mistake. They treat email and SMS as separate channels competing for budget and attention. That's the wrong frame.

Some marketers will try to convince you to pick one. They're wrong.

The real question isn't email OR SMS—it's how to stack them so each channel amplifies the other.

The Simultaneous Send Strategy

When you have a time-sensitive offer or a major promotion running, send the same message across both channels simultaneously. Same offer. Same urgency. Your subscriber sees it twice—in their inbox and their pocket.

Doubled exposure. Zero extra effort.

Klaviyo email SMS flows make this seamless. You trigger once, and both channels fire. Your SMS list catches it on their phone while your email list gets it in their inbox. You're hitting two high-intent moments with one strategic message.

When to Use Email Alone vs. Email + SMS Together

Your SMS list is smaller than your email list. That's exactly why it matters more.

SMS reaches people directly in their pocket, with much higher immediate visibility than email. Treat your SMS list as your high-priority channel for time-sensitive offers: flash sales, back-in-stock alerts, last-chance reminders.

Email handles volume: newsletters, product launches, re-engagement campaigns for colder segments.

SMS handles urgency.

Here's the unlock: segmentation. Your SMS subscribers who purchased via SMS get different flows than your email-first buyers. That's where channel stacking ecommerce actually wins—you're not sending the same message to everyone. You're matching the channel to the behavior.

How Channel Stacking Actually Amplifies Your Paid ROAS

All of this infrastructure serves one purpose: making your paid dollars work harder. Let's talk about the math that most brands are missing.

The Attribution Gap (And How to Close It)

Last-click attribution is lying to you.

When a customer buys after clicking a Meta ad, you credit Meta. But if that customer first discovered you through Klaviyo email SMS flows, joined your SMS marketing retargeting strategy via a welcome flow, and then saw your retargeting ad three days later—Meta gets 100% of the credit.

That's the attribution gap. You're undercounting email and SMS impact because last-click models ignore the research and nurture phases.

Channel stacking closes this gap by coordinating your paid and owned channels into a single revenue system.

Real Math: What Happens When Email/SMS Touches Paid Conversions

Here's the multiplier effect that most DTC brands miss:

Paid drives awareness → Your DTC email automation flows nurture and educate → SMS marketing retargeting keeps you top-of-mind → Paid closes the sale

You're not choosing between channels. You're stacking them.

When brands coordinate email, SMS, and paid campaigns, they're not measuring email ROAS or SMS ROAS in isolation. They're measuring blended ROAS across every touchpoint.

And the brands doing this right in Klaviyo aren't just sending newsletters. They're building revenue machines that compound over time—with Klaviyo email SMS flows handling the nurture work that makes every paid dollar work harder.

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Your 30-Day Channel Stacking Implementation Roadmap

Theory is good. Let's get tactical. Here's exactly how to implement this over the next 30 days.

The goal: turn your Klaviyo email SMS flows into a retargeting engine that amplifies every dollar you spend on paid ads.

Week 1-2: Audit and Fix Your Core Flows

Before you build anything new, close the gaps in what you already have.

Which of your 8 core flows are live? Which are broken? Which haven't been touched in 6+ months? Most brands discover at least 3 that are silently failing.
Run an SMS compliance check. Verify consent collection at checkout is set up correctly. If you're in alcohol or another regulated vertical, Klaviyo offers age gating solutions so you stay compliant with SMS marketing regulations while still growing your list.

This matters because every subscriber you collect becomes a custom audience member across your paid channels.

Week 3-4: Build Your Retargeting Audience Infrastructure

Now the real leverage begins.

Connect Klaviyo to Meta Business Manager, Google Ads, and TikTok Ads Manager.
Create your first retargeting segments: cart abandoners, product viewers, email engagers, SMS engagers. These become your custom audiences. They cost nothing to run forever.
Set up a simple attribution view. You want to track customers who receive email/SMS and later convert via paid—even if paid gets the last click. Without this, you'll keep cutting the channel that's actually driving real revenue.

By day 30, you have the infrastructure. Now it's about scaling what's working.

You've been renting customers long enough. The infrastructure exists. The flows are proven. The retargeting audiences are sitting in your Klaviyo account right now, waiting to be synced to paid.