What you will achieve
You will have a live automation that writes to every person who leaves a purchase unfinished, and a screen that tells you how many of those purchases were completed after the message.Requirements
- Your Shopify store connected to Eva. Without it, the cart start does not appear.
- A WhatsApp number ready to send. The Recover purchases recipe builds its three steps over WhatsApp: it asks for a number and three approved messages, and offers no email option.
- Messages already approved by Meta on that number, one per step.
- A payment method on your Meta account. Without one, Meta does not deliver template messages and the automation sits built but silent.
If Shopify is not connected yet, the create screen offers it right there: the Things that happen in your store card says “Connect Shopify to start with abandoned carts and fulfilled orders.” and carries the Connect Shopify button.
Where it starts
In the side menu, open Automations and select New automation. The screen has two routes to the same result. Under When it starts sits Someone leaves a purchase unfinished, which says when it fires: “When a cart goes 1 hour without being paid.” That route lets you build the steps from scratch. Under With the steps ready sits Recover purchases, which arrives with the three messages and their timings already set. That is the short route, and the one this page describes.Create the automation
1
Pick the recipe
In New automation, under With the steps ready, select Recover purchases. The card says what it will build before you create anything.
2
Name it and choose how it sends
Type the Name and choose the Number it sends from.
3
Choose the three messages
Under Messages it will send you get the three slots: First message (after 2 hours), Second message (next day) and Third message (after two days). Each one uses templates already approved on that number.
4
Create it
Select Create automation. Eva saves it and opens the steps for you to review.
5
Review it and turn it on
Adjust whatever you want, select Save and then Activate.
6
Decide who it starts with
On activation, Eva asks Include people who already left their cart? and offers three answers: Last 30 days, Last 7 days and Only new ones. With a day window, the people from that period enter today, and each cart keeps its original date. With Only new ones, only people who abandon a cart from now on enter.Confirm with Activate. Not yet closes the window without activating anything.
The three messages and when they go out
The recipe builds the sequence the screen itself describes: when someone leaves their cart, your agent writes after 2 hours, the next day and 2 days later. All three steps are yours: change the text, move the timings, add a condition or remove a message. The recipe only saves you from building them. Email comes in afterwards, in the editor: every message card lets you change how it sends, and that is where a step moves from WhatsApp to email. The recipe does not do it for you. The sequence stops on its own. The moment the person completes their purchase, they leave the automation and never get the remaining messages. The same happens if they reply, or if they ask not to be messaged.What Meta charges you
A cart reminder is a marketing message, and marketing is Meta’s most expensive category in almost every country. Every message in the sequence that WhatsApp delivers is charged that way. That is three messages per person, so the spend grows fast with cart volume. An automation carries no spend limit of its own: what you see in its results is spend that already happened, not a brake. If it looks like too much, remove a step or stretch the wait between messages. What does hold sending back, and comes set from the recipe:- The person leaves the moment they reply or complete the purchase, and gets none of the remaining messages.
- One active automation per person: a second cart from the same person does not enroll them twice.
- The Sending hours, 09:00 to 20:00 in your workspace’s time zone. A message that comes due outside those hours waits for the next opening.
- The recipient’s quiet hours, and anyone who received another message very recently.
- If your account runs out of balance, sends wait instead of going out. In the results they show up as No balance to send, and they continue once you top up.
- What sending a WhatsApp campaign costs
How to know it worked
Open the automation from the list. At the top, the state says Active and how many people are inside. What it generated holds the sales: Store purchases counts who bought after the message and how many orders that was. Next to that number sits the cart line, “Value of carts that ended in a purchase”, comparing what was recovered against the total that entered. Who bought opens the detail person by person, with their order, their products and the amount. And Reach shows the other half: how many it reached, how many saw it and how many replied.How to pause it
In Automations, open More on the automation’s row and select Pause. The state changes to Paused and it stops writing to anyone, including people who were already halfway through. To pick it back up, select Resume from the same menu. A message that went stale during the pause is skipped instead of arriving late.If something goes wrong
The cart start does not appear when I create
The cart start does not appear when I create
Your Shopify store is not connected to this workspace. The same screen carries Connect Shopify, or you can connect it from the agent.
The message slots show nothing to choose
The message slots show nothing to choose
Choose the Number it sends from first. Approved messages depend on that number, so until then the list is empty.
The automation is active but nobody receives anything
The automation is active but nobody receives anything
Check its row in Automations: when something is holding it back, the reason is written right there, for example that the template is no longer available or that the sending number disconnected.
Fewer people entered than I expected
Fewer people entered than I expected
A cart only counts when Eva knows who to write to. Carts with no contact details, carts with no products and duplicates from the same person stay out.