The free plugin covers what a shop needs to write to its customers honestly: a box at the checkout to ask, a tag that says who bought, two fields that say when and how often, and a way to announce new products. Abandoned carts, post-purchase emails and segments by what people bought are the Pro add-on's job.
Asking at the checkout
Settings → Sign-up checkboxes → WooCommerce checkout adds an unticked box to the checkout, both the block checkout and the classic one. A buyer who ticks it is signed up with their billing address and first name, with double opt-in if it is on, to the list you chose for the checkboxes. Nothing else subscribes anyone: a purchase is not consent to a newsletter.
Knowing who your customers are
Settings → Shop → Keep track of customers does three things every time an order is paid (WooCommerce's processing or completed status), for buyers who are already subscribers:
- They get the tag Customer (you can name it differently).
- The field Last order (
{last_order}) is set to the day the order was paid. - The field Orders (
{orders}) goes up by one.
Each order counts once, whatever statuses it passes through. Buyers who are not subscribers, and users of your site, are left alone. The two fields are created the moment you turn the switch on and behave like any custom field: you can see them on the Subscribers screen, export them, and use them in emails.
With that you can already do the useful things: send a newsletter to Only people with a tag → Customer; send a launch to everyone and a different one to customers; write "It has been a while since your order on {last_order}" (people without an order get a blank, so keep that sentence for the customers audience). The action postalion_order_recorded( $subscriber_id, $order ) fires for your own code.
Announcing new products
Products are posts, so the two automatic emails take them: under Settings → Automatic emails tick Products in the new-post notification to send one email per published product, or in the digest to collect the week's new products in one email. The product's picture, excerpt and a button to it go in, like a post.
What the Pro add-on will add
- Abandoned-cart emails, with the cart in the email.
- Post-purchase emails: a thank-you, a review request, a follow-up some days later.
- Segments by what people bought: a product, a category, more than an amount, nothing for six months.
- Coupons and product blocks inside newsletters.
If you run a shop and want these, say so on the Pro card; that is how we decide what comes first.
Next: Automatic emails