Email Campaigns
Create effective dunning emails with LostChurn's template editor — personalization, subject lines, previews, and deliverability best practices.
Email is the primary dunning channel for most subscription businesses. LostChurn's template editor makes it easy to create branded, personalized recovery emails that drive customers to update their payment information.
Template Editor
Navigate to Campaigns > Templates and click New Template. Select Email as the channel.
Each email template has three parts:
Subject Line
The subject line is the single most important factor in email open rates. Keep it under 50 characters and make the purpose immediately clear.
Effective subject lines:
- "Action needed: update your payment method"
- "Your subscription payment didn't go through"
"We couldn't process your payment for {{product_name}}"
Subject lines to avoid:
- "Important account notification" (too vague)
- "URGENT: Payment failed!!!" (spam triggers)
"Hi {{customer_name}}"(no context)
HTML Body
The rich HTML version of your email. The editor supports a visual builder and raw HTML mode. Use HTML for:
- Branded headers and footers
- Styled call-to-action buttons
- Payment update links
- Company logo and colors
Plain Text Body
A required plain text fallback for email clients that don't render HTML. This also improves deliverability since many spam filters flag HTML-only emails.
Personalization Variables
Templates support dynamic variables that are replaced with real values at send time. Use double curly braces to insert them:
| Variable | Description | Example Output |
|---|---|---|
{{customer_name}} | Customer's full name | "Jane Smith" |
{{customer_email}} | Customer's email address | "jane@example.com" |
{{amount}} | Failed payment amount with currency | "$49.99" |
{{currency}} | Currency code | "USD" |
{{product_name}} | Subscription product name | "Pro Plan" |
{{update_url}} | One-click payment update link | Unique tokenized URL |
{{merchant_name}} | Your company name | "Acme Inc" |
{{decline_reason}} | Human-readable decline explanation | "Your card was declined by the issuing bank" |
{{retry_date}} | Next scheduled retry date | "March 15, 2026" |
{{subscription_id}} | Provider subscription identifier | "sub_1234abc" |
The {{update_url}} variable generates a secure, tokenized link that takes the customer directly to a payment update page without requiring them to log in. This significantly improves conversion rates.
AI-Powered Personalization
LostChurn can use AI to generate personalized email copy based on the customer's decline history, subscription value, and communication preferences. This is powered by the LLM integration and uses the EmailPersonalization and CampaignCopy use cases.
To enable AI personalization, toggle AI-assisted copy in the template editor. You can review and approve generated copy before it is sent, or allow fully automated personalization for high-volume campaigns.
Multi-Language Support
Templates can be translated into 30 supported languages. LostChurn caches translations per template and language to avoid redundant translation calls. The customer's preferred_locale determines which translation is used. If no translation exists, the original template language is used as a fallback.
Preview and Test Sending
Before activating a campaign, preview and test your emails:
- Visual preview — Click Preview in the template editor to see the rendered email with sample data populated in all variables.
- Send test email — Click Send Test and enter an email address. LostChurn sends the email with sample data so you can verify formatting, links, and rendering across email clients.
- Mobile preview — Toggle the mobile preview to see how your email renders on smaller screens.
Always test across multiple email clients (Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail) before launching.
Deliverability Tips
Email deliverability directly impacts recovery rates. Follow these practices:
Authentication
LostChurn supports two sending modes:
- Default sender -- emails are sent from a shared LostChurn domain. No DNS setup required, but deliverability may be lower.
- Custom sender domain -- emails are sent from your own domain (e.g.,
recovery@yourdomain.com). Requires adding CNAME records to your DNS. See Custom Sender Domain for the full setup guide.
For the best deliverability, set up a custom sender domain with a dedicated subdomain (e.g., mail.yourcompany.com). LostChurn handles SPF and DKIM signing automatically through CNAME-based delegation and includes an automatic domain warmup ramp for new domains.
Content
- Keep a healthy text-to-image ratio (aim for at least 60% text)
- Avoid spam trigger words ("free", "act now", "limited time")
- Include a clear unsubscribe link (LostChurn adds one automatically)
- Use a recognizable "From" name that matches your brand
Sending Patterns
- Respect quiet hours to avoid sending at inconvenient times
- Space out campaign steps by at least 24 hours
- Monitor bounce rates in Analytics and clean your lists regularly
Engagement Tracking
LostChurn tracks the full email lifecycle through these delivery statuses:
| Status | Description |
|---|---|
| Queued | Email is scheduled and waiting to be sent |
| Sent | Email has been sent to the mail provider |
| Delivered | Mail provider confirmed delivery to inbox |
| Opened | Recipient opened the email (pixel tracking) |
| Clicked | Recipient clicked a link in the email |
| Bounced | Email bounced (hard or soft bounce) |
| Failed | Email could not be sent |
What's Next
- Custom Sender Domain — Send from your own domain for better deliverability
- SMS Campaigns — Add SMS as a secondary channel for urgent reminders
- A/B Testing — Test subject lines and message copy to improve open rates
- Engagement Analytics — Monitor delivery rates and recovery attribution