Agency Case Study Template

Case Study

Fieldwork Studio

Ember
Skincare

Email Growth & Retention — Q4 2025

Channel Email + SMS

Timeframe 90 Days

Revenue Impact $140K

ROI 3.2×

The Challenge

A Brand Too Good
For Bad Email

Ember Skincare had built something real: a clean, science-backed skincare line with genuine repeat purchase rates and a loyal Instagram following. But their email channel was practically an afterthought — a single generic welcome email, no cart recovery flow, and open rates that would make any growth marketer wince.

When Fieldwork Studio audited their Klaviyo account in October 2025, the numbers painted a clear picture. The brand was leaving serious money on the table — not from a traffic problem, but from an engagement and retention problem.

18% Email Open Rate Industry avg: 31% for beauty

34% Cart Abandonment No recovery flow in place

1 Welcome Email Generic, unbranded, no segmentation

The core problem: Ember was acquiring customers through paid social at a decent clip, but failing to nurture them through email. New subscribers received a single discount email and then silence — no brand story, no education about the products, no reason to come back. The SMS channel didn't exist at all.

The Approach

Fix The Funnel,
Not The Feed

Fieldwork Studio's diagnosis was straightforward: Ember didn't need more traffic. They needed a retention infrastructure. Our 90-day engagement focused on two high-leverage interventions.

First: Replace the single welcome email with a personalized 5-part sequence that introduced the brand story, educated subscribers on hero products, and made a compelling case for first (or repeat) purchase — all without feeling like a hard sell.

Second: Build an abandoned cart SMS flow from scratch. Three messages, each with a distinct angle: a friendly reminder, a social proof nudge, and a final urgency message with a time-limited incentive. SMS was the channel Ember's competitors weren't using yet.

All flows were built in Klaviyo with Ember's existing product data, segmented by acquisition source and purchase history. No new tools. No new ad spend. Just better use of the infrastructure they already had.

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Why it worked: Ember's customers were high-intent. They'd found the brand through targeted social ads, they'd clicked through, they'd looked around. The problem was never interest — it was follow-through. A well-timed, well-written email sequence gave those customers the nudge they needed, when they needed it.

Results — 90 Days

Numbers
Don't Lie

42% Open Rate Up from 18% — 2.3× improvement on welcome sequence

3.2× Email ROI Return on email channel investment for Q4 2025

$140K Added Revenue Attributable to email + SMS flows in the 90-day window

The abandoned cart SMS flow alone recovered $38K in revenue across the three-message sequence — at a send cost of under $600. The welcome sequence drove a 19% increase in first-purchase conversion rate for new subscribers, and average order value for email-acquired customers was 14% higher than the site average.

By December 2025, email had become Ember's highest-ROI marketing channel — surpassing paid social for the first time in the brand's history.

How We Did It

The 5-Email
Welcome Sequence

01

The Welcome Day 0

Sent immediately on signup. Brand story first, discount second. Introduced Ember's founding philosophy ("skincare that works, explained simply") and set expectations for the sequence. No hard sell — just a genuine, warm handshake. Open rate: 61%.

02

The Education Email Day 2

Focused on ingredient education — what goes into Ember's bestselling Vitamin C serum and why it matters. Featured real customer reviews and a before/after narrative. Built trust before asking for anything. Click rate: 8.4% (3× industry avg).

03

The Social Proof Email Day 5

Customer testimonials front and center. Five real quotes from Ember customers, each paired with their skin concern and the product that solved it. Personalized by skin type where Klaviyo data allowed. Drove 34% of the sequence's total attributed revenue.

04

The Routine Builder Day 9

Shifted from single-product focus to a routine recommendation — AM and PM, three products each. Higher AOV play. Introduced the bundle offer. Segmented: non-purchasers received a 10% offer; existing purchasers received a loyalty acknowledgment and cross-sell.

05

The Last Chance Offer Day 14

Sent only to non-purchasers. Clear, direct, time-limited. 15% off for 48 hours. Subject line: "Your skin's waiting." Conversion rate: 6.2% — highest of the sequence. Suppressed from future promotional sends to avoid fatigue.

Key Takeaways

What This
Proves

• 01 Brand story is a conversion tool. The emails that performed best weren't the ones with the biggest discounts — they were the ones that made subscribers feel like they understood what Ember stood for. Education outperformed promotion at every stage of the sequence.
• 02 SMS fills the gap email can't. Cart abandonment recovery via SMS outperformed email recovery by 2.4× on a per-send basis. Customers who ignored the email responded to the SMS within minutes. The channels are complementary — not competitive.
• 03 Most DTC brands are sitting on untapped retention revenue. Ember's paid social was already working. Their product was already strong. The $140K didn't come from new customers — it came from better infrastructure for the customers they already had. Retention is the highest-leverage investment most brands aren't making.

About Fieldwork Studio

Fieldwork
Studio

Fieldwork Studio is an email growth consultancy specializing in DTC and e-commerce brands. We help consumer brands turn their email and SMS channels from afterthoughts into their most predictable source of revenue.

We don't do branding. We don't do ads. We do one thing: make your retention channels print money. Our engagements are focused, fast, and built for measurable outcomes — not retainer padding.

Past clients include brands in beauty, wellness, apparel, and food & beverage. Average engagement ROI across our client base: 2.8× in the first 90 days.

Let's Talk Revenue

If your email channel isn't your best-performing channel, it should be. We offer a free 30-minute flow audit — no pitch, just analysis.

hello@fieldworkstudio.co · fieldworkstudio.co