Starting your first lifecycle program

The first 72 hours decide who activates

Activation isn't a seven-day project. It's a 72-hour race most teams lose without noticing. Why the window is that short, what to watch inside it, and how to intervene while users are still reachable.

9 min read

The welcome email sequence: the 7-day structure that works

Most welcome sequences over-pitch, under-onboard, and keep firing long after the user has either activated or wandered off. Here's the 7-day shape that moves signups to activation — shorter, sharper, conditional on what the user actually did — and the stop rules that keep it from training users to ignore you.

9 min read

The cadence question: how often should you email?

Everyone asks how often to email. Almost nobody answers it properly, because it's the wrong question. Cadence isn't a single number — it's a consequence of five other decisions you probably haven't made yet. Here's the version of the debate that resolves.

9 min read

Transactional emails: the highest-engagement messages you ignore

Order confirmations, password resets, receipts, shipping updates. Transactional emails post open rates two to three times higher than marketing sends — and most lifecycle teams have never touched them. Effort is going to the wrong place.

10 min read

Birthday and anniversary emails: the easy wins most programs don't run

Birthday and anniversary emails are low-effort, high-response lifecycle triggers that most programs never set up. Here's the playbook — what to send, what to offer, and how to handle the 40–70% of users who didn't give you a birthday.

6 min read