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% SMS Revenue

How much of the shop your text messages pay for.

60 second readAppears on: Klaviyo

What it means

% SMS Revenue is the share of your revenue that Klaviyo credits to text messages, flows and campaigns counted together. Both sides of the fraction are Klaviyo's own figures for the period, and SMS is credited on a shorter attribution window than email, so texts are under-counted more often than over-counted. Added to % Email Revenue% Email RevenueEmail's share of sales, the backbone of owned revenue.28% or more is healthy, it makes up % CRM Revenue% CRM RevenueHow much of your sales your own list drives.30% or more is healthy.

Show the math

Formula and a worked example
% SMS Revenue = SMS revenue ÷ total revenue

SMS revenue is every order Klaviyo ties back to a text, flows and campaigns together. Total revenue is Klaviyo's own revenue figure for the period.

Worked example. April does €120,000 and Klaviyo credits €4,800 to SMS. % SMS Revenue = 4,800 ÷ 120,000 = 4% — mid-band.

SMS attribution windows are shorter than email's, so the same shopper nudged by both often lands on the email side instead.

It answers the question

Are texts earning their place, or just adding cost? Every message here carries a per-send price, so a low share isn't neutral — it's spend with nothing behind it.

Why it matters

Think of it as the shop phone: the right tool for telling a regular their order is ready or that the thing they wanted is back, the wrong one for reading out the catalogue.

It's also the fastest channel to burn. An inbox tolerates a weekly newsletter far longer than a phone does, so a share that climbs on rising send volume is often a bill arriving later in unsubscribes you can't replace.

What good looks like

8%2%
Needs workHealthy
8%+Texts are driving solid sales.
BetweenTexts help a little. Send timely offers and alerts.
Under 2%Texts barely sell. Collect more phone numbers using pop-ups and by emailing your list.

These bands assume you actually hold a phone list. A store that started collecting numbers this quarter will read near zero by design, and the fix is capture rather than sending. Klaviyo also credits SMS on a shorter window than email, so this share is a conservative count — read it as a trend of your own.

How to improve it

LeverWhat you doExpectHow longWatch out for
Fast
Ask for the number where consent is easiest
Add a phone step to the sign-up pop-up and a checkbox at checkoutShare follows list size within 6–8 weeks1 week to buildA two-step pop-up converts slightly worse on email capture, so you trade a little list growth for a little phone growth.
Fast
Text only the two moments that convert
Cart recovery and back-in-stock alerts — nothing elseShare holds on far fewer sends, at a much lower cost2 weeksYou give up the revenue broadcast texts were bringing in, and that shows up in the euro figure before the efficiency does.
Slow
Mirror your best email flows in SMS
Add a text step to the flows that already convert, timed a few hours behind the email2–3 points on top of what email earns6–8 weeksSome of it is revenue moved off the email line, not new money. Watch % Email Revenue at the same time or you'll double-count a win.
Slow
Grow the phone list from the email list
One campaign a quarter whose only job is collecting numbers from engaged subscribersA bigger base, so the share rises without more sending1–2 quartersThat's a send that earns nothing today, and every consent you collect carries record-keeping you have to maintain.

Every lever costs something somewhere. The last column is the one to read twice.

Read it with

The share tells you what texts contribute. The subscriber count tells you whether there's a channel there at all.

% SMS Revenue and SMS Subscribers, period over period on Klaviyo
SMS Subscribers up
SMS Subscribers down
% SMS Revenue up

A channel that's building

More numbers and more revenue from them. Growth here is nearly all list-driven, so protect the list and the share follows.

Keep capture running and leave the cadence alone.

Sending harder into a smaller list

You're getting more out of fewer numbers. On SMS this turns quickly — unsubscribes are permanent and a phone list is expensive to rebuild.

Cut the broadcast texts back to alerts and offers people asked for.
% SMS Revenue down

Collected but not converted

You're gathering numbers and doing nothing with them. Usually the flows were never built, not that texts don't work for you.

Switch on a cart recovery text before adding any campaigns.

Not a channel yet

Neither the audience nor the revenue is there. Treat it as a build, and don't judge the messages until there are enough numbers to judge them on.

Fix capture first. Sending more to a list this size just costs money.
% SMS Revenue + % Email Revenue% Email RevenueEmail's share of sales, the backbone of owned revenue.28% or more is healthy

Read together, they show whether SMS added revenue or moved it. Both rising means the owned channel genuinely grew. SMS up by roughly what email fell is a shuffle — the same shopper, credited to whichever message they clicked last.

% SMS Revenue + Rev. / RecipientRev. / RecipientHigher is better; each recipient is worth more on average.

Share next to per-head value tells you which kind of SMS programme you're running. A decent share at a high per-recipient figure means few, well-aimed texts. The same share at a low one means volume, which can grow the share while losing you money on the channel.

Common misreads

“SMS is only 4%, so it isn't worth doing.”

Compare it per recipient, not as a share. The phone list is usually far smaller than the email list, so a small share of revenue can still come from a strong Rev. / RecipientRev. / RecipientHigher is better; each recipient is worth more on average..

“We should push SMS towards email's numbers.”

Different bar, different economics. Getting there means sending far more texts, and the unsubscribes and per-message costs land well before the revenue does.

“SMS revenue looks too low — the tracking must be broken.”

SMS is credited on a shorter window than email. A shopper who reads a text at lunch and buys that evening on their laptop often ends up on the email line instead. Under-crediting is normal here.

Also called

SMS revenue share · text revenue % · % of revenue from SMS

See yoursWhat texts contributed to revenue this period, with the SMS flows and campaigns behind it.

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