The most common mistake in review email strategy isn't a bad subject line or a weak call to action. It's timing. A review request that lands before the customer has received their order does the opposite of what you want — it creates friction and occasionally negative reviews from customers who haven't even opened the box yet.
The trigger and the delay
Revova sends post-purchase emails based on the orders/fulfilled webhook — meaning the clock starts when the order is marked fulfilled in Shopify, not when it's placed. That's the right starting point. What you control from there is the delay: how many days after fulfilment before the email is sent.
Matching delay to delivery time
There's no universal right answer for delay, but the logic is consistent: the email should arrive after the customer has had the product for at least a day or two. A reasonable framework by fulfilment type:
- ✓Same-day delivery or local pickup: 1–2 days after fulfilment
- ✓Standard domestic shipping: 7 days (Revova's default, and a sensible starting point for most stores)
- ✓International shipping: 14–21 days — international transit time varies widely, and a review request that arrives mid-shipment reads as spam
The case for a reminder
The majority of customers who will leave a review don't do it on first prompt. A single follow-up email — sent roughly seven days after the initial request — meaningfully increases total review volume without feeling aggressive. Revova automatically prefixes the reminder subject with 'Reminder:' so customers recognise it as a follow-up rather than a duplicate.
Duplicate suppression
Shopify occasionally fires fulfilment webhooks more than once for the same order. Revova tracks every email sent per order in the Email Log and automatically suppresses duplicates, so customers never receive the same request twice due to a webhook misfire.
To test your email setup, place a test order in your Shopify development store and fulfil it. The email will be sent or scheduled within seconds.
The one setting most stores forget
Set a reply-to address. The default sender is reviews@revova.io with your brand name, but without a reply-to, any customer who replies to the email will hit an unmonitored inbox. Even if review requests rarely generate replies, the occasional reply you do get is usually from a customer with a real issue — and those are worth catching.