What is the Recharge integration?

The Recharge integration connects your Recharge subscriptions to Instant AI. Events from Recharge, such as a shopper starting a subscription or a subscription payment failing, can start flows in Instant.

Why you need it

  • Without it, Instant does not know when a shopper starts, pauses or cancels a subscription, so none of your Subscription flows can react to those events.
  • Without it, Instant does not know when a subscription order is coming up, has gone through, or has failed.
  • Without it, your subscription emails must stay in Recharge or Klaviyo.

How to set it up

Before you start

  • You need a paid Recharge account for the same store.
  • You need to be able to log in to Recharge and create an API token.

Creating a Recharge API token

  1. Log in to Recharge
  2. Go to Integrations > API Tokens
  3. Create a new token for Instant
  4. Give the token read access to Store, Customers, Subscriptions and Orders
  5. Save the token
  6. Copy the API access token and the API client secret from this token. Keep this tab open

Note: Copy both values from the same token. Instant needs both to connect.

Connecting Recharge

  1. In your Instant AI dashboard, click the Settings cog in the bottom left corner
  2. Under Site, select Integrations
  3. Select the Subscriptions tab, or search for Recharge
  4. Click Connect on the Recharge card
  5. Paste the token into the API access token field
  6. Paste the client secret into the API client secret field
  7. Click Connect
  8. Recharge shows under Connected

When you connect, Instant sets up the webhooks it needs in Recharge for you. You do not need to add them yourself.

Setting up a Subscription flow

  1. Go to Flows in your Instant AI dashboard
  2. Scroll to the Subscriptions section
  3. Click Manage flows to see every flow in that section
  4. Click Set up next to the flow you want
  5. Click Start from Template to add a starter email. The email, subject line and preview text are already written for that event
  6. Edit the copy and design to suit your brand
  7. Enable the flow when you are ready to send

Note: If Recharge already sends a notification email for the same event, turn that email off in Recharge. If you also have Recharge flows in Klaviyo, turn those off too. If you do not, shoppers get two emails for the same event.

How it works

Subscription flows

Each flow starts when Recharge sends Instant the matching event. 6 flows in the Subscriptions section can start from Recharge:

  • Subscription Started: starts when a shopper starts a subscription.
  • Subscription Paused: starts when a shopper pauses a subscription.
  • Subscription Cancelled: starts when a shopper cancels a subscription.
  • Upcoming Subscription Order: starts when Recharge tells Instant that a subscription order is coming up. Recharge sets how far ahead of the order this happens.
  • Subscription Order Succeeded: starts when a subscription order goes through.
  • Subscription Order Failed: starts when the payment for a subscription order fails.

How often a shopper gets each email

  • Each subscription, order or payment sends its own email. A shopper with two subscriptions can get two emails.
  • If Recharge sends the same event more than once, Instant sends the email only once.
  • These flows do not wait for a cooldown between emails, so a shopper can get emails from two Subscription flows on the same day.

Product details in your emails

The starter emails include the product name from the Recharge event, and the upcoming order email includes the order date. If an event has no product name, the starter copy leaves the name out of the sentence.

Tip: Keep the product name and date in place when you edit the starter copy. They come from the Recharge event, so each shopper sees their own details.

FAQ

Do I need to connect Recharge to see the Subscriptions section? No. You can see the Subscriptions section on the Flows page, but the Recharge flows cannot start until Recharge is connected.

Instant shows an error when I click Connect. What do I do? Check that you copied the API access token and API client secret from the same Recharge token. Then check that the token has read access to Store, Customers, Subscriptions and Orders.

Recharge shows Action needed on the Integrations page. What do I do? Instant cannot read your Recharge store with the token it has. Check the Recharge API token and its permissions in Recharge. If you deleted the token, disconnect Recharge in Instant and connect again with a new token.

Can I change the API token without disconnecting? No. Disconnect Recharge first, then connect again with the new token.

Can I connect a different Recharge store to the same Instant site? No. Disconnect Recharge first, then connect the other store.

Can a shopper get a Subscription flow only once? No. Subscription flows send one email for each event, so a shopper gets a new email each time the event happens.

What happens if I disconnect Recharge? Instant removes its webhooks from your Recharge account, so your Recharge flows stop starting. You can reconnect at any time.

For more on how Instant decides when to send, see What does Instant AI check before sending an email?.