Pat Flynn runs Smart Passive Income, teaching entrepreneurs how to build sustainable online businesses. With Kit’s email automations, he’s generated over $5 million in revenue while reclaiming hundreds of hours back to focus on the work he loves.
At a glance: Pat Flynn’s email automation results
The challenge: Outgrowing basic email marketing tools
Pat Flynn didn’t set out to become one of the creator economy’s most influential voices. After getting laid off from his architecture job in 2008, he started a simple website to help architects pass an exam. That PDF guide unexpectedly generated three times his former salary and changed everything.
As Smart Passive Income grew, Pat found himself managing an increasingly complex business: podcasts, courses, books, affiliate partnerships, and a community of thousands. His email marketing setup couldn’t keep up.
“I had 125,000 people all on the same email list,” Pat recalls of his time before Kit. “I talked about a lot of things. If I talked about SEO, beginners would bounce. When I wrote for complete beginners, advanced people would think ‘This is below me’ and they’d bounce too.”
He knew he needed sophisticated automation to segment his audience and deliver personalized content, but the tools available were either too simple or overwhelmingly complex. He was was simply outgrowing basic email tools and needing advanced email automations.
The solution: Automation that actually works
Unlike his previous platform, Kit offered the email automation power Pat needed without requiring a dedicated technical team to implement it. Kit was powerful enough to handle complex automation workflows, but intuitive enough that Pat could build them himself.
Since partnering with Kit in 2013, Pat has built an intricate automation system that runs his business largely on autopilot. Today, he has 145 email automations managing everything from welcome sequences to product launches to re-engagement campaigns.
“Anything that can help me save time and ensure that systems are working correctly, I’m all for it,” says Pat. “This is one of my favorite parts about Kit—it automated so much of the process for me so that I can do more of what I really want to do.”
Want to see how other creators use Kit to reclaim their time? Check out how Gillian Perkins manages multiple revenue streams with Kit.
Key email automations driving Pat’s success
Pat has more than 145 email automations running. Here are a few key automations or variations of the email sequences that help power his success.
1. Welcome sequences by interest
New subscribers receive tailored content based on how they joined Pat’s list, ensuring relevant first impressions.
2. Post-purchase follow ups
Automated follow-up sequences help new customers get the most value from their purchases, increasing satisfaction and reducing support requests.
3. Re-engagement campaigns
Inactive subscribers automatically receive compelling content designed to reignite their interest before they’re removed from the list through automated cold subscriber cleaning automations.
4. Self-paced email course or challenges
Automated email courses or challenges can provide high-value content to leads or new subscribers without a course platform.
5. Advanced community automations
The Kit App store’s integration with Circle means the team can use automated sequences automations to improve the subscriber community experience.
How Pat’s email automation system works
Intelligent segmentation
Pat’s automations sort subscribers based on their experience level, interests, and actions. Beginners receive foundational content while advanced entrepreneurs get sophisticated strategies—all automatically.
“We have a lot of different lead magnets and a lot of different products, so we do have a sort of spider web of things that can be complicated,” Pat explains.
Kit has come in to organize things and automate those things so that we can remove our brain space from that and put it into more of providing value for our audience.”
Multi-product nurture sequences
Each product Pat offers has its own automated funnel, moving people through the customer journey without manual intervention. Some run for just days; others nurture for six months before making an offer.
“For some, I have a seven-day nurture sequence before a lower tier offer,” Pat says. “I know some people who have a six-month nurture sequence because they need to build that bigger relationship before offering a $10,000 coaching program.”
Template-based efficiency
Pat’s team has created reusable automation templates for launches, webinars, and promotions. This approach means Pat can focus on creating content and connecting with his audience—the work only he can do—while automations handle the operational complexity.
We can almost play Mad Libs now. We can copy-paste the sequence that we know has worked, change the dates, change the title and maybe the subject line to be relevant to what we’re pushing out. And then it just works.
The results: Million-dollar revenue and hundreds of hours saved
The numbers speak for themselves: Kit’s automations have helped Pat generate over $5 million in revenue across his various business ventures.
By building sophisticated, scalable automation systems with Kit, Pat has:
- Generated over $5 million in revenue
- Saved hundreds of hours annually
- Built multiple revenue streams that work 24/7
- Created freedom to focus on meaningful work
- Grown his email list by 23,000+ through the Creator Network
But for Pat, the real transformation isn’t just about dollars but rather time and freedom.
Reclaiming the most precious thing: time
“If I were to estimate how much time automations save me, I don’t even know if I can quantify that because it’s so much,” Pat reflects. “It’s gotta be hundreds of hours a year. Hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years saved as a result of using the automations.”
Without automation, Pat would need to expand his business exponentially. “We would need more staff members to take care of those things if I didn’t want to take care of them. There’s the potential for human error, as well as just all the stress of thinking about not having the automations anymore.”
Recurring revenue on autopilot
Pat’s automation success extends beyond Smart Passive Income. His affiliate marketing revenue—from recommending tools he genuinely uses—regularly generates $30,000-$80,000 per month, largely through automated email sequences that share his results and recommendations.
I was generating 30, 50, sometimes up to $80,000 a month in revenue simply from recommending things. I wasn’t even selling anything on Smart Passive Income. I was just talking about what I was doing.
Freedom to focus on what matters
Perhaps most importantly, automation has given Pat the freedom to optimize his time. With his email marketing running automatically, Pat can focus on:
- Creating new content and courses
- Speaking at events worldwide
- Writing books (his fourth launches in 2026)
- Building genuine relationships with his community
- Spending time with his family
“I have all the t-shirts, right? Teach everything, you know. Default to generosity is a huge one for me too,” Pat says, referencing Kit’s values. “My own version is Serve First. Show up and help others. This creator economy just has such a wonderful way of coming back to you for what you give it.”
Start saving time with email automations with a free playbook and email automations templates. Download “The creator’s automation playbook”, a free guide that walks you through the email automation templates top creators like Pat use to grow without burnout.
