A waitlist is a segment of subscribers that have expressed specific interest in a product or service that is not yet available. Waitlists are a great way to gauge excitement, create anticipation and exclusivity for something upcoming and understand what your audience is interested in. It can also help you align timing for an upcoming launch depending on the amount of interest you see on your waitlist. A waitlist also gives you a targeted group of interested subscribers to reach out to when a product or service is now available. Here are some examples of when you might want to use a waitlist in your business:
You have a new product coming soon and you want to collect email addresses for subscribers interested in knowing when the product launches.
You are launching a new service and want to understand the level of interest in this service prior to launch.
You are launching a new product or service and want to send out a special offer to a select group of people that signed up in advance.
You want to create buzz around an upcoming event your business is running and have a list of interested subscribers to email when signups become available.
You are restocking a product and want to let everyone interested know the product is available again.
You are launching a membership and want to collect email addresses of anyone that might be interested in signing up when the membership launches.
To create a waitlist you need to create a new segment for the waitlist group and a waitlist landing page or signup form.
Step 1: Create your segment in your email service provider.

Step 2: Create a waitlist landing page or signup form.

Some tips to remember when creating your waitlist landing page:
Clearly let subscribers know what they will be getting when joining the waitlist. Giving them early access or a discount at launch? Make sure to mention that in your copy.
Use a visual to help encourage signups. If you have images of your new products or service use those on the landing page to help drum up excitement for what's coming.
Make your call to action (CTA) button easy to understand and compelling.
Step 3: Once you have your segment and landing page set up, make sure to create a workflow with a dedicated waitlist welcome email that lets subscribers know they are on your waitlist and will be hearing from you soon. You can also send them into your nurture or welcome sequence workflow after they receive the initial email.

Once you have your waitlist steps set up, you can continue accepting signups until you are ready to launch your product, service or event. Now you have a dedicated group of interested subscribers ready and excited to hear from you about your offer! You can create a truly custom message that is super personal and really speaks to this audience. Having a dedicated group to email also cuts down on the amount you need to message your full email list which could increase your unsubscribe rate over time.
I hope this blog post helps you when setting up waitlist segments going forward.
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