Stage 1 — Launch
Waitlist
Turn pre-launch attention into an email list that actually converts on launch day.
- 01
Minimum viable form
Email field, an action-verb CTA ("Get early access," never "Submit"), and a one-line trust note ("No spam. Invited in launch order."). If your product works on the user's own product or site, add an optional URL field — it filters serious leads from curious passersby.
Tip: Capture the ?ref= query param into a source column. On launch day you'll want to know which channel actually filled the list. - 02
Confirmation email — immediately
The confirmation email is the first product experience; do not skip it. Subject: "You're on the [Product] list." Body: one sentence on what you're building, the promise that invites go out in signup order, and one thing they can do meanwhile (follow, join the Discord, read a post).
- 03
Weekly nurture, not silence
A waitlist that hears nothing for six weeks is a list of strangers. Send one short update per week: what you shipped, one honest problem you hit, one screenshot. Build-in-public emails outperform polished marketing emails for pre-launch lists.
Tip: Write four weeks of nurture topics the day you open the waitlist, or week three will silently not happen. - 04
Momentum tactics
Show the count once it's non-embarrassing ("214 founders waiting"). Move people up the list for referrals. Give the first N a founding-member perk. Each tactic works because it makes joining feel like progress, not paperwork.
- 05
Launch-day conversion
The launch email is one screen: "It's live. Here's your access. Here's what to do first." Send it in the same order people signed up, in waves — early access is the reward for early trust, and waves let you fix onboarding bugs before the whole list hits them.
Use this in your AI agent
Every step above is baked into the /waitlist agent skill. Install shipping-skills and type /waitlist to run the full playbook interactively for your product.