Launching turns your Waitlist into an Offer, charges everyone on it, and emails them a way into your community. Heartbeat never launches a Waitlist on its own, even on the launch date you set. Nothing happens until you click Launch Waitlist.

How to launch

1. Go to Settings > Revenue > Waitlists and open your Waitlist.
2. Click Launch Waitlist.
3. Check the settings in the Launch Waitlist window, then click Launch Waitlist.

• Send a launch email is on if Email waitlist on launch day is on in the Waitlist's settings, which it is unless you turned it off. You can edit the subject, body and button text here.
• Post-purchase redirect is where members land after they log in.
• Existing members only shows if the Waitlist's Access Group already has members. Remove from Group takes their access away until they pay. Give Exemption lets them keep it for free, and you can remove the exemption later.

The Launch Summary then shows how many members were charged, and counts anyone who:

• Will pay balance at sign up: their payment method needs their approval, so they pay when they log in.
• Must check out: they joined at an earlier price and you chose to require checkout for the new price.
• Ran into an error: contact support about these.

What happens at launch

• Your Waitlist becomes an Offer with the same name and the Waitlist's price. A Waitlist holds one price, so everyone moves to that price and nobody picks a plan.
• Everyone on the Active tab is charged. What they paid to join and any referral credit count toward their first payment, so people who paid upfront aren't charged twice. On a Partial Upfront, Partial at Launch Waitlist, the rest of the price is charged now.
• Each person pays the price they joined at. If you changed the Waitlist's price after people joined, you chose what happens: Honor their original price charges each person what they agreed to, and Require checkout for new price makes them pay the new price before they get access. A promo code they joined with still applies.
• People already in your community get access straight away. Their launch email takes them to your post-purchase redirect. Everyone else gets access by clicking the button in the launch email, which logs them in and takes them through your onboarding.
• Your Sign Up Link keeps working and now sells the Offer, so the links in your emails and on your website still work.
• Your Page is rewritten for you. A published Page connected to the Waitlist becomes a checkout page for the new Offer, keeping its design, and is published straight away. Read through it once you've launched.
• Anyone who unsubscribed from your emails doesn't get the launch email.

Free Waitlists

A free Waitlist doesn't become an Offer, and nobody is charged. At launch:

• People already in your community are added to the Waitlist's Access Group.
• Everyone else joins by clicking the button in the launch email, so leave it on. Until they do, they're Leads, not members.
• The Sign Up Link becomes a free Sign Up Link for the Group, and a connected Page is rewritten as a free sign-up page.
• For people already in the Group, you choose Remove from Group or Keep Access.

Letting people choose their plan

A Waitlist holds one price, so everyone launches on it. To offer monthly and yearly, for example, either:

• Add the prices after launch. Once the Offer exists, add more pricing options to it. Members can then switch plans from their profile picture > Account Settings > Billing > Change Plan.
• Sell the Offer instead of launching. Publish the Offer with all its prices, connect your Page to the Offer's Sign Up Link, and only then delete the Waitlist. Deleting a Waitlist deletes its Sign Up Links, so a Page still connected to one stops loading.

Removing someone before launch

1. Go to Settings > Revenue > Waitlists and open your Waitlist.
2. On the Active tab, open the three-dot menu at the end of their row and click Remove.

Removing someone doesn't refund or email them, and they won't be charged at launch. To refund what they paid, go to Settings > Revenue > Transactions, find their payment and refund it from its three-dot menu.

People can also leave on their own before launch. The page they see after joining has a Change of heart? link to leave the Waitlist. Leaving refunds anything they paid, stops the launch charge, sends them a confirmation email and moves them to the Canceled tab. They can join again at any time.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is there a minimum number of sign ups before I can launch? No. You can launch with any number of people on the Waitlist.

Why don't my Waitlist and Leads counts match? Leads lists everyone whose email you have who hasn't joined your community, from every source. People on your Waitlist who aren't members yet show there as Waitlisted until 30 days after launch, and people who are already members don't show there at all.

How does a sign up limit work on a Waitlist? Before launch, the limit counts people on the Waitlist. Once it's reached, anyone new who opens the sign up page sees that the Waitlist is at capacity. After launch, it counts purchases of the Offer, including Waitlist members who convert at launch, and checkout closes once it's reached. Setting a limit doesn't remove anyone already on the list, and everyone on it still gets your launch email. To keep the Waitlist open until launch, set the limit just before you launch, in the same edit as any launch price change.

Does the "Email waitlist 1 day before launch" email send if I haven't launched? Yes. It's scheduled from the launch date you set, so it goes out the day before that date even if you haven't clicked Launch Waitlist. It's skipped if you've already launched, changed the launch date, or turned the email off. On the launch date, you get an email reminding you to launch.