Product Requirements

A countdown timer is a virtual clock set to expire at a given time, usually indicating the beginning or end of an offer. The campaign helps generate awareness while creating a sense of urgency and scarcity that encourages shoppers to expedite their purchase decision. Countdown timers are an essential component of any business' conversion rate optimization (CRO) strategy, as they leverage the innate power of FOMO (fear of missing out) to generate more conversions.

The countdown timer with signup play differs from the countdown timer bar play in that it allows you to collect visitor information, letting you grow your email list and reach out to them later.

Create the campaign

To create a countdown timer:

Navigate to the Plays dashboard via the main navigation.
Locate the Countdown Timer Bar with Signup play, and select the Create button.
Adjust the Coupon, Start date, Start time, End date, and End time of your timer. The selected coupon is provided to visitors who signup for the campaign via the campaign's thank you page and the optional follow-up email.
Click Continue to start customizing the campaign's design.

Customize your campaign

To customize your new countdown timer bar:

Select the Bar option from the sidebar menu.

In the subsequent menu, select the headline, timer, and button elements to customize the content, styling, and any applicable actions. Make sure to leave the {{ countdown }} merge tag in the timer element, as the campaign needs it to function.
To edit the campaign's background, click < Edit Text Element to go back to the Elements menu. Under Display Styles, click Background color to select a new color for the countdown bar, or click Background image to set an image as your timer's background.

Next, click the < Elements to go back to the Displays menu and repeat the process for the additional Popup and Thank-You Page that is enabled when the bar's button action is to show a display - this is the default and recommended setup for this campaign type.

When your design is complete, click Save in the upper-right.

Target the right audience

As with all Privy plays, a recommended target audience is already selected for your campaign. In this case, a countdown timer with signup appears Immediately to All audiences (everyone). To change these default settings, click on the appropriate card and update the settings.

The When To Show setting allows you to determine when and how often the campaign appears to visitors. If you make any changes, please select Save.
The Who To Show It To setting allows you to target a more specific segment of your visitors instead of all visitors. If you update these settings to include various other attributes, activities, and behaviors, please select Save.
The How Long to Show It setting determines how long the campaign will appear to visitors. Update the setting if you'd like to update the remaining time on the timer and Save.
The Notifications setting allows you to enable or disable real-time notifications for your users. These notifications will alert the user of new campaign signups immediately. If you make any changes, please select Save.

Follow-up the campaign

To sync the campaign's signups to another service or send a follow-up message to the customers that submitted the campaign, move to the Follow-up step, and review the following optional options:

Enable and customize the default after signup email to send an email to the individuals that decided to sign up for the campaign.
Select the Create series option to send additional after signup emails.
Select the Sync signups option to sync the signups to a list in a linked account. If you're not using Privy Email, this setting is particularly important as it ensures the contact information (e.g., Email address) is available in the third-party provider.
Select the Send text message option to send an after signup text message to the individuals that decided to sign up for the campaign.

Note: The text message option requires a Privy Text subscription. Additionally, a customer is only eligible to receive texts if their phone number was collected via a Privy campaign using the phone field, they checked the text opt-in checkbox, and they answered "YES" to the double opt-in message sent to their number.

Launch the campaign

Once the campaign has been created, the target audience selected, and any desired follow-up messages configured, select the Publish button at the upper right of the Follow-up step and confirm your decision in the prompt.

The countdown timer campaign is now live and will appear to your qualifying customers.

Review the results

After a campaign is published, you can dig into its performance by navigating to the All Campaigns dashboard, selecting the campaign, and clicking the Results option.