Why back-in-stock apps may not be helpful to your customers

When a product is out of stock, the common advice is to add a back-in-stock app. This allows the customer to sign up to receive an email when the product is back-in-stock.

Generally, I agree with this advice.

Even so, it's not always the best customer experience.

Let's think about it from the customers point of view.

When a product is out of stock, these are the questions they may be asking themselves.

• How long will it take for the product to be in stock?
• Are we talking a few weeks, or months, or will you ever get it back-in-stock?
• Is there a similar product that I can get now?

Getting their email address with a back-in-stock app is great for you. Wahoo you've got another subscriber!

But what if they don't trust you enough yet to give you their email address? Or what if they need something now and can't wait?

Asking them to give their email address to be notified sometime in the future doesn't help solve their problem right now.

That's why I recommend showing relevant and alternative products along with the back-in-stock notification option.

This gives them options and the control is in their hands.

They can give their email address and/or find an alternative product that may suit their needs now.