Notify me when available

Plan: Starter and up (it sends alert emails, which Free doesn’t include).

The Notify me when available block shows a button on the product page whenever the selected variant is sold out. Shoppers who tap it get one email from Cove when that variant is back in stock. The emails themselves are covered in Alert emails.

Set it up

1. In the Cove app, open Alerts and check that Back in stock is switched on (it is by default). See Alert emails.
2. In the theme editor, open your product template and add the Notify me when available block anywhere in the product section, for example under your theme’s Add to cart button.
3. Save.

The block has one setting, Product, filled in automatically on product pages. Its look follows your theme and Cove’s design.

Caution

The block doesn’t check your plan. On Free, or with Back in stock switched off, the button still shows on sold-out variants, but sign-ups are refused and the shopper sees an error message. Add the block only on Starter and up, with Back in stock on.

What the shopper sees

The block is invisible until the shopper selects a variant that was sold out when the page loaded. Switching to an in-stock variant hides it again; no request is made either way.

Signed-in customers tap Notify me when available once and see “Thanks! We’ll email you when it’s back in stock.”

Guests tap the button and get a short form:

• Email address
• A consent tick box: “Email me once when this is back in stock. My email is used only for this alert.” The form can’t be sent without it.
• Notify me

Then:

Double opt-in	Shopper sees	What happens
On (default)	Almost done: check your inbox to confirm.	Cove emails a confirmation link. Nothing is sent to the address until it’s confirmed; unconfirmed addresses are deleted after 7 days.
Off	Thanks! We’ll email you when it’s back in stock.	The sign-up is live straight away.

Double opt-in is set on the Alert emails page (“Ask guests to confirm their email”). It is recommended in the EU and UK.

An address that doesn’t look like an email gets “Please enter a valid email address.” All texts are translated into the six storefront languages.

Limits

To stop abuse, sign-ups are limited to 5 a minute per browser, 10 an hour per email address, and 25 live sign-ups per email address in your store. An address that has bounced or complained before gets the same answer as any other, so the form can’t be used to test addresses; Cove just never emails it.

Each back-in-stock email counts toward your plan’s monthly alert emails. See Alert emails.

The shopper’s email stays private

• Signed-in customers: Cove stores only their Shopify customer ID. Their email address is read from Shopify when the alert is sent, and never stored.
• Guests: the email address is stored encrypted, next to the one sign-up it belongs to. It never appears in the Cove admin, an export, a report or a log, and you can’t read it.
• The address is deleted as soon as the alert is sent, when the shopper unsubscribes, after 180 days if the item never comes back, and when Shopify asks Cove to erase the customer’s data.

Each sign-up gets one email. Every email has an unsubscribe link. More in Privacy and GDPR.