How to build a pre-launch email list for a Product Hunt launch

Start collecting emails on your own page four to six weeks before launch, with a hidden source field so you know which channel each signup came from. Ask people to opt in to a launch-day email, then export the list the week before and split it into two sends: one right after the Product Hunt day begins at 12:01 a.m. Pacific, and one for the Americas in their morning.

A Product Hunt launch has a fixed date and a 24-hour window. The people most likely to try your product and leave a thoughtful comment are the ones who asked to hear from you, so the list matters more than the launch post. This page covers what changes when the list is built for that one day.

What's different about a Product Hunt list

• The deadline is fixed. A normal waitlist can wait until the product is ready. Here, the list has to be exported, cleaned and loaded into your email tool before a date you picked weeks ago.
• The day runs on Pacific Time. Launches go live at 12:01 a.m. PT and compete for that day's rank. Your list lives in every time zone, so one send at one hour reaches half of it asleep.
• The ask is feedback, not votes. Product Hunt's rules forbid asking for upvotes, and doing so can get a launch disqualified. Ask the list to try the product and comment on what they'd change. It's within the rules, and comments read better than a count anyway.
• Launch day brings a spike. Product Hunt visitors land on your site and sign up within minutes of each other. Form limits that never mattered for weeks can matter for a few hours.

The form

Start from the email-only form in the main guide and add two things: a checkbox that asks for the launch-day email, and a hidden ref filled from the link people arrived on.

<form id="launch-list" action="https://ikiform.com/f/frm_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" method="post">
  <label for="email">Email</label>
  <input id="email" name="email" type="email" autocomplete="email" required>
  <label>
    <input name="launch_reminder" type="checkbox" value="true">
    Email me the morning we launch on Product Hunt
  </label>
  <input type="hidden" name="ref" value="direct">
  <input name="_gotcha" type="text" tabindex="-1" autocomplete="off" hidden>
  <button>Get early access</button>
</form>

<script>
  const params = new URLSearchParams(location.search);
  const ref = params.get("ref") || params.get("utm_source");
  if (ref) {
    document.querySelector('#launch-list [name="ref"]').value = ref.toLowerCase().replace(/[^a-z0-9_-]/g, "").slice(0, 40);
  }
</script>

• The checkbox starts unticked. A launch-day email is a separate thing from early access, so people opt in to it. Ikiform stores true or false with the signup's timestamp.
• The script copies ?ref= or ?utm_source= into the hidden input and strips anything that isn't a letter, digit, - or _. Without either, ref stays direct.
• Product Hunt usually adds ref=producthunt to the links on your launch page, so launch-day signups tag themselves.

Add the field definition on the form's Fields tab. Ikiform then refuses posts that are missing the email, stores the checkbox as a real true or false, and caps ref at 40 characters so nobody can stuff it.

{
  "version": 1,
  "title": "Launch list",
  "fields": [
    { "id": "email", "type": "email", "label": "Email", "required": true },
    { "id": "launch_reminder", "type": "checkbox", "label": "Email me the morning we launch on Product Hunt" },
    { "id": "ref", "type": "text", "label": "Source", "validation": { "max_length": 40 } }
  ]
}

One ref per channel

Decide the values before you share the link anywhere, and use them every time:

Get the form ready for launch traffic

The default limits suit a quiet pre-launch page. Launch day isn't quiet. Each visitor can post 5 a minute, which is plenty, but the whole form is capped at 300 a minute. A front-page launch can send more signups than that in a busy minute.

• The day before, open the form's settings and choose a Custom rate limit with a higher limit for the form. Put it back after the launch week.
• If you're demoing at a meetup or a co-working space, everyone shares one IP. Choose Relaxed for that day.
• A refused post gets 429 rate_limited and a Retry-After header. The plain HTML form shows Ikiform's error page with a link back.
• Turn on the human check under Spam check if launch day brings bots. The plain form needs no change for it; see spam protection.

Split the launch email into two waves

A week before launch, read the list through the REST API and split it. This script keeps the newest signup per email, drops anyone who didn't tick the box, and writes two CSV files by the country Ikiform recorded. It needs a secret key with submissions:read.

import { writeFileSync } from "node:fs";
import { createClient } from "@ikiform/sdk";

const AMERICAS = new Set(["US", "CA", "MX", "BR", "AR", "CO", "CL", "PE", "EC", "UY", "PY", "BO", "VE", "GT", "CR", "PA", "DO", "PR"]);
const ikiform = createClient({ apiKey: process.env.IKIFORM_SECRET_KEY });
const seen = new Set();
const waves = { midnight: [], morning: [] };

for await (const submission of ikiform.submissions.iterate({ formId: "frm_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx", status: "received", limit: 100 })) {
  const email = String(submission.fields.email ?? "").trim().toLowerCase();
  if (!email || seen.has(email)) continue;
  seen.add(email);
  if (submission.fields.launch_reminder !== true) continue;
  const country = submission.meta.country ?? "";
  const wave = !country || AMERICAS.has(country) ? waves.morning : waves.midnight;
  wave.push([email, String(submission.fields.ref ?? "").replaceAll(",", ""), country].join(","));
}

for (const [name, rows] of Object.entries(waves)) {
  writeFileSync(`wave-${name}.csv`, ["email,ref,country", ...rows].join("\n"));
  console.log(`${name}: ${rows.length} people`);
}

• Signups arrive newest first, so a person who signed up twice is judged by their latest answer. If they unticked the box the second time, they're left out.
• Import both files into your email tool as separate segments and schedule them: wave 1 for a few minutes after 12:01 a.m. Pacific, wave 2 for around 6 a.m. Pacific.
• Run it once more on launch eve to pick up the last week of signups.

The launch-day email

Send it from your email tool, so unsubscribes and bounces are handled. Lead with the product, link the launch page second, and ask for a comment, not a vote:

Subject: We're on Product Hunt today

Hi,

You joined the Acme list a few weeks ago. Today we launched on Product Hunt,
and the product is open to everyone on this list first.

Try it: https://acme.example/start
Our launch page: https://www.producthunt.com/products/acme

If you have a minute, tell us on the launch page what you'd change.
Honest comments help more than anything else today.

Ada, founder of Acme

The day after

Export the list again with Export CSV, filtered to the last 7 days, and count signups by ref. The channels that brought people who later signed in are where your next launch post goes. Send the people who joined on launch day a short thank-you from your email tool; they found you through Product Hunt and haven't heard from you yet.

Check it works

Do this a week before launch, not on the night.

1. Under the form's Allowed domains, add your site's domain, plus localhost while you develop. Leave it empty to accept posts from anywhere.
2. Open the page with ?ref=x and submit. The submission shows ref as x and launch_reminder as false.
3. Submit again with the box ticked and no query string. ref reads direct and launch_reminder reads true.
4. Open Submissions in the dashboard. The new submission is there with every field you sent.
5. Run the wave script and check each test address is in the file you expect for its country.
6. Nothing arrived? Switch the dashboard's status filter to Spam. Spam gets the same success answer as a real submission.

Gotchas

Questions