When you’re getting ready to launch a new website, building a “coming soon” page is probably on your mind. It’s a great way to launch the website with a bang rather than to prevent momentum from building. How can you make it a great user experience until your WordPress site is ready to launch? 

With careful planning, hard work, and implementing ways to help with your user engagement, you can build the perfect momentum to your site launch before it even occurs. Here is a look at what steps to take to build your perfect “coming soon” page and where to focus your efforts to maximize your results on your actual launch day!

<h2>Where to begin</h2>

It’s important to start by picking your objective and setting your metrics. What is the objective of the “coming soon” page exactly? While it’s just temporary, it still will have a huge impact on the launch. You should already have an idea of what your objective is and the only thing you need to figure out is how to see it come to life. The objective is to gain traffic through fans and customers which can be achieved by opening communication with your customers on your launch status. 

Along with telling them about the exciting things to come, it’s crucial that you actually provide the information on when you will launch and how to contact you until the site is up and running. This could be through your social media page or it could be an email list, just as long as it’s a convenient way to contact you. 

It may be difficult to decide between offering a social media page or an email list since building your email list should be the focus right now, but sometimes starting the social media page may be an easier way to convert your fans to followers. Perhaps you could build an email list of a few thousand before launching your social media page and website. 

<h2>Build the page</h2>

<img src="https://itxdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/WPMaintenanceMode.png" alt="WP Maintenance Mode" width="743" height="234" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-9341" />

Now that you know what you’re trying to achieve, you need to build the page to show your statement of intent. WordPress lets you do this easily through plugins with options like <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-maintenance-mode/">WP Maintenance Mode</a> and <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/coming-soon/">Coming Soon by SeedProd</a>. Known as one of the best “coming soon” pages, Coming Soon by SeedProd is a plugin offering an easy way to create your page with tons of rich features. Check it out for free or go with the premium for a charge. 

<img src="https://itxdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/ComingSoonbySeedProd.png" alt="Coming Soon by SeedProd" width="733" height="216" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-9340" />

You can also use the WP Maintenance Mode as it’s one of the most popular choices for creating the page. It’s easy to use, quick to use, and you’ll find the most important features with ease. There are many more plugin options through WordPress, but these are some of the best. 

<h2>What do you want it to say?</h2>

<img src="https://itxdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/coming-soon.png" alt="coming soon" width="225" height="225" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-9342" />It’s time to determine what your message is going to say. A “coming soon” page is already a deterrent as it lets people know that your website isn’t ready for them yet. With no content to read, they aren’t going to stick around for long but you can get right to the point when people land on your page with a “coming soon” message. 

How do you deliver the message concisely and quickly to a reader that is click-happy? Put an incentive out there right away that will make readers want to stick around for a moment and check back in when you’re up and running. Use your email list and social media followers to offer the promotion along with posting it on the website. 

Your message should have a financial incentive like a free credit, be interesting in the unique design using few words and clear communication, and should have a form for entering an email address for notifications on when the site is ready. The email signup and invite to join social media will be an easy way to gain a future follower and keep it from being too overwhelming. 

<h2>The launch </h2>

<img src="https://itxdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Coming-Soon-Page.jpg" alt="Coming Soon Page" width="309" height="163" class="alignright size-full wp-image-9343" />Now, you can launch your “coming soon” page early in the pre-launch process so that momentum for the actual site can start to build. Give it 6-12 months as long as you’re willing to keep people engaged until the actual site launch. One site that found success with this method was Mint.com, in which people were begging to use the product before the launch. That is because they promoted like crazy and kept users engaged throughout the pre-launch. 

Once you’ve chosen your objective, built your page, and launched your page, just be sure to keep users engaged, updated, and prepped for the website launch. Once your website launches, you should have thousands of users eager to see the site, ready to tell their friends, and ready to spend money with you from memberships to product purchasing. 