We tested asking for the email last instead of first. It roughly doubled opt-ins on its own

Shopify Discussion
,
1

The default popup treats the email as step one. Enter your address, get 10% off. For the visitor that’s the biggest ask you have, and you’re making it before they’ve done anything or gotten anything from you.

We ran the other order across popups on our platform: ask for a small choice first, put the email at the end. Against a plain non-gamified email field sitting around 0.50% opt-in, the choice-first setups landed about 8× higher. Just letting someone pick something, answer one question, commit to a tiny step, before the field ever appears.

What surprised me was where the ceiling actually sat. The micro-commitment on its own gets you the 8×. Wrap that same “make a choice first” motion inside a game and it climbs further:

  • Scratch card: 6.95% opt-in

  • Spin wheel: 6.54%

  • Gift box: 5.29%

All measured against that same 0.50% baseline, so the scratch card is doing roughly 13–14× a plain field. The mechanic underneath every one of them is identical to the boring version. You act, then you’re asked. The game is just a more fun wrapper on the same “small yes before the big yes” sequence.

A plain multi-step quiz, choice first but no game layer, came in lower than any of the gamified ones. So it isn’t the extra step by itself carrying the result. The step lowers the barrier, and the game makes taking it feel like a reward rather than a form. You need both to hit the top numbers.

One thing I’d flag before anyone runs with this. These are opt-in rates, not list quality. Someone who spun a wheel for a code is a different subscriber than someone who typed their address cold, and I don’t have clean downstream revenue to say the gamified opt-ins are worth the same per head. Higher capture, unknown quality, is the honest summary.

If you’re capturing email with a single field on load, the cheapest test is probably not a fancier popup. It’s moving the email to the end of a two-step flow and seeing what one small question in front of it does.

2

Interesting result. I’d compare revenue per 1,000 visitors, not just opt-in rate. Gamified popups may capture more emails but also attract lower-intent subscribers.

A proper A/B test should also track first-purchase rate, discount usage and unsubscribe rate for each flow.

3

This is a good conversion rate optimisation approach. A lot of stores are focusing on the value of the discount, but don’t consider the friction they’re causing before the signup. Two-step popups can be effective because they build engagement before requesting personal details. I’d suggest experimenting with alternate first steps, such as preferences, product interests or simple selections, and track not just signups but also conversion and quality of repeat purchase. The trick is to get the best of both worlds more leads and better customers.