In Stock Alert: How to Track Product Availability?

Manually checking product pages and scouring for the “add to cart” option – that’s joyless work.

Track product availability and receive an in stock alert, via email, when the item’s available.

Visualping monitors product availability, so you don’t have to.

“Sold Out:” Thou Hath Loathed these Words For Time Eternal

While product supplies have returned to normal since the summer of 2020 (that time nobody could buy toilet paper), getting your hands on luxury products hasn’t gotten much easier.

Take the PlayStation 5. Despite numerous back in stock debuts, the console continued to sell out in seconds. Walmart and Amazon went rogue overnight and opened their online pre-release slots early – one day ahead of Sony’s official release date.

Without an in stock alert, many unexpecting gamers were left high and dry the next day. Walmart refilled its supply several times. It continued to sell out in seconds.

It’s a dismal reality for any online shopper. Many resort to rechecking bookmarked pages for the betrothed words, Back In Stock. Others sign up for unreliable in stock alerts from the retailer.

But you can track product availability and receive an in stock alert when the product returns with Visualping.

The world’s top website change monitoring tool, Visualping monitors product availability at pre-set intervals.

When there’s a change to the area of the page you’re tracking – such as a back in stock message having replaced the sold out tag – Visualping sends you an email alert, with a screenshot of the highlighted changes.

Fun fact: 80,000 people, across the US, used Visualping track the availability of 2021’s most sought after product: the Covid-19 vaccine. The Wall Street Journal, NBC and Fox News recommended Visualping as a way to receive an in stock alert when shots are available.

From gaming consoles to the vaccine, rely on Visualping to track product availability and receive an alert when products are back in stock.

1. In Stock Alert from the Retailer

Before we talk about how Visualping can help, let’s talk about your first option: retailer alerts.

Inconsistent Availability

Many retailers offer email notifications for when a product returns. Just select the Alert Me When In Stock option (or similar) on the product page.

But major retailers, like Walmart, Target and Amazon, don’t always let you track product availability for high-demand or limited items.

Walmart’s website says “some” product pages offer back in stock alerts, and that “this option may not be available for all items.” Amazon, for many of its high-demand products, replaced the alert option with the message “We don’t know when or if this product will be back in stock.”

Delayed Notifications

Even when a retailer does send you an in stock alert, it’s often delayed. Despite frantically navigating to the page for the purchase, the product is, once again, out of stock. Mass surges of consumer traffic can slow the website down and, in some cases, cause it to crash. Delayed alerts are usually part of an effort to stagger the traffic.

In fact, the Shopify Back in Stock app - a popular email alert system among retailers - says it sends customers an in stock alert two or four hours after the product is available.

Spam

Retailers' notifications also go hand-in-hand with unsolicited messages for commercial advertisements: spam. When you click the button that lets you track product availability, sometimes, you’re also opting-in to their email advertisments – whether that’s being made clear to you or not.

Even if you’re presented with a pop-up asking for your permission, it’s usually littered with cute words like “special offers” and “discounts”. Your strength wavers. You resort to the I Agree button just to make it go away. And then a week passes, and your inbox is full with marketing messages.

There’s a better way.

Visualping.

2. Get an In Stock Alert from Visualping

Visualping is a free and easy way to track product availability and receive an in stock alert for any product you’ve got your eye on.

It’s the world’s top web page change detection tool, with over 1.5 million users – out of which 83% are Fortune 500 companies.

Visualping will track product availability for you by checking the web page at pre-set intervals. When it detects a change – i.e., the product is available – you receive an alert with a screenshot attached. The changes are highlighted for you.

The in stock alert is instant and 100% spam-free. You don’t have to worry about delayed emails, nor being pummelled with marketing campaigns you don’t remember agreeing to. The only email you’ll receive is of your available product.

Visualping is used for many website monitoring purposes. As well as sending you restock alerts, it’s often used as a price tracker by monitoring product pages and sending you price drop alerts when there’s a sale on a product you’re thinking of purchasing.

You can keep tabs on social media by monitoring Facebook pages and Instagram profiles for changes. Businesses use Visualping as a competitive monitoring tool, and to produce competitive intelligence and regulatory compliance.

How to Track Product Availability: Tutorial

Visualping takes automatic screenshots of the product page at regular intervals – every 5 minutes, 30 minutes, hourly, daily, etc – and compares each image to the last to check for changes. You set the frequency when you set up your alert. You can opt for higher frequency monitoring through several affordable subscription options.

You also set the area of the page you want Visualping to monitor. You can monitor the entire page, or just parts of a page, such as the area surrounding the Alert Me When Available button.

When Visualping detects a page change, it sends you an in stock alert, via email. Attached is a screenshot of all the highlighted changes.

With Visual-compare, the monitoring type Visualping recommends for tracking product availability, changes that were added to the page are highlighted in red.

When you receive an email, click the Access Site link at the bottom of the message. Visualping takes you straight to the product page, where you can promptly make your purchase.

Below are the step-by-step instructions on how to monitor product availability and receive in stock alerts with Visualping.

Step 1: Copy and paste the URL of the product page you want to monitor into the search field on Visualping’s homepage. You don’t need to first sign up. Click Go.

Step 2: Once the page appears in the viewport, select the part of the page you want monitored. For restocked products, this is usually the part of the page surrounding the Not in Stock label.

Step 3: Specify the frequency you want Visualping to check the page – every 5 minutes, 30 minutes, hourly, daily, etc.

Step 4: Type the email address you want the alerts to be sent to. Click Start Monitoring, and that’s it!

Step 5: Visualping will send you an email, asking you to make a password for your account. Don’t forget to do this. The password completes your account, and allows you to login to your user-dashboard, where you can view all your Visualping monitors and email alerts in one location.

Conclusion

Retailers don’t always offer an in stock alert – especially for in-demand products. And, when they do, they’re often delayed and accompanied with marketing campaigns and spam.

Forget bookmarking the page and missing out on your favourite items. Use Visualping to track product availability and receive an in stock alert that’s instant and spam-free.

Visualping monitors product pages, so you don’t have to.