Aspenware offers integration with Queue-it, a virtual waiting room for high-traffic events that requires a separate license and implementation. Queue-it provides digital queueing capabilities for planned, high-traffic events and a SafetyNet feature for unexpected spikes in traffic.
This feature is supported for all versions of Aspenware Commerce.
Key Terms
Soft-launch scenario (from Queue-it)
Products are made available on the website first and the users are told about it through e-mail, social media or TV ads.
Opening scenario (from Queue-it)
Visitors have been told up front that the sale / event will start at a specific time in the future and if the users enter the website prior to that time, it is not possible to purchase / register.
Virtual waiting room
Leverage a pre-queue page to show visitors a count down until the sale starts. It’s a holding room so that traffic waiting for the sale doesn’t cause your shop to crash or add to the concurrent user load not the site
Queue number validity time
Is the user session cart time out period - Recommended that these are longer than 3 minutes, but shorter than 20 minutes. Queue it recommends 5 - 10 minutes, but because Ski check out flows are slightly more complex than concert ticket check out flows, Aspenware recommends between 10 - 15 minutes. Vail had a 10 min period for the epic pass sale. If you are using 1Risk waivers, consider an even longer cart time out period. Check GA for average session times of guests who end up completing purchases using steps outlined above.
Max redirects per minute
Website throughput - visitors per unit of time (i.e. 100 users per minute) Throttle the user flow into the protected site. Start with a safe low value and increase slowly while monitoring the health of the protected site.
Pausing the queue
Can pause the queue if site starts running too slowly
Queue number
Guest's spot in line during the period of a queue
Actions
Bind trigger and configuration settings to an event
Triggers
Initiate action
Configurations
Set the cookie information
No shows
When users close browsers, computers lose internet - don’t count as part of the redirect speed
Feature Description
Aspenware offers integration with Queue-it, a virtual waiting room for high-traffic events that requires a separate license and implementation. Queue-it provides digital queueing capabilities for planned, high-traffic events and a SafetyNet feature for unexpected spikes in traffic. Queue-it is the queuing system used by many high-volume providers such as Ticketmaster, StubHub, Vail Resorts, and AXS. It can help when autoscaling falls short. Read more about How Queue-it works.
NOTE: It is recommended that resorts plan for “Flash sales” which are characterzed an an announced, scheduled release of limited inventory on a specific date. Read more about Scaling for Flash Sales or talk with your Aspenware Representative (support@aspenware.com).
For high-volume sales events, Queue-it has been shown to have a positive effect. For a comparison of how Queue-it can influence conversion rates and revenue – here are two pass deadlines that ended at the same time, one with queue-it, and one without – revenue and conversion rate.
The site with Queue-it SafetyNet turned on had significantly higher revenue AND conversion rates. Queue-it was triggered twice, but kept the site humming the entire time. The other line represents what happens to revenue and conversion rates when there is a crash during a deadline from a site that didn’t have Queue-it. The climb after the dip is with Queue-it emergently enabled. If the blue resort had had Queue-it, it likely would have shown a steady climb up until the deadline.
Queue-it Options for Resorts
Queue-it offers two features; SafetyNet and Pre-Queue. The SafetyNet creates a virtual waiting room for site guests and controls inflow and transaction completion time once an event has started. The Pre-Queue function enables site guests to “get in line” prior to an announced event. For more information, watch How Queue-it works. Read below to learn more about how it’s worked well for mountain resorts.
SafetyNet | Pre-Queue |
|---|---|
Pass deadlines, soft launches of new products, media attention that drives traffic to the site | Planned, announced sale with limited inventory, passholder reservations opening, ticket release for high demand dinner events, Black Friday sales |
SafetyNet
A SafetyNet can be configured to be continually running in the background of your shop so that when traffic surpasses levels that can cause outages, it will be triggered. The SafetyNet routes overflow traffic into a waiting room where a predetermined number of visitors are allowed onto the site. Once guests are allowed onto the site, they are given a predefined amount of time to shop and complete their transactions in order to make room for others in the waiting room. Once traffic levels have fallen below the preconfigured threshold, the queue will no longer be triggered and shopping time limits will not be enforced.
Pre-Queue
A Pre-Queue can be configured when guests have been told upfront that a sale or event will begin on a specific date and time. For example, perhaps a resort set the expectations with their guests that a flash sale will start at 10:00 am. If a Pre-queue is set and the guest enters the shop just prior to the opening time at 9:45am, they will not be able to access the shop, but will instead be placed into the queue and able to get priority access to the shop once the sales event begins at 10:00am.
Pre-queue prevents guests from coming to the site ahead of time and “sitting” on the site. Without a pre-queue, “sitting” site visitors may not trigger the virtual waiting room or site slowness, but as soon as the products become available, they all end up trying to check out at the same time which will likely exceed concurrent user limits. If you “hold” all of these users in a waiting room and trickle them once the event starts.
NOTE: When using Pre-Queue, you’ll likley want to protect the whole site rather than just a few product pages. If you are setting up a pre-queue, the event is likely large enought that you’ll want to maximize ite resources toward making that event successful, so that people buy that promoted product as soon as it’s available. Guests browsing other products take resources away from the focus product or promotion.
See our Queue-it Use Cases for examples of how resorts have implemented Queue-it.
When to Use Queue-it for an Aspenware Store
Scaling and Queue-It should be used hand in hand. When planning for flash sales, pass deadlines, ticket launches, and other expected high-traffic events, continue to contact Aspenware (support@aspenware.com) to scale up Azure resources so that your shop can be set up to handle greater loads for known high-traffic periods. While scaling is effective, traffic is difficult to estimate and Queue-it provides peace of mind. Aspenware has seen repeatedly that no matter how prepared ski resorts are for online sales releases, online traffic can greatly exceed expectations.
Use the Performance Guide for recommendations on what Azure levels to scale your site based on your expected traffic.
Queue-it events should be set up with scaling in mind. If a shop is going to be scaled for a sales event, the configured thresholds in Queue-it, such as how many users are allowed in per minute, will also increase depending on the scaled Azure configuration during the event. The desired guest experience is to minimize the need to place guests in a waiting room in order to shop, but when traffic and its impact on your systems are unpredictable, Queue-it provides reassurance that your shop will be able to stand up under any load.
IMPORTANT: Aspenware will only be supporting the JavaScript integration. As long as the Queue-it plugin is not installed in test or prod stores, Known User actions that are set up will not trigger.