What is a dynamic countdown timer?
A dynamic countdown timer creates a deadline for each contact based on the email trigger you choose. Use a dynamic timer when each contact should get their own personalised countdown, rather than everyone sharing one fixed expiry date.
Dynamic timers are especially useful for evergreen promotions, follow-up campaigns and anything else where the available time should start from a contact's own email activity.
The trigger decides when ZipLeads starts calculating a contact's personalised countdown.
Email Sent: Starts the countdown when the email is sent to the contact.
Email Opened: Starts the countdown when the contact first opens the email.
Duration and Ends at Time
Duration controls how long the countdown runs. The Set End Time control turns on the Ends at Time behaviour, which lines up the expiry with a chosen time of day.
Duration only
Turn off Set End Time when you want the timer to expire strictly after the set duration.
Example: With a 2-hour duration and an Email Opened trigger:
A contact who opens the email at 2:00 PM expires at 4:00 PM.
A contact who opens it at 5:00 PM expires at 7:00 PM.
Duration with Ends at Time
Turn on Set End Time when the countdown should line up with a chosen clock time, rather than ending purely on the exact trigger time.
Example settings:
Trigger: Email Opened
Duration: 2 hours
Ends at Time: 11:00 PM
If the duration can't be completed before the chosen end time, the timer rolls over to the next occurrence of that end time.
Timezone adaptation for dynamic timers
Turn on Adapt to Contact Time Zone when the timer should adjust to the viewer's local timezone.
Emails: Uses the contact's timezone when it's available.
Funnels and websites: Uses the visitor's timezone, detected from their IP address.
Fallback: If there's no timezone data, ZipLeads uses the timezone you chose when setting up the timer.
How to set up a dynamic countdown timer
Set the trigger, duration, expiry, timezone and destination links before adding the timer to a campaign.
Create the timer
Go to Marketing → Countdown Timers.
Click + New.
Choose the countdown timer design you want and continue to the timer settings.
Select Dynamic as the Timer Type.
Set timing and timezone
Select the trigger:
Email Sent: Starts the countdown when the email is sent.
Email Opened: Starts the countdown when the contact first opens the email.
Set the Duration for the countdown.
Choose the end-time behaviour:
Turn off Set End Time if the timer should expire after the set duration.
Turn on Set End Time if the countdown should line up with a chosen clock time.
Select the Time Zone.
Turn on Adapt to Contact Time Zone if you want the timer to adjust to the viewer's timezone.
Set links and design
Set the Active Link for contacts while the timer is running, and the Expired Link for contacts after the timer expires.
Customise the timer's look using the design settings.
Save, place and test
Give the timer a clear name and save it.
Add the saved timer to your email, funnel or website where supported. See the articles on using countdown timers in emails and funnels, and syncing countdown timers, for placement and synchronisation steps.
Test the timer before you publish or send the campaign. Check that the trigger, duration, end-time behaviour, timezone and destination links all work as expected.
Important dynamic timer behaviour
Check these behaviours before reusing or syncing a dynamic timer.
One-time trigger per contact: Once an Email Opened timer is triggered for a contact, reopening the same email doesn't restart it. Later opens show the time remaining from the original trigger.
Same campaign: When you use the timer across an email and the funnel or website it links to, use the matching saved timer so the countdown stays in step.
Different campaign: If the same contact needs a new dynamic timer for another campaign, we recommend cloning the timer before reusing it.