Alia Popup Review: Higher Rate, Same Email Signups

This Alia popup review comes from a real switch: we moved a DTC brand's sign-up popup from a Klaviyo form to Alia in October. Alia's dashboard now shows an email submit rate of 22% to 24%. The Klaviyo form was at 15.4%. That looks like a 47% improvement, and it isn't one.

Measured against Shopify sessions, email sign-ups ended up about even after a slow first two weeks: 10.0% of sessions on Alia vs 9.5% on the Klaviyo form. Alia shows its popup in fewer sessions (57% vs 85%), so a similar number of sign-ups divided by fewer views gives a higher rate. The real gain was SMS. SMS sign-ups per 1,000 sessions doubled, from 29 to about 60, and held through a big change in traffic.

Is Alia's Submit Rate Accurate?

Yes, but it answers a different question than the one you care about. Submit rate is submits divided by popup views. It goes up when more viewers sign up, and it also goes up when the popup is shown to fewer, more interested people. Alia showed its popup in far fewer sessions than the Klaviyo form did. We haven't confirmed with Alia why. Here's the same brand on both tools, as a share of all Shopify sessions:

Klaviyo form: September 9 to October 4. Alia: October 23 to November 1, after Alia's rate settled (more on that below). The Klaviyo form's submits include its SMS step, so its submit rate isn't a pure email rate. The email subscriber row is popup sign-ups only. The SMS row counts SMS sign-ups from every source and, for Alia, covers October 19 to November 1.

The Klaviyo form was already strong, well above the median in our popup conversion rate benchmarks, so there wasn't a weak form to beat. A brand starting from a low rate could see a different result.

Sign-Ups per Session: The Number to Judge a Popup By

If you switch popup tools, or change who sees your popup, compare sign-ups per session, not submit rate:

Sign-ups per session = new subscribers from the popup ÷ total store sessions

Sessions don't change when the popup changes, so this number only moves when more visitors actually join your list. Two sources matter:

• Sessions: Shopify Analytics, "Sessions over time," exported by day.
• Sign-ups: Klaviyo's Subscribed to Email Marketing and Subscribed to Text Messaging Marketing events, split by source. Alia's sign-ups carry a method detail of "Alia sign-up," so you can separate them from checkout opt-ins and imports.

Don't use Klaviyo's Active on Site as the traffic number. It only counts visitors Klaviyo can identify, so it rises every time sign-ups rise, and any rate built on it is distorted.

Email Sign-Ups: About Even

Counting every email source except one unrelated backfill list (popup, checkout opt-in and everything else), here's sign-ups per 1,000 sessions across three periods:

Alia started behind on email. In its first 12 days, at traffic only slightly above September's, the brand got 87 email sign-ups per 1,000 sessions vs 103 before. By late October it was back to roughly the old level. These totals use different windows from the popup-only table above, which is why the two Alia figures don't line up exactly. Including checkout opt-ins matters here: a popup can look better by catching people who would have opted in at checkout anyway, and this total would show that.

SMS Sign-Ups: Doubled

SMS is where Alia earned its place. SMS sign-ups per 1,000 sessions went from 29 to 59 in Alia's first 12 days, before traffic changed, and stayed at 62 after traffic doubled. At about 7,500 sessions a day, 30 more per 1,000 sessions is roughly 225 to 250 more SMS subscribers a day.

The likely reason is the mechanics. The old Klaviyo form collected phone numbers through click-to-text: the shopper had to open their messages app and send a keyword. Alia collects the number in the form and passes consent through Shopify. One less app switch is a big deal on mobile. If your current popup uses click-to-text, that's worth testing on its own, whatever tool you use. We've also had good results with a separate SMS popup shown only to email subscribers.

Not sure how many of your visitors your popup reaches, or how many of them actually join your list? We'll measure it on your store.

The Late-October Jump Was Real

From October 19 to 22 (the earliest dashboard data we have), Alia's submit rate sat around 14% to 15%. On October 23 it jumped to 20.5% and stayed above 20%. The share of sessions that saw the popup didn't move (about 57% before and after), and submits per session rose from 8.4% to 12.9%. So that jump came from more people signing up, not from a smaller audience. We don't know yet what changed on Alia's side; we've asked. It brought Alia up to the Klaviyo form's level on email. It didn't push past it.

Are Alia Sign-Ups Real New Subscribers?

In a random sample of 60 Alia email subscribers and 60 from the Klaviyo form, 97% of Alia's were brand-new profiles (created within a day of subscribing) vs 93% for Klaviyo. Alia isn't padding its count by re-subscribing people already in the account.

About 22% of Alia's submits never show up as subscribes in Klaviyo. The Klaviyo form had a similar gap (27% of its submits), partly because its submits included the SMS step. The likely causes, most to least likely: people who were already subscribed (Klaviyo only logs a subscribe event when consent changes), duplicate submits, invalid addresses, and real sync failures. Only the last one loses you subscribers. We haven't confirmed the split, so spot-check it: match one day of Alia submits against Klaviyo.

What This Doesn't Prove

• It's a before and after, not a split test. This setup didn't allow a holdout, so we compared periods.
• Traffic roughly doubled from mid-October. Different visitors sign up at different rates, so the late-October numbers are partly the popup and partly the traffic. The first 12 days on Alia had traffic only slightly above September's and are the cleanest comparison: email worse, SMS better.
• One brand. It started with an unusually good Klaviyo form.
• Purchases aren't measured. We don't know whether Alia's sign-ups buy at the same rate as the Klaviyo form's.

How to Check Your Own Popup

1. Export daily sessions from Shopify Analytics for at least four weeks before and after the change.
2. Pull Klaviyo's email and SMS subscribe events for the same days and split them by source: popup, checkout, imports.
3. Divide popup sign-ups by sessions for each period. Do the same with all sign-ups, to catch a popup taking credit from checkout.
4. Look up what share of sessions saw the popup in each period. If it dropped, a higher submit rate is expected and doesn't mean more subscribers.
5. Check for a traffic change in the window. If there was one, weigh the days before it more heavily.

If your setup lets you, run a holdout instead: keep the old form for a share of visitors and compare sign-ups per session side by side. It's the only way to fully separate the popup from the traffic.

Is Alia Worth It?

On sign-ups, yes, mainly for SMS. That's the honest Alia popup review from one brand: email came out about even after a slow start, and SMS doubled. We haven't weighed tool cost or how the new subscribers buy. If you're choosing between tools, judge them on sign-ups per session for each channel, and treat any submit rate a vendor shows you as half the picture. More SMS subscribers only pay off if your SMS program and welcome flows are ready for them, and it's worth knowing what a subscriber is worth before you pay for a tool to get more. If you're thinking about what to ask in the form itself, see our post on adding a question to your popup.

FAQ

Does Alia increase email sign-ups?

Not much in our test. Email sign-ups were 10.0% of Shopify sessions on Alia vs 9.5% on the Klaviyo form, after Alia trailed for its first 12 days. Alia's submit rate was much higher (22.6% vs 15.4%) because it showed the popup in fewer sessions (57% vs 85%).

Does Alia increase SMS sign-ups?

Yes, in our test. SMS sign-ups per 1,000 sessions went from 29 on the Klaviyo form to about 60 on Alia, and held after traffic doubled. The old form used click-to-text; Alia collects the phone number in the form.

Why is my popup submit rate higher but sign-ups are flat?

Submit rate is submits divided by popup views. If the popup is shown to fewer, more interested visitors, the rate rises even when the number of sign-ups doesn't. Compare new subscribers divided by total store sessions instead.

How do you measure whether a new popup is working?

Divide new email and SMS subscribers from the popup by total Shopify sessions for the same days, before and after the change. Also check what share of sessions saw the popup and whether traffic changed in the window. A holdout test is the cleanest option if your setup allows one.

Methodology

• Brand: one DTC brand we manage on Shopify and Klaviyo, kept anonymous. Sign-up capture moved from a Klaviyo form to Alia in early October 2026.
• Sessions: Shopify Analytics daily sessions, September 9 to November 1, 2026.
• Alia: Alia is a Shopify popup app. We have no relationship with them.
• Sign-ups: Klaviyo Subscribed to Email Marketing and Subscribed to Text Messaging Marketing events, split by source from event properties. An unrelated backfill list is excluded from email totals.
• Klaviyo form: views and submits from Klaviyo's form events, September 9 to October 4.
• Alia: daily popup views and email submit rate from Alia's dashboard exports, October 19 to November 1. Submits = views × rate.
• Quality check: random samples of 60 email subscribers from each tool; a subscriber is new if their Klaviyo profile was created within one day of the subscribe event.
• Not controlled for: traffic source mix, offer changes, and seasonality. This is a before and after comparison.