Note: Every product launch is different. Use these steps as a guideline to your own. Often by adding one or two steps you would otherwise leave out, you’ll get a significant increase in sales.

THE BIG PICTURE

  1. Ensure that your product or service has a clear value proposition.* What do customers receive when exchanging money for your offer?
  2. Decide on bonuses, incentives, or rewards for early buyers. How will they be rewarded for taking action?
  3. Have you made the launch fun somehow? (Remember to think about non-buyers as well as buyers. If people don’t want to buy, will they still enjoy hearing or reading about the launch?)
  4. If your launch is online, have you recorded a video or audio message to complement the written copy?
  5. Have you built anticipation into the launch? Are prospects excited?
  6. Have you built urgency—not the false kind but a real reason for timeliness—into the launch?
  7. Publish the time and date of the launch in advance (if it’s online, some people will be camped out on the site an hour before, hitting the refresh button every few minutes).
  8. Proofread all sales materials multiple times … and get someone else to review them as well.
  9. Check all Web links in your shopping cart or payment processor, and then double-check them from a different computer with a different browser.

NEXT STEPS

  1. If this is an online product, is it properly set up in your shopping cart or with PayPal?
  2. Test every step of the order process repeatedly. Whenever you change any variable (price, order components, text, etc.), test it again.
  3. Have you registered all the domains associated with your product? (Domains are cheap; you might as well get the .com, .net, .org, and any very similar name if available.)
  4. Are all files uploaded and in the right place?
  5. Review the order page carefully for errors or easy-to-make improvements. Print it out and share it with several friends for review, including a couple of people who don’t know anything about your business.
  6. Read important communications (launch message, order page, sales page) out loud. You’ll probably notice a mistake or a poorly phrased sentence you missed while reading it in your head.