Launch.
Say the word often enough, even just in your head, and it starts to sound really wacky. Like a made-up word. Go through too many iterations of the thing itself and you’ll want to implode.
That was May, for a lot of us. There were all these launches, see — tons of new products, all of them (I’m sure) packed with great value and priced appropriately (ahem) and they were all blasted across our Twitter streams, our email inboxes, our blog feeds … and then multiply all that by the ten or eighty affiliates of each said launching product and …
Phew. I’m tired just thinking about it.
If you’re not clear on the concept, or even if you are and want to read more, I highly recommend these two posts — Dave Navarro, aka “The Launch Coach” wrote about why launches suck, and over at Productive Flourishing, launch fatigue was the post that launched 159 and counting comments.
From these conversations, and others I’ve had over the last few weeks, I think I’ve identified a handful of potential pitfalls for the unwary launcher but the two biggest categories seem to be:
- Mishandled affiliate programs: When your price is well over $500 and you’ve got major A-listers hawking your wares over all their available channels … c’mon. We all know what’s going on here. Even if those affiliates really, truly believe in your genius and have the very best intentions, the appearance is that you and your high-school cool-kids clique are trying to make a buck off the less popular kids. Unfair? Perhaps. But that’s the impression you’re leaving your audiences with.
- Tricks and deception: Let me be clear here — I despise this, and so do most thinking, rational people out here on this side of your launch. We know what you’re doing. You’re not fooling anyone with that “oops, I sent the wrong link! I’m so human” email, or the “oh, this is TOTALLY unsolicited and objective and it looks like I’m going to honestly critique this product of my buddy’s but I’m really just going to tell you how fabulous this product is” email, or the “Oh WOW, we broke the servers, really!” email or the “Honest, I’m just putting out all these free videos here, I don’t have ANYTHING to sell” email (followed in two weeks by the “well, y’all talked me into it, OK, reluctantly, and only because you REALLY wanted it, I have this new product for sale now” email). You’re not fooling anyone. And I, for one, WILL NOT BUY if this is how you treat me (I don’t care how great your product is).
Why do I care about all this stuff? Obviously, I’m planning a launch. And I don’t want to go down that road. I’m trying to learn from my past mistakes, and from others’ mistakes. So, I’ve been willingly seeking out all these launches, so I can follow along, see what they’re doing (good and bad) and trying to find my own way through.
Part of my mission here at The Inspired Solo is to remind other solo entrepreneurs that we all have our own unique, special-snowflake paths to tread in business, and that when we do walk our own paths, we have better results than when we just try to follow in the footsteps of someone else’s path.
So, I’m looking for my “highest, truest, best” launch path, if you will. And I think I’ve found it. I’ll call it the UNlaunch, and yes, that’s a totally uninspired name but there it is. The UNlaunch is based on a few key lessons I’ve learned over the last month:
- No traditional launch “tricks,” period. I just cannot bring myself to engage in these tactics.
- No affiliates — not on this product, anyway. Not to say I’ll never use them, but I want the audience for this product to know that anyone who’s recommending it is doing so not out of self-interest but out of objective rational thought.
- Upfront sales copy — the price will be at the very top of the page, in bold, large print.
- Absolute clarity about who this product will be for, and who it will NOT be for (more importantly).
- Excerpt made freely available pre-launch. No hiding the whatever under the whatever.
- No list-bombing. Just a few posts here at the blog, a few tweets, one mention on the Facebook page — that’s all you’ll get from me. (If others want to recommend it, that’s out of my hands but I’m going to recommend they be discreet and unjerky about it.)
I’m curious — what do you think about the UNlaunch? Will it work? I guess we’ll find out. (Note I haven’t said what the product is — that’s because I want this post to just be about the method of launching it, not the product itself which frankly isn’t done yet.)
Innovative an intriguing. I did find myself asking. “Hey I wonder what the product is.”
I think that in today's market it is really effective to be authentic. We are all turned off by gimmicks like the ones that you described. And as long as being authentic does not become a gimmick then it will be more effective.
I do think that above all, you need to have a product that solves the customers problems or satisfies their needs to be successful.
So when you are ready, let me know. If I think you product will help my market, I will give you a plug.
Thanks, Roy! I really didn't intend to use this to gen up interest for that product, interestingly enough – I just wanted to stir up some thinking about launches in general but hey, there you go – your point is proven: genuine & authentic actually work!
You're absolutely right – in the end, it IS all about the product (although I think launches done more honestly help). It's true of any kind of business — the greatest marketing in the world won't save you if you can't do the job well.
Thanks for stopping by.
What I find really valuable about your idea for the UNlaunch is the willingness to try a completely different perspective, and to play with a different way of doing things than the “usual launch template.”
Part of the launch fatigue experience comes from the repeated patterns we see in launch after launch (as Dave Navarro deftly described in his post). I think that's part of what makes it all feel so inescapable–everyone seems to be following the same template, over and over and over again. But I understand why… it works. It's been successful. Tampering with the pattern feels akin to tampering with success.
The fact that so many people are engaging in the conversation about that pattern and the fatigue / resentment / boredom it's generating signals to me that even if that pattern is highly successful, it's time for some of us to tamper with it.
That you're taking the next steps of asking what could be done differently, what would resonate with you and your audience, and how you might approach a launch in a way outside of the established template is fantastic. I hope that's what comes from the launch fatigue conversation: lots of people interested in other ways of “launching” (or ways of UNlaunching, as the case may be), and hopefully a good chunk of people actually willing to try some of those new / different ways.
Glad you're percolating on the ideas and willing to run in your own direction with them. May we all be bold enough to do likewise.
Thanks for sharing your take on this!
Marissa – thank YOU for that post at Productive Flourishing – it started the whole ball rolling, and I (and others) got a ton of great stuff out of it, obviously.
I absolutely agree that the depth and breadth of the conversation means we've all been thinking about this stuff for awhile, and it's time to take some different action. (Took guts to bring it out into the open, though!) In some ways this “UNlaunch” plan feels like throwing yet another string of spaghetti on the wall but damn, one of these days, one of 'em's gonna stick.
You know, until it falls off, and then we'll start all over again.
I guess we'll see! (And thank you so much for stopping by and commenting here. Truly appreciate it.)
You know, just once I would like to see someone who's been approached to promote something say, “You know, I'm a fan and I'd love to help you out, but I'd like to evaluate your product first by letting several of my readers test it and give me feedback.” That would give a more credible “Consumer Reports” feel to the evaluation. It would also probably stop a lot of this abusive launch behavior cold.
Also, in following the comments on the original “Productive Flourishing” post and Dave Navarro and David Risley's follow-up posts, I see more than one professional “launcher” getting very defensive about these tactics. I've made a mental note never to buy products from these people. Thanks to Marissa and company for “outing” these guys for me.