I have to admit, there’s nothing more exciting than a company or individual doing a pre-launch. The anticipation… The build-up… The buzz… Oh my!
As an early participant on the consumer end, a well-run pre-launch is often filled with valuable content, awesome prizes, and the chance to be first.
On the company side, a pre-launch that is conducted like a well-oiled gold-getting dredge in the Klondike… well, that’s where dreams are made. (And where investors become happy.)
Whether it’s a pre-launch for a new business opportunity, company, or product, they are almost always filled with twists, turns, and surprises. (Sometimes planned, sometimes not.)
So a little heads up… there are over 12,900 words on this page and it takes the average person an hour to read it. So be sure to bookmark this page so you can come back to it from time to time.
Coffee and bathroom breaks are also highly recommended.
So, why should you read what I have to say about the art of pre-launch marketing?
Well, I’ve been living in the pre-launch and launch world since 2003.
Having created, managed, or been a part of over 40 pre-launches and launches over the years, I certainly know a thing or two on this subject.
And I even have the (now sadly, multiple) hospital stays and scars to prove it. (Launches are no joke.)
I’ll never forget my first pre-launch because it was a record-setter. It was in 2003, and I generated over 30,000 enrollments into a pre-launch in just 30 days.
Then, on the day that the company opened their doors for business, we generated over $1,000,000.00 in revenue in the first 24-hours of the company being open. And over the course of six years, many millions of dollars were generated for the company.
Since then, I’ve had a long string of five, six, and seven-figure launches in a wide variety of industries covering all different types of products… Not to mention several flops for various reasons that I’ll go into detail on later.
Lastly, I lived and breathed the “Internet marketing product launch” world for over a decade.
So today, I wanted to download some information that has been trapped into my head for years about the art of pre-launch marketing.
I’ve broken this article up into several sections so you can either read everything on the page, or you can scroll down and find the type of pre-launch marketing campaign or information you are looking for.
And of course…
I do provide this type of marketing service for companies and individuals from time to time as a Launch Consultant. So if you’re looking for someone to help launch your product, company, or something else, let’s jump on a Zoom or phone call.
Are you ready to go? Let’s dive in.
An Introduction to pre-launch marketing.
There are multiple types of pre-launch marketing campaigns, strategies, and methods one can use to get the word out about a new company or product.
One of the first items you’ll want to create is a pre-launch checklist that includes your entire pre-launch marketing strategy (as well as launch and post-launch). This will more often be a long list of items that includes your prelaunch email campaigns and social media posts.
We will get into some of the details on these items below.
Ultimately, the entire purpose of a pre-launch is to laser-target a group of potential buyers for your product, service, or business opportunity and get them onto your pre-launch email list.
From there, companies typically release additional information, news, videos, images, e-books, reports, and other types of media throughout the pre-launch.
Doing so serves a couple of important purposes: First, the potential buyers (AKA the leads) get to know you, your brand, and your product(s). This is critical as the most important element of this equation is building trust.
Second, these leads are ultimately your initial “buzz builders” for your company and brand throughout the pre-launch and post-launch.
A company will need to create epic, sharable content that those on the pre-launch list will not only consume like wild banshees, but also share with others via email and socially.
The Goal Of The Pre-Launch…
It’s to go viral and get as many enrollments as possible.
Even with just a little viral-action going on, the ROI on marketing can be astronomical for a company. Let me give you an example…
Let’s say a company ran a pre-launch and generated 5,000 leads on their level 1 over a period of 30 days. Meaning, all of those leads came into the company directly from their own marketing efforts.
But throughout the well-executed pre-launch, there were multiple viral components and content released that those 5,000 people shared.
That 5,000 could balloon to 6,000… then 9,000… then 13,000, then 20,000…. throughout the launch.
In this example, using the 20,000 number, that’s 15,000 extra leads that the company had zero acquisition cost.
To drill deeper, let’s say the average CPA (cost-per-acquisition) was $4.00 per enrollment into the pre-launch for the company.
The company spent $20,000.00 on marketing (5,000 X $4.00) to obtain those 5,000 leads.
But thanks to the viral nature of a pre-launch, they had an extra 15,000 leads that came in.
So that brings down their overall cost per lead to just $1.33. Crazy, right?
It’s All About The Conversion After A Pre-Launch.
Once once the pre-launch period is over, it’s ALL about converting those leads into customers or reps.
The leads are great, but where the rubber meets the road, is how many of those leads take out their wallets and share their credit card with you to buy your product, service, or enroll into your business.
There needs to be an extremely tight conversion campaign in place to take those leads by the hand and gently walk them across the street to make their purchase.
This piece is serious business.
A mistake, delay, or misstep here can kill the entire pre-launch marketing campaign.
There is often a very fine line a company needs to walk during this phase. Everything is on the line. And it doesn’t take much but a single delay in the launch to destroy all the work that went into the pre-launch and launch.
We’ll go into more detail about this and the dreaded “launch killers” later in this article.
Now as mentioned above, this article has been broken down into the following areas to make going through the content easier…
- New Product Launch (And Pre-launch)
- New Company Launch (And Pre-launch)
- New Business Opportunity Pre-launch
- Crowdfunding Pre-Launch (And launch)
- Direct Sales & Network Marketing Pre-launch
- Pre-launch landing pages
- Pre-launch marketing on Facebook (and other social media)
- Pre-launch software and services
- The elements of a successful pre-launch and launch
- Launch killers (no clowns, please.)
A New product pre-launch can build a huge list, get people excited, and generate a flood of sales on launch day (and beyond).
If you have developed a new product, don’t forget to create your pre-launch marketing campaign plan before you go to market.
Being an Amazon product description copywriter and product or company launch consultant, I know the importance of making the biggest splash you can – especially when you are competing on Amazon. Or anywhere for that matter.
While my business partner and I were going back and fourth with China on our product samples, I was busy working on our pre-launch marketing strategy to ensure we’d have a huge launch day and massive buzz for our product.
A good 40-60 days prior to our product going live, I created a Facebook page for our brand and started marketing. How?
I did a lot. But just to give you one example, we knew our brand had to stand out, so we gave our brand an attitude and unique personality, which was completely different than anyone had done in the niche.
I then wrote dozens and dozens of funny sayings, and then went to Pinterest to get more funny sayings for our niche.
Next, we hired a graphic designer to create unique images for all of those sayings. We had hundreds…
And then we scheduled out 3-5 posts a day, every single day. When one got traction, we then ran marketing campaigns targeting our market, leading people to a landing page with a special offer.
We had multiple images go viral. A few with well over 100K views… We grew our highly targeted email list quickly.
I then did some blogger outreach and Facebook page owner outreach. We had a bunch of bloggers blogging about us in the niche and sending people to our landing page.
All during this time we sent emails to our list to nurture, build trust, and have fun. But most importantly, we kept reminding them of the launch date of our new product.
And the craziest thing about it… No one knew what our product was because all we did was show people the box!
That was all part of the marketing I put together. We needed to be different and I found any and every single way possible to zig while everyone else in the niche zagged.
Launch day came and we sold TONS of products. From there we continued to push our Amazon marketing hard and soon reached the #1 best-seller status.
And for you Amazon sellers out there, you know once you reach the top (it is a grind getting there) it’s very easy to stay there.
Now the above is just one example.
Another example would be when I’ve launched books on Amazon to reach the #1 best-seller status. The reality is that it is not hard to become a #1 best-selling author now.
Sure, it sounds nice and makes you sound official and everything, but it is seriously easy to do on Amazon if you follow all the steps.
Heck, people can even buy their way to the NY Times Best-Seller list now. I know of multiple people who have done it and it takes a six-figure investment to make that happen.
In fact, I recently had a conversation about this with a potential client, his book publisher in New York City, and a 3rd party who makes the magic happen in the background.
However, the credibility of being labeled a NY Times Best-Selling author has a much more elegant ring to it than an Amazon Best-Selling Author…
In other launches I’ve done, we utilized everything from other social media, Google ads, massive influencer outreach, top-notch New York City PR firms, direct mail, email, flyers at colleges, you name it.
And this was for a physical product. There is a whole different world of strategies and things you need to do for an online product launch for a digital product like a course or e-book. I’ll save that topic for another article…
So basically, when you pre-launch and launch a new product, you go all out using any and every marketing medium possible that your target customers may see.
Below are just a few things that you need to have in place in order to pull off a successful product launch.
- Pre-Launch Landing Page – I suggest Elementor for landing pages
- Email List software
- Project management software
- Create and schedule out all social media marketing content on marketing calendar
- Graphic designers
- Video producers
- Support staff
- Content writers (blogs, marketing content, emails, website content, and more)
- Ad campaign manager(s)
- Programmers (if your business or product requires it)
- Various software (totally depends on the product you’re launching)
- Blogger & Influencer outreach campaigns and marketing material creation
- PR campaigns (If makes sense to do so)
- List of freebies, special offers, etc. to offer to people on your list
- Prizes for any contests you run (optional)
- Someone to manage all of this for you (or do it yourself)
- A salesletter to sell your product (pending the type of product you are selling)
- Website, back-end technology, payment systems, etc. ready to go weeks before you go live. Read that last part 28 times
- Affiliates or JV Partners (if you’re going to have an affiliate program on day 1.)
- Various marketing materials ready for the pre-launch, launch, and post-launch
- There’s a lot more. Every launch is different and needs to be mapped out from start to finish.
The above are just the basics. Depending on the complexity of your pre-launch and your marketing budget, you could very easily add another 50-100+ things to this list. Sound crazy?
Trust me, it’s not if you’re going to go big. Granted, you can do smaller scale launches, such as a book launch on Amazon to reach #1 best-seller which I’ve done a few times. Every single launch is different and how you do a launch changes constantly as technology changes.
Yes. It’s a hell of a lot of work and can take some very specialized knowledge. But it’s worth it.
A pre-launch for your new product that gets some traction can turn your product launch and company into a massive success overnight.
Yes, your life and business will be crazy while you fulfill all those orders, manage support, and all the other moving parts of your business, but you’ll be glad you did it… and your competitors will be upset that they didn’t.
Next, we’re going to jump into a company pre-launch…
You may think that a company pre-launch and a product pre-launch is the same… nope.
A New Company Pre-Launch can build serious buzz, save loads of time, and help explode revenue.
Just about any type of business can benefit from running a pre-launch to develop interest in their business before they officially open their doors.
A few examples of these types of businesses are…
- Restaurants
- New B2C or B2B software company
- New cyrpto currency, coin, or token
- Plastic surgeons
- HVAC companies
- Membership websites
- Non-profit organizations
- Pool cleaners
- A new division of a Fortune 1000 Company
- A frozen yogurt shop
- A website that will sell pens
- A furniture store
- An e-commerce business
- A cleaning business
- Just about any website
- Just about any business
You get the idea, right?
If you’re going to be offering any type of product or service in exchange for money, you can, and should pre-launch it to build up interest before you open your doors.
Now just as there are countless types of businesses, there are countless ways to pre-launch a business in order to build up the buzz and list of people who may want what you’re soon going to be selling.
An example could be that you’re opening up a new restaurant, and you want everyone in town to know it.
The first step would be creating a great landing page with a special offer, such as a free appetizer or a buy one lunch and get one free deal.
I’d be sure to put your personality or the personality of the business into the landing page and ideally show a video. Dare to be different.
Next, I’d get your Facebook page ready to start marketing locally to your target market, driving people to your landing page.
Then I’d get some awesome content created that is designed to spread locally. It could be funny local videos of someone interviewing locals about the types of food they like, articles, photos, etc.
The key here is to use humor if you can. Why?
Because a large percentage of your marketing will be done on Facebook. And besides us marketers, most people use Facebook to be entertained, and funny content spreads quickly.
Next, I’d create fliers with the special offer and get ready to plaster them around town, leading people to your landing page.
Next, I’d create a list of the 50 largest businesses in town. I’d create a custom flyer for each one, with their logo, and headline, “Special Lunch Offer For (Company Name)”. I’d get someone ready to drop all of those off at those companies.
I’d get Press Releases ready. I’d try to get some local celebrity or band to the restaurant every night during opening week. I’d hit the radio stations. TV stations. Everyone. Everywhere.
The company pre-launch would be an all-out marketing war locally.
And I would schedule everything to hit about 2 weeks prior to the restaurant opening to provide ample time for people to see your restaurant name not just once, but over and over again.
Now of course, there are a lot of other moving parts to the above, but hopefully you get the idea.
If your company is online, you can do much of the same thing, focusing on your target market and doing all you can to build your email list before you open your doors.
Make it fun.
For spin-offs of Fortune 1000 companies or new divisions, such as an Enterprise-level SAS (Software As a Service) company, that is a whole different approach all together.
A pre-launch of a company that sells products and services Enterprise-level obviously needs to be done much more methodically and professionally. However, you still can, and should, have fun.
Notice how fun keeps coming up?
A great (old school) example of what could have been an awesome video to pre-launch a company that offers conference call services to large businesses is the video below:
I’m sure you’ve seen that video before. Their company does not offer conference call services to businesses… But if it did, imagine the number of new customers this video would have brought in.
LeaderCast did a brilliant job. They created content that their target audience would not only get a kick out of, but content that they would share. A grand-slam marketing campaign.
And share they did at a tune of over 20 million views. Do you have any idea how much that is worth?
What if you had 20 million people view your video for your company pre-launch? Think that would be a game-changer for your business?
You can pre-launch just about any business in any market. It just takes some market research, creativity, a marketing budget, and a willingness to do something different.
The ROI can be ginormous, even if you just hit a single.
A New Business Opportunity Pre-Launch can build interest faster than the latest stock pump on reddit. (Diamond hands.)
Sometimes when I used the word, “business opportunity” people automatically assume direct sales or network marketing. We’ll get into those two later.
What I’m referring to is any and every other type of business opportunity. This could be anything from:
- New Franchise opportunities
- New Affiliate programs
- New “work from home” business opportunities
- New reseller opportunities
- New commission-only sales rep opportunities
- Etc.
Basically any type of business that offers someone the opportunity to make money marketing, selling, or sharing their product can greatly benefit from a pre-launch.
For example, I offer a service that offers recruiting for commission-only independent sales reps. This service was added because I’ve been the #1 recruiter in multiple companies and have built multiple affiliate teams and teams of independent sales reps into the hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands of people.
I enjoy creating processes and marketing systems that recruit.
I know what it takes to market, get interest, sort through the tire-kickers and the serious, all the way to having them enroll as an independent sales rep for a company.
Several years back a business partner and I came up with a unique idea in the credit card processing industry that we ended up getting on patent on.
And that was simply to offer merchants the ability to earn commissions from their own merchant accounts. They enrolled as a sales rep with us, and then sold themselves their own merchant account. Pretty simple, right?
We created a multi-tier affiliate program for the business opportunity. Meaning, someone could enroll and build a team of people that they are earning commissions from down multiple levels.
Because it cost $0.00 to become a sales rep with our company, we were not a network marketing company. This type of multi-tiered affiliate program is popular, and has been around forever. It used to be called a “webmaster’s affiliate program” back when I started marketing online in 1999.
Once I did all the normal pre-launch prep work needed, I opened the doors for the pre-launch and started marketing the pre-launch.
Tens of thousands of sales reps and seven-figures in affiliate commissions paid out later, the pre-launch of our business opportunity was successful and created a long-term, sustainable business.
Now putting together a pre-launch for an upcoming business is very similar to the set-up needed for a typical product and company launch. However, there are some major differences, especially on the back-end.
There is typically a lot more set-up and work needed to manage a business opportunity pre-launch because of the back-end technology.
Depending on how your company is set up, often times a 3rd party software will be needed to run the pre-launch. Additionally, you’ll need to have your entire back-office set up for your sales reps.
That includes training videos, materials, commission tracking, and more.
Besides that, you’ll need to get crystal clear on the pre-launch marketing and post-marketing funnels your company will be using.
For example, is anyone who has a pulse allowed to enroll into your business opportunity?
Are there more steps needed, such as a survey, questionnaire, or a test? Or, are there a few automated hoops to jump through that leads the serious candidates to a phone call with your head recruiter?
Are you a pharmaceutical company or medical device manufacturer seeking independent pharmaceutical sales reps to sell your product to their existing Doctor clientele?
As you can see, we’re already starting to get into the weeds a little here. But that’s OK.
The point is, every business opportunity pre-launch is different. They are all custom-designed from the ground up to fit the needs and goals of the company.
This is all pretty specialized knowledge gained from people who have created and ran business opportunity pre-launches multiple times in the past.
And there are not many of us out there.
A crowdfunding pre-launch builds interest before you go live (and adds happy juice on launch day .)
Who could forget one of the largest buzz-generating greats, “The Coolest Cooler” from Kickstarter from back in the day?
Now The Coolest is a classic case study on the ‘100 things NOT to do in a croudfunding pre-launch’. But then they learned, re-launched, and became a massive success.
But even then, that success was filled with the “what could go wrong, will go wrong” saying.
They went through hell just about every step of the way. However, what they did do was not only get the attention of the press during the pre-launch, but they caught the attention of the masses.
Not too long ago I was watching one of those, “How They Made Their Millions” TV show reruns, and the Coolest Cooler was featured on there.
The creator went through the ringer trying to get his cooler launched. From components not fitting or working, to the massive, massive delays, they still made it and they are changing the cooler industry, one cooler at a time.
Now what was amazing about this launch is that one of the main ‘Launch Killers’ I talk about later, was seen in this pre-launch and launch over and over again… Delays.
Delays usually kill a pre-launch, but they are one of the fortunate who survived and thrived.
Would you like to see what a crowdfunding pre-launch looks like?
1. Go run out and buy 10 boxes of 1000-piece Lego sets.
2. Empty them all onto your living room floor into one pile.
3. Throw away the boxes and instructions.
4. Try to build all 10 Logo sets.
In all seriousness, it’s not that crazy, but it can seem like it at times.
When there’s hundreds of millions of dollars on the line, there are a lot of moving parts that need to be managed.
Pardon my language, but there is literally a shit-ton of moving parts in a crowdfunding pre-launch. Trust me, I counted.
Why? (Not why I counted or how I determined such an exact number, but WHY there are so many moving parts in a Crowdfunding campaign launch.)
Because there are a lot of moving parts by itself… From dealing with backers, the manufacturer, PR, 3rd party software providers, designers, content writers, social media, blog posts, investors, the product itself, and on and on.
I do have experience creating pre-launches in the crowdfunding world… And I have either spoken to or worked with many of the top crowdfunding marketing firms in the country.
If you have been active in this world, you know very well how top-tier their pricing can be. I was blown away getting some pricing for manged services recently.
Typically people go the crowdfunding route to raise funds in order to get their product to market. And on the flip side, companies that already have funds use crowdfunding to take their products to market to build awareness, buzz, and sales.
It’s a wild business model filled with lines of RedBull cans and pizza boxes.
However, a win here with a pre-launch to a crowdunding campaign could mean hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in sales and an overnight fan base consisting of thousands of customers.
Much like all other pre-launches, you’ll need a very attention-getting landing page.
Now where I see SO many companies go wrong when doing the pre-launch and launch of their crowdfunding campaign, is that they’ll do all of the PR, Influencer outreach, media, ads, blogs, this, that, and everything else… And direct ALL of that traffic to their crowdfunding page.
*Slap palm on forehead*
The amount of high PR (Page Rank) websites that could link to your product means high-ranking SEO city. You’ll never have that opportunity to get such link juice again for your website.
So if you are about to pre-launch and launch your crowdfunding campaign, and the only thing you took away from this article is to always have sites link to YOUR website (not your crowdfunding URL), that is gold.
Besides the high PR, do you know what you could do with thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands (or more) visitors to your website?
You got it… You’re going to offer something cool and capture email addresses like a the bad-ass marketer that you are.
And once you have those email addresses, you can build a relationship and trust with your audience to further boost your conversion rate come launch time.
And then at some point post-launch, you could offer other products, services, or anything else to drive additional revenue for your company.
Ultimately, to run a successful pre-launch for a crowdfunding campaign, it takes some serious marketing dollars. And that’s not for just someone to put together and manage the launch…
You have your ad spend, plus other service providers, such as Influencer outreach providers, a PR firm, in-house or outsourced content creators, a direct response copywriter, etc.
It’s not inexpensive, but the rewards can be astronomical is your product takes off. Especially if your campaign generates hundreds of millions of dollars.
A Direct Sales & Network Marketing Pre-Launch (I have a secret sauce to recruit leaders)
How do you launch a new network marketing company or direct sales company? Very carefully. The regulations are tough and there are a lot of moving parts.
Creating and managing pre-launches in the network marketing and direct selling space is where I got my start many moons ago and still take on clients in this world from time to time.
Now I’m fully aware of many people who strongly dislike this industry for many, many reasons. For one, Aunt Edna will not shut up about buying her Tupperware. And then you have your neighbor who won’t shut up about trying her new makeup. Or your friend at the office who is constantly trying to get you to drink one of his weight loss shakes. Or good ‘ole Uncle Andy, who is always promising you that “this is the one” and you’re going to get rich quick. Oh silly Andy.
Regardless of your relationship with Network Marketing / Direct Sales, launches in this space are incredibly more difficult than other industries. There are more personalities. More moving parts. More technology (in most cases). More regulations. More of just about everything.
If there was such a thing called, “Launch School” this profession is where you’d find all of the case studies and training on all the moving parts than you can plug into any company or product launch.
In fact, I’ve run both company and product pre-launches in many countries, such as: USA, Canada, Mexico, UK, Australia, and New Zealand. Each of those had their own unique challenges.
Over the years, I’ve done more than two dozen launches in the direct selling / network marketing professions. And it was because of those launches that I had the opportunity to learn and come up with my own unique methods on how to launch new companies and new products online.
Although both network marketing and direct sales are under the same umbrella, how you create, run, and manage a pre-launch for them is different.
The reason for this is mainly the target market that you’re going after. The overall mechanics of the pre-launch is almost the same for each profession, but the markets and overall feel needs to be different in order to attract the right types of people.
Now as a side note, understand that I have a very good understanding of the legalities, rules, and regulations of these industries. I have also attended multiple-day DSA regulatory events in Washington, D.C.
Despite the industry reputation (by some), many do not know that the profession is extremely regulated. It is. Like crazy now-a-days.
So much so that when I do offer services as a Network Marketing Consultant or Direct Sales Consultant for new companies that are launching, I always bring in one of my direct selling compliance experts.
Although I understand direct selling compliance on both the corporate front and the independent rep front, I always ensure the company I’m consulting for is on the same page.
So let’s break it down, shall we?
A Direct Sales Pre-Launch
When you hear direct sales, what do you think of? Many will think of the companies that have been around forever. Companies like: Mary Kay, Avon, or Tupperware.
What else do you think of? Do you think of women? If so, ding-ding-ding!
Yes, there are some men in direct selling companies, but the vast majority are women.
And when you look at the products: Makeup, perfume, candles, jewelry, oils, soaps, bath supplies, etc. it only makes sense. Besides that, the direct selling profession offers an awesome opportunity for a stay-at-home mom to earn an income from home while being there for her child(ren).
In fact, this is exactly what my ex-wife does.
Funny I’m bringing up my ex-wife, but it’s cool. It’s good and we co-parent amazingly well.
She’s in a direct selling company, and has been for a many years now. Hopefully she won’t mind me using her as one of the examples here. (Referring to divorce decree… Check. I’m clear.)
After years of trying to get my ex to join a direct selling company, I gave up. She had zero interest. So you could imagine the surprise when she told me one night that she found a company that she loved, and wanted to join.
The company had already been around for a little while, so there was no chance for us to do a company pre-launch for the direct selling company that she could participate in.
So I did the next best thing and taught her my strategies on how to become a recruiter… And that she did.
Within 12 months, she reached the top of the compensation plan, and was ranked the #4 recruiter out of over 350,000 distributors in her company her first year.
Now there was a bit of my pre-launch secret sauce tossed into the mix besides learning how to recruit a lot of like-minded people…
After about 6 months, we learned that the company was going to launch into another country in one month. I had no time to waste.
I worked like crazy to put together a quick pre-launch marketing website, back office, training materials, videos, and more. That direct sales pre-launch into a new country definitely helped build out her team. (She became the #1 recruiter in that country on launch day.)
Now whether you are a brand new direct sales company preparing to open your doors, or you’re an existing company preparing to launch into a new market, the benefits of a pre-launch are far too long to list.
The opportunity to pre-launch a direct sales company the right way, professionally, ethically, and honestly, is more ripe than ever.
Why?
Because there have been very, very, VERY few of them compared to traditional network marketing company and business opportunity pre-launches and launches.
Ultimately, you need all the same tools, bells, and whistles as you’d need with most other launches. The pre-launch materials, replicated websites, a HIGH QUALITY back-end software (I will leave the names out, but there are direct selling back office software companies you want to avoid), a tight launch and content calendar, all of the providers lined up, back office lined up, legal, compliance, marketing, etc. etc.
But the trick is to nail the look, feel, overall messaging, the content, marketing materials, and most importantly, the calls-to-action both during the pre-launch, and during the upgrade period.
If you ran a typical network marketing pre-launch for a direct selling company, it wouldn’t work. There would be multiple disconnects because the psychology and even the methodology of the pre-launch is so different.
How you market during your pre-launch is not how you market to your independent distributor base post-launch. And this is one of the main reasons why having your internal marketing department create and run a pre-launch is not the best idea… unless they have ran multiple pre-launches previously.
The #1 thing to keep in mind during the pre-launch is your target audience. And I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that it’s your typical mom, 35 years old, has 2 kids, drives a mini-van or SUV, her husband works, she’s active in her kids school, likes to watch some Netflix and plays some apps on her phone occasionally, and she wants to earn income from home.
The ads and messaging you use to attract her into your pre-launch are created for the sole purpose of sharing, initially.
You can’t just toss up ads like, “Join For Free! New Pre-Launch Business Opportunity! First To Market!”. You’ll attract the ‘get rich quick network marketers’, who you want to avoid in both a direct selling and a network marketing pre-launch.
Think about the type of content that your target distributor is already consuming on Facebook, on blogs she reads, or Podcasts she listens to. Most importantly, think about the type of content that she comments on and shares…
What happens when you create that lovable and shareable content that ties into your products or business?
Boom. Pixel dropped.
Now you have her and her friends on the hook for the next several phases of the pre-launch.
I call this type of marketing, “Pre-Launch Drip Marketing”.
You can’t just run up to her in a grocery store randomly and say, “Hey, want to join my new business opportunity?”
You have to get her attention… win her trust… offer her value… and connect what you offer with what she wants.
Now that’s just the very first phase of a direct sales pre-launch. A tiny little piece.
Next, you have everything that happens during the pre-launch, and then the most important phase, the upgrade period…
The upgrade period is period of time where those enrolled in the pre-launch can decide to lock arms with your company and start marketing your products and business, or not.
Typically this runs from 3-7 days, depending on the overall launch plan.
A direct sales pre-launch can put a company on the map overnight.
Especially if we’re working together and I share my secret sauce on how to recruit hundreds of experienced leaders into your company that are ready to rock and roll the day your actual pre-launch begins.
But I’m getting ahead of myself here…
Next, let’s dive into the other side of the coin…
A NETWORK MARKETING Pre-Launch
When it comes to a Network Marketing Pre-launch, what’s the first thing that you think of?
For many, it’s hype, $100 bills falling from the sky, big claims, and images of boats, mansions, and craziness…
That’s the way some ran their launches in the wild west days of the early 2000’s. And I completely cringe when I see someone, or a company pop up with that style of hyped-up marketing.
It doesn’t work, attracts the wrong types of people, and it’s one of the fastest ways to not only hurt your reputation, but destroy your credibility.
The ONLY type of pre-launch that I suggest network marketing companies do, is one that is highly professional, open, honest, ethical, way above board, unique, exciting (without hype) and extremely transparent.
Not doing so is the kiss of death for a network marketing pre-launch. Sure, you can attract the wrong types of people, enroll thousands, even tens of thousands of ‘biz opp seekers’ into your business the first month, but within 90 days, those people are all gone.
To attract the types of professionals you want to join your pre-launch, you must create content materials that they not only want to consume, but is done so with a high level of professionalism.
Yes, the bar is high, and continues to rise. But that’s what make the challenge of pulling off a successful network marketing pre-launch fun.
And don’t worry… Despite what you may think, there is very little competition for a well-run pre-launch for several reasons:
1. Network Marketing company Founders launching a new company often fail to put together a budget for a real pre-launch in their business plan when they brought in investors.
This is either because they simply don’t know, or don’t understand what a successful pre-launch can do for their business. Not their, or anyone’s fault. They just didn’t know that this type of marketing exists.
2. There are very few Network Marketing pre-launch and launch consultants and experts in the world. Personally, I’ve created and led at least 14 pre-launches in network marketing and direct selling out of my 40+ company and product launches I’ve done over the years.
3. Some Network Marketing company Executives choose to go the direct leader route and hope for the best. Meaning, they enroll one, three, five, or more leaders direct to the company that they know, like, and trust.
It is then up to the leaders to do what they can to launch the company. Note that there is nothing wrong with this model – at all. It’s just much slower than a pre-launch. But if you combine the two… you’re tapping into an awesome power.
The absolute most ideal way to run a Network Marketing pre-launch is the following:
Hire Your Pre-Launch Consultant – Hire a Network Marketing Company Launch consultant as soon as possible, post initial funding. Trying to do this internally without experience running launches is tough. Not to mention, you’ll miss out on recruiting tons of leaders even before you launch (my secret sauce.)
It takes a few months to get everything ready including the people, content, videos, design, staff, scripts, marketing materials, pre-launch back office, replicated website software, custom programming, and other long-term projects that will both protect your company and drive revenue.
Pre-Launch Marketing Materials – Work with your launch consultant on the pre-launch, launch, and post-launch materials needed while you line up your core leadership team – but do not start talking or marketing yet. Keep your company name and products under wraps. This is critical. And in fact, this is where I see so, so many companies drop the ball. It creates problems from top to bottom if you let the cat out of the bag too early.
Your Reputation Wall – Your pre-launch consultant works with internal and/or external staff on a method that I created and highly suggest called, “The Pre-Launch Reputation Wall”.
I’ve never shared this publicly… But I have a lot of methods I keep top secret. I’ll share this one. Basically what you need to do is release a lot of content with your company name, product name, and all your executive names across many different domains and sub-domains, and do some SEO.
What this does is builds a wall of protection against any negative reviews about your company for the short and long-term. There’s more to it that I only share with clients. But this piece alone can easily add seven-figures a year in revenue to a company.
Why?
Because one of the very first things that anyone does when they hear about a new company, is search on Google. They will search for your company name, company name + reviews, and they will also search all of the company Founder’s names to ensure that they have a solid reputation.
Having even one negative review or blog post about your company or products will cost you many, many new distributors and customers short and long-term. Not to mention the constant frustration your current reps feel always having to battle that bad review.
You also protect yourself from all the savvy marketers who know targeting new Network Marketing or Direct Selling companies via SEO is low-hanging fruit. They can quickly rank their blog posts, YouTube videos, and more to get traffic and very often generate leads they can pitch their business to or sell products/services.
I know that game well because I used to do that many moons ago. I was one of (if not the) first to do that. Everyone wondered how I was always recruiting 30+ new people per month. That was one of the methods – there were many others…
Leader Round-up – The Company Launch Consultant and Executive team has a meeting with the core leaders and shows them everything that has been created for the pre-launch. The overall pre-launch, launch, and post-launch marketing plans are shared.
It is up to the leaders if they wish to use the system developed, in addition to the recruiting they are planning on doing. Those that do opt to participate will add some serious rocket fuel to their business.
If there is a marketing budget available on the company side (highly recommended), then a replicated site would be set up to distribute those leads among the leaders. Exact details of this type of set-up and marketing reserved for clients. There are also several other pieces to this to build the team of leaders prior to the launch. Sorry, not going to share all my secrets here!
Pre-Launch & Launch Technology Checklist – This is one many companies miss – and it could cost them their company. Literally. ALL of the pre-launch and launch technology needs to be 100% completed within two weeks of going live. That’s tested. Finished. Ready to roll.
If ANY delays are to happen, this is the last place that they can. Any delays of the launch of the company past this point, the pre-launch is cooked. Done. Most enrollments will be off doing something else. Trust and credibility would be out the window.
Your Launch Consultant works with you, your tech team, marketing staff, content developers, and any/all outsourced providers to ensure everything is ready to go and is 100% working.
You want to literally be ready to open your doors to your company to go live prior to going into the pre-launch. I have a mountain of data to prove why this is mission-critical.
The Pre-launch Begins – Things have changed very recently as far as how long a company needs to stay in a pre-launch for maximum effectiveness. Although I cannot go into the specifics or methodology behind this here, this is one of the most critical components of a launch. I have seen dozens, and I mean dozens of companies get this wrong over the years and destroy their own network marketing company pre-launch.
Pre-launch Activities – The Launch Consultant will have worked with the internal team to create a tight content calendar for an exciting, yet highly professional launch. This includes everything from videos, webinars, social posts, emails, and more.
Remember, all of which was created ahead of time and not on the fly as some companies do. That opens the doors for confusion, error, and a box filled with things you do not want to see. Believe me.
Launch Activities – This is a critical time for the pre-launch… It’s time to turn those free enrollments into paid distributors and customers. There are at least a dozen ways you can set this up, depending on your goals, company, products, packages, etc.
Basically, this is the time where we convert those thousands, or tens of thousands of people into paid distributors. Based on all of my previous launches, I have the actual percentage of how many people will upgrade within 2-3 percent on either side.
All of the content, action items, videos, materials, etc. was created ahead of time for this phase. Everyone just follows the launch calendar and enjoys this super exciting time.
Post-Launch Marketing Activities – This is another area where I see the ball get dropped over and over again. This is the second most critical phase during a pre-launch and launch.
There are things you can do to get a percentage of the people who did not upgrade during the upgrade window to upgrade and become a distributor. It is not a huge percentage, but it is enough to make the post-launch marketing activities to those who did not enroll more than worth it.
The post-launch marketing activities should run for 30-days and include extremely special offers, promos, and success stories about your opportunity and products. There is an entire methodology behind this phase as well.
Yes, there is a lot to a new Network Marketing Company pre-launch, which is why I highly suggest a company hires a launch professional that not only knows how to set it up, but they also understand the corporate, legal, reputation, regulatory, social media, and launch psychology areas.
Another area that your Launch Consultant could help you with, beyond the launch, is consulting on the actual marketing materials that will be provided to the distributors post-launch.
Training your distributors and providing them the technology to correctly market their business online (while staying compliant) will go a long way and keep the retention high. Not to mention keep your company safe from regulators if you had some bad eggs in the mix.
To take it a step further, there are opportunities to teach your distributors how to effectively market not only your products and business, but also themselves.
This is an area that I see barely touched upon by network marketing companies.
Back when I was a full-time network marketer, I recruited an average of 30 people per month, every single month. I was the #1 recruiter in multiple companies.
And over the last few years, I promoted a few multi-tiered affiliate programs and was the #1 recruiter in those companies. One of them had over 100,000 reps and getting to the #1 spot was some hard work, let me tell you.
I sincerely do not say this to brag. At all. I only say this because as a recruiter, I know what works, what doesn’t, and I see so many people spinning their wheels, not seeing success, and giving up.
Being that personal development is the core of the network marketing profession, I believe it should be one of the missions of the company to educate their reps on how to properly market not just the business and product, but themselves.
This would ultimately lead to more reps and customers for the company, a great addition to company culture, and many more commission checks.
And you already know what happens when you have a lot of commission checks being mailed out… Momentum baby!
And honestly, that is exactly what a network marketing pre-launch is all about…
Yes, it is of course to get everything ready to launch and build buzz…
But the #1 reason why I do network marketing & direct selling pre-launches is to both manufacture, and lay the foundation needed for MOMENTUM.
Momentum is an elusive creature.
It’s what many direct selling and network marketing executives are chasing… And it’s what every single leader wants to see happen in their organization.
Because once you hit momentum, you’ve created a train that takes your company to the top faster than nearly any other business model in existence.
Yes, a company can reach momentum without ever doing a pre-launch… But it’s going to take potentially years for that to happen.
Ultimately a pre-launch can shave off many of those years and get your company in a position to go into momentum much faster.
And to set realistic expectations, a pre-launch does not guarantee that you’ll go into momentum the first month that you launch. In fact, that would be extremely rare, maybe even impossible.
The pre-launch lays the foundation needed to foster hyper-growth. In best-case scenario, you’d have a massive first month, followed by steady growth for the next several months, and then you hit that critical mass needed for the explosion into momentum later.
If going into momentum is the goal, if you’re still working with your network marketing pre-launch consultant, you should work together to outline a product launch road-map for the next 12+ months.
And then, have your launch consultant map out BOTH the internal and external launch strategies for those product launches. This can help you manufacture the momentum MUCH faster.
You see… There is another secret…
Most companies launch their new products at convention. There is nothing wrong with that. It’s been done that way for years and years and frankly, it works.
However, there are certainly multiple things that can (and should) be done when launching a new product to your distributors to market.
In many ways, you should treat the launch of a new product much like you’d treat pre-launching your company.
For example, if you were a nutritional product company, what if you put together an entire internal product launch campaign, much like how a product launch in the Internet marketing world is done?
You could have new landing pages, an opportunity for all existing distributors to buy sample packs, marketing materials, pre-launch videos, calls, webinars, and much more, all leading up to your conference… Where the actual launch happens.
Then when the doors are officially opened, you not only create a stampede at your convention, but you create one online for all of the distributors who were not able to make it out to convention.
One of my previous mentors, who is one of the highest earners in network marketing history, told me, “Always be building to the next event.”
I took that to heart, not just for company or team live events, but I also see the launch of a new product as a new event.
There’s a lot a that network marketing company can do internally and externally to dramatically increase the sales and excitement of a new product introduced to their network of Independent reps or distributors.
If you create an internal culture that is focused on “Always be building to the next event AND launch”, combined with your culture of giving, supporting, leading, and/or growing, you’ve created a very powerful 1-2-3 punch that can build an epic company that can stand the test of time.
Next, we’re going to dive into…
How to create pre-launch landing pages that convert better than selling your bitcoin for $15K a coin.
In many cases, your pre-launch landing page will be your potential customer’s first exposure with your company. You want it to look amazing, clean, on-brand, and of course be mobile responsive since the majority of your traffic will be mobile.
I mentioned before that my preferred pre-launch landing page website builder is Elementor. You can literally build anything you want. For all types of pre-launches and marketing funnels, you can create an awesome landing page with a video, information about your product, company, or opportunity, and capture names and email addresses.
The same basic rules apply in a pre-launch landing page or a traditional lead-generation landing page or marketing funnel.
You keep the content short, sweet, simple, and tight.
But most importantly, you run A/B tests like crazy to ensure your landing page is converting the best that it can to drive down your CPA costs and overall ad spend.
You will want to split-test everything from:
- The headline
- Background image
- Bullet points
- With or without video
- Variations of the video itself
- Any and all other images
- All the colors used
- Any and all the other written content
- Multiple versions of the page with completely different angles
- The offer
- And so on…
Boosting the conversions of a pre-launch landing page is money in the bank.
Now an area where I see many companies miss the boat is what happens after someone submits their information.
I’m sure you’ve experienced this yourself multiple times…
You submit your name and email for a launch and you’re brought to a thank you page that simply says, “Thanks, You’re In!”
Whoopee-doo-da. Yawn.
Now the person is back to scrolling through their Facebook Newsfeed like a zombie. What a waste of an extremely rare opportunity…
You’ve got their attention. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to get the attention of people in this micro social media driven, quick-fix, information-overloaded, ADD, scrolling-zombie world?
Do not waste this awesome opportunity. Seize it. Capture it. Own it.
Especially during a pre-launch, the goal is to not just capture emails, you’ll also want to quickly get the new subscriber engaged in your product, brand, business, opportunity, etc.
What can you do immediately after you captured their email address and now the user is sitting on your thank you page?
This all depends on your pre-launch marketing business model, company, product, goals of the launch, etc. It varies immensely.
However, a few examples could be…
If you are a restaurant, you could integrate a social sharing contest software into your landing page that would provide rewards for people who refer others locally to your landing page.
Refer 5 friends and get a free appetizer. Refer 10 friends and get a free lunch. Refer 20 friends, get a free lunch and a free dinner.
Refer 50 friends, win the private room rented out for you and 10 of your friends, with unlimited food and a coupon for $500 worth of drinks from the bar, PLUS a limo to pick you up and bring you all home.
Another idea could be for a new software product you’re launching… On the thank you page, you could provide people with the opportunity to unlock private beta access to your software early.
All they need to do is share the special link you provide them with just 5 friends who enroll on the landing page. Doing so would unlock 100% free unlimited access to the software for 1 week to try out before you launch. (I’ve never seen a software company do this, but I think that would be awesome and spread virally for the right software.)
Another idea for a company-sponsored direct sales or network marketing pre-launch (during the first phase), could be a longer video that goes into more detail about the people behind the company, the product, opportunity, and details of the upcoming pre-launch. Then below that, you have an application people fill out to apply to be one of the company’s direct leaders.
Another idea for a physical product (such as a new invention, pre-Kickstarter campaign, book, Amazon product, etc.) would be a heart-felt video from you to thank folks and ask them to take some sort of action while you prepare for the launch.
It could be as simple as asking them to share your page on Facebook, download a report, fill out a short survey, or some other micro action that will keep them on the hook a bit longer and provide more of an experience.
If you can evoke any sort of emotion here to help make the first experience with you or your company enjoyable and memorable, you earn extra bonus points.
The things you can do and ideas one can come up with are endless.
But don’t stop with just one. Test multiple thank you pages to see which one produces more of the results you are looking for. Most importantly, you’ll start learning what types of content your audience responds to, and shares the most.
Do you think that type of information would be beneficial knowing before you officially launch your product? You bet!
Need A COMPANY Launch? HOW ABOUT A PRODUCT LAUNCH?
Pre-launch marketing on Facebook (and All other social media)
It’s no secret that a large amount of my pre-launch marketing happens on Facebook and all the other social media platforms (and non-social media through media buys – another topic for another day).
However, depending on the market you’re targeting, you may also add Twitter, Instagram (a great one), LinkedIn, Google, TikTok, various content networks, blogger and Influencer outreach, PR, and so fourth. (There’s no platforms to market on launch just about every day. There’s far too many to list here.)
Now I’m going to be a little lite here because I could write an entire book on the subject of marketing a pre-launch using Facebook ads and other types of social media. I’ll do my best to keep this high-level.
Having run literally hundreds of my own Facebook marketing campaigns, plus countless pre-launch Facebook marketing campaigns for other companies, I’ve learned a lot.
One of the biggest lessons is testing and re-testing to ensure you get the highest conversions for your landing page.
You need to test all of the elements of your ads. From the headline, to the image, to the copy on the image, to the description, to the call-to-action button.
Eventually you find the winning ad(s) and then you scale.
If you market on Facebook, you know that the targeted marketing you can do is awesome. And if you add in some secret ninja style pixel tracking plus a multi-step pre-launch marketing strategy, you can create a 1-2 punch that would make even Mike Tyson blush.
One of the biggest mistakes that I often see people make here is tying to run their own Facebook marketing campaigns while trying to manage all of the moving parts of the pre-launch.
For example, for a recent campaign we did for our local seminar marketing company, we ran over 20 variations of the Facebook ads, 20+ tests targeting different demographics, plus at least that many variations to the landing page.
This meant that I created over 20 images, did the copywriting for 20 different Facebook ads, and on and on. If I was launching my own seminar, it would have been impossible to manage everything all at once. Bottom line – you need to outsource your Facebook marketing in a launch if you have the resources to do so.
And there is no shortage of Facebook marketing agencies out there that can do it. Just make sure that they have real-world experience marketing what you’re launching.
Personally, I work with someone who has managed tens of millions of dollars in ad spend and was responsible for campaigns I 100% guarantee that you’ve seen on and off of Facebook. She is my go-to when it comes to any launch. I create all the ads, videos, images, etc. and she runs and manages the campaigns.
Besides Facebook, there are different strategies to use, depending on which social media platform that you’re marketing on. But frankly, if you outsource this piece for your pre-launch and launch, you don’t have to worry about all the nitty-gritty details. There are a LOT of them.
After all, that’s what you’re paying someone else to take care of for you.
software you can use to make millions (or billions) of dollars in your launch - Guaranteed.
OK. The headline sounds good, but it’s not really true. Neither I nor anyone can guarantee you can or will make money with your launch. Sorry! However, what I can promise you is that there are more software options available today than ever to help make your job a lot easier.
There are countless types of software applications to choose from to manage your pre-launch and launch of your product, service, or business opportunity.
In an effort not to be redundant, I’ve already covered the landing page software I suggest above. For many of you, a landing page, auto-responder account, and video hosting provider will be needed.
For those in the direct selling and network marketing world, a custom pre-launch software is needed – or there are some providers that have developed their own holding tank software. I have used many of them from all of the large enterprise-level network marketing and direct selling software providers.
Understand that every launch is different. And every set-up when it comes to technology and the software used is different. We would be here for months going over every software option available. So I’m going to stay very high level for this section.
Video Hosting
I do not suggest hosting your videos on YouTube for the fact that you have an “out” on your landing page. Meaning, a viewer can click on the YouTube logo and then be brought to YouTube. Once that happens, you’ve lost them forever.
YouTube does an excellent job at showing other videos that they’ll be interested in watching.
Instead, I suggest video hosting providers such as Vimeo or Wistia. Wistia provides deep viewer analytics, which is a huge advantage when split-testing your video on your landing page.
Email Marketing
For the smaller pre-launches and launches, you can choose any email provider such as: Aweber, MailChimp, ConstantContact, or hundreds of others.
For larger-scale company launches, I highly suggest investing in an enterprise-level email service that is in the cloud that if self-managed (Google Cloud or Amazon). Having such service will provide you with greater deliverability, support, peace of mind, and professionalism.
The Top Secret Elements of a Successful Pre-Launch and Launch THAT The Government DoesN't Want You TO Know ABOUT.
Kidding. Of course the Government wants you to be successful. After all, the bigger the launch, the more tax dollars go to Uncle Sam.
A pre-launch can be anything from mild to wild in regards to how many moving parts it has.
But ultimately, in order for a pre-launch to work, you need to…
1. Create Excitement – Let’s face it. You need to create some buzz and excitement for your pre-launch and launch or else no one is going to sign up on your list.
Just be careful not to make over-the-top promises you can’t keep. Be exciting, but stay clear away from any and all hype. Most importantly, have a little fun without going over the top and annoying people or hurting your credibility.
2. Build Anticipation – This is one of the most critical pieces your launch. Building anticipation is psychological. The only way to build it is use of words, images, or videos. If you’re not a great direct response copywriter, then hire one.
Anticipation is built throughout the entire launch cycle, and needs to be done in a way where it builds. But at the same time, it needs to be created in a way where it doesn’t matter if someone joined your list on day #1 or day #28.
3. Make it Sharable or Viral – If it is appropriate for your product, service, or company to add some humor into your pre-launch, that’s one way sure-fire way to get people sharing your content over and over.
And if you’re able to crack that code, your marketing dollars will go thousands of times further than if you are stuck with trading dollars for enrollments one at a time.
When you have people signing up onto your pre-launch website that you spent $0 to obtain, you’re in the money baby! It’s time to scale as big and as fast as you can to drive that viral growth.
4. Ensure it is Solid – Before you open the doors to your pre-launch, make 100% sure that your pre-launch, launch, and post-launch websites, materials, technology, back-end, front-end, this-end, and that-end are all 100% functional, working, and ready to go.
I cannot stress the importance of this enough. Hence why I keep ringing this bell.
Do not go into pre-launch until you are 100% ready to launch that day, if you wanted or had to. Now there are just a couple tiny exceptions to this golden rule, depending on what type of pre-launch and launch you are running.
5. Have a Plan – You cannot go into this on the fly. You literally have to detail out each and every single item that is needed, what needs to get done, when it needs to be done by, and then create a content marketing calendar.
Not doing this is disastrous.
I can assure you countless unknowns and surprises will crop up all throughout the launch. There are always fires to put out and you’re pulled in multiple directions. Before you know it, you missed an important email or announcement, and the entire structure of the launch begins to collapse.
Think about a pre-launch like building a house. You need a blueprint and things have to be done in order and on time or else your house will become a pile of rubble.
6. Work Your Plan – Stick to your original plan as much as possible. However, make your plan to be open for opportunities that can enhance your launch. There will be plenty of new things that come up. Sometimes a lot.
For example, let’s say you’re pre-launching an awesome product and you find yourself on your local TV news station being interviewed about what you’re about to launch. Do you think it would be a good idea to use that content in your marketing?
You better bet your bottom dollar, buckaroo! Of course it would.
When opportunities like that emerge, you’ll need to refer back to your launch plan, website, marketing materials, etc. to make some modifications.
Sure, it is more time invested, but the pay-offs are huge when big things happen that add more credibility to you, your product, your business, or opportunity.
7. Have a Contingency Plan in Place – Expect the best; have a plan for the worst. Create a “if shit hits the fan plan” and stuff it away and hope you never have to refer to it during your launch. Now it is impossible to have a plan for everything that could go wrong. However…
I can tell you exactly where 95% of the launches have issues or where the failures happen: The technology.
Have a list of back-up service providers. Additionally, have a list of back-up workers. For example, your kick-butt graphic designer just had her baby and she’s off for the next few months. Now what? Or your content writer decided to pack his bags and move to Alaska to search for gold completely out of the blue.
You just never know. But having not just one, but multiple back-ups for each an every single piece of your pre-launch and launch will save you valuable time, frustration, money, and bad decisions.
8. Bust Your Ass – I don’t know why I love pre-launches and launches so much. They are truly the most demanding work I have ever done in every sense. There’s no reason for me to sugarcoat it and tell you launches are filled with unicorns and butterflies…
The reality is that when a launch is working, it is crazy each and every single day that the launch is live – from day 1 to the last day of the entire launch-cycle (pre-launch, launch, and post-launch).
You have to be willing to make some serious sacrifices with your family and personal life. Be sure that you sit your spouse down and let him or her know that you’re basically headed off for war.
But you are doing so because if the launch works even a fraction of what you hope, then you’ll be able to provide an even better life for your family.
This is no joke. I’m sure many in the tech start-up world ruined or missed out on a lot of things because Founders of companies underestimated the work that it takes to launch their product or service.
Anyway. Another way to think of it is you’re having a baby. Your company, your product, or your service is your baby. And you’re basically speeding up the natural process by modifying the DNA and injecting growth hormones into your business.
OK. That got weird. I need to work on better examples.
You’ve got to work your launch like it is your last stand. You have to go all-in and all-out or you’ll end up regretting not doing so forever if it fails.
Besides, the energy that you and your team are putting into the launch creates a positive ripple effect for your launch and your company… and most importantly for those on your email list.
Lastly, one thing I always do is schedule some time off ahead of time once the launch is over. I suggest that you do the same.
You’ll need to rest and you fully deserve it. Besides, it’s a nice reward to work towards…
Especially if you make it something fun like being pampered at an all-inclusive luxury resort where all of the stress you have simply melts off of you like butter on a hot butter knife the moment you arrive.
I’ll be 100% transparent with you here… on a serious note.
For years I offered full “done for you” company launches and product launches. Even the extremely large ones. I found out my limit as a human three times.
I ended up in the hospital on three different occasions immediately following launches. But the last one (March of 2021) was the worst and was a pretty big wake up call that I needed to immediately change my business model. I nearly worked myself to death while not missing one moment with my son.
Yes, I had “balance”, at least in some areas and I was able to maintain my title “Best Dad In The World”. It’s true. I have both a coffee cup and a tee-shirt to prove it.
But what I did not have was sleep or proper nutrition for weeks. Whoops.
So long story short, I do offer “done for you” solutions on small company and product launches. But for the big ones, I offer Launch Consulting with a few potential add-ons. The days of me doing everything from A to Z in a launch are over.
However, I can tell you that without a doubt, I can do everything when it comes to everything that is needed for a launch (minus programming). Proven it many times. So the great news is I know exactly what is needed, who to hire, and how to manage them.
Now Do You SEE THAT YOU REALLY Need TO Launch YOUR BUSINESS OR PRODUCT?
How To Avoid The Dangerous Launch Killers That Lurk Under, Behind, And Above Your Bed At night.
They are lurking behind every dark corner of every launch and pre-launch. And their only mission is to ensure that they completely destroy and kill your pre-launch.
Oh yes, these creatures are real. Very real. And if you don’t know what to look for, they will quickly appear when you least expect it and slash open your server, spilling it’s bits and bites all over the floor.
However, the good news is that you’re about to be armed with incredibly powerful knowledge that will ensure you evade these blood-hungry pre-launch and launch killers…
1. Delay Monsters – If you’re launching a new business opportunity and you announce that you’re launching on July 1st, then something happens and you have to push the launch out a week or two or more, you might as well consider as much as 75% of your list… GONE.
They have moved onto something else.
For product and company launches, the damage is not as severe, thankfully. However, you do lose some very critical brownie points, trust, and respect if you do not open your doors on the day that you said you would. It won’t be as costly such as a pre-launch of a business opportunity, but it will still cost you. I can guarantee that.
To avoid this launch-killing beast, you simply have to ensure that everything is ready to go before you begin your pre-launch marketing sequence. But most importantly, you need to be aware of any potential snags such as shipping, product fulfillment, delivery, etc. If there is any potential for delays, why not wait until everything is 100% ready to go before you launch your pre-launch?
Yes, if you have investors, they may be anxious and pushing you to launch. However, getting them to understand the reasons why it’s in everyone’s best interest to wait to go live would be a smart move.
2. Slimy Technology Critters – Ah. Technology. This is actually the #1 reason for failure of a pre-launch or launch. It’s directly tied into #1, however, a large issue in technology could not only delay the launch, but kill the entire company even before they launch.
A few years back, I watched a company pre-launch their business. I knew they did it way too early. They were still working on the back-end technology for their product during the launch. BIG MISTAKE.
They ended up having a 2 week delay. Then another. Then a month. Then a few months. And then they just faded away with their tail between their legs.
About a year later, I ran into the Founders of this company through a mutual friend. They were trying to sell the technology that they had 90% developed, but could not get it past the finish line. To my knowledge, they have yet to sell it.
So many people lost their credibility because of that launch. Many of them severely. Life-long friendships were lost, millions of dollars were lost. And tens and tens of thousands of people had their time wasted.
Thankfully, running a pre-launch is 1000 times easier than what it was like when I did my first in 2003. But when it comes to technology, there are some things you just cannot rush or go with 2nd or 3rd best to save a few pennies in exchange for serious risk of your product launch or company launch.
Take your time. Do your homework. Make sure your technology is rock solid.
3. The Green Plan Eaters – Forget the dog eating homework. These monsters will eat your plan or do all they can to get you off track. If you go into your launch haphazardly, expect the same type of results at the other end. Your pre-launch and launch plan is your Bible for your business in the beginning.
If you get distracted by shiny objects and start testing out new ideas, software, technology, content, etc. while the launch is live, you are going to end up with not only a mess, but a confused list that converts poorly at launch time.
4. Other People (The Zombies) – Make sure you have the right people for the job internally. I can tell you from real-world experience that you need to be open to suggestions from your service providers, launch consultant, business consultants, marketing consultants, investors, or whomever you are working with.
If someone tells you that “Joe” honestly has no idea what he is doing, could delay the launch, is causing confusion among the programmers, and has the potential to kill the entire launch we just spent months putting together, please listen to them, and have “Joe” work on something else.
The human capital equation is one that you need to have a plan for. I mentioned earlier you need to have back-ups of providers in mind, and that includes any workers such as: Designers, video production, programming, marketing, social, content development, etc.
It’s not a bad idea to do the same for mission-critical personnel that are responsible for various aspects of the launch as well.
Life happens. And you need to ensure that any happenings in another person’s life doesn’t effect your pre-launch or launch. Have back-ups… Hope you don’t have to use them…
And you’ll sleep much better at night.
Final Thoughts On The Pre-Launch And Launch World…
At the end of the day, running a pre-launch and launch for a company, product, person, business, or opportunity is one of the most exciting things you can do in business, in my opinion.
The rewards can be massive, even life-changing.
If you know what you re doing, a product launch can be done as a solo entrepreneur. It’ll take massive effort and 38 cases of midnight candles to burn, and not sleeping for weeks, but you can pull it off. I’m living proof of that. However, I wouldn’t recommend it. The hospital bills are crazy.
For those with mid to large marketing budgets for your launch, you have the potential to create something epic, memorable, and truly have a potential reach of millions and millions of people in a very short period of time.
If you are looking for a pre-launch or launch marketing consultant, feel free to contact me any time.