One launch tests one room
A launch that went out to one community and one launch platform has reached a small slice of the people who might want the product. It says very little about demand. Building has never been cheaper, so more products launch every week, while the people you want to reach still have the same few minutes in an evening for trying something new. Getting noticed takes more pushes than it used to, and one push rarely does it.
First, try more ways of reaching people
The most common cause is the plainest one. Work down a list before you conclude anything:
- Everyone you talked to while researching the problem. Write to each of them personally. They described the problem to you, so they're the likeliest to try the product and tell you what's wrong with it. Thirty people is plenty.
- Communities where your people already gather. Share the product as a story about the problem you kept seeing and what you built, with a real request for feedback. Communities ignore drive-by promotion and listen to members they recognise, so it works best where you've been taking part for a few weeks.
- Launch platforms, one at a time. Prepare each listing properly and keep a day free to answer comments. Expect a spike of traffic and some sign-ups, not a business.
- Individual messages to people who fit. Old colleagues with the problem, the person who complained about it in a forum months ago, someone whose work you follow.
Most people won't answer the individual messages, and that's fine. If one in ten says yes, a hundred users is about a thousand messages, which is a few weeks of steady sending.
Videofy, the video app I co-founded, got going with a handful of personal emails to bloggers. One of Sweden's biggest bloggers tried it, her readers followed, and so did other bloggers. For Minutemailer, a guest article with general email-marketing tips in a magazine for small businesses brought some of the best customers it ever got, because the readers were the people the product was built for. Neither had a launch day.
Then, narrow who it's for
If people do see the product and still don't sign up, the likelier cause is that it speaks to everyone, so nobody feels it was made for them. Narrow the audience and the product until someone specific recognises themselves in the first sentence. A product for everyone gives nobody a reason to be the first to try it.
A quick check is to show the page to someone who fits and ask them, after ten seconds, what it is and who it's for. If they can't say, the page has more work to do than the product.
Only then, ask whether the problem was worth solving
Sometimes it wasn't, and that happens to everyone. But "nobody wanted this" is a much heavier conclusion than "nobody found this" or "nobody knew it was for them", so it's the last one to accept. Silence after two attempts doesn't mean much. After ten, it starts to.
Look under the totals
While you work through the list, the numbers will be small and noisy, and refreshing them every hour only makes that worse. I look at the pattern under the totals instead. Of the people who arrived, did they understand what it was? Of those who tried it, did anyone come back without being reminded? Of those who came back, did anyone say something interesting?
A few people coming back on their own count for more than a spike of sign-ups. Sign-ups are curiosity, and a launch brings plenty of it. Coming back means the product has found a place in someone's week.
The other trap is going back to building. Adding features feels productive when feedback is quiet and asking strangers is awkward, but new features reach nobody who hasn't found the product yet. During these weeks the job is getting it in front of people.
Decide on a date, not on a mood
The easiest way to end a product is to drift, adding a little, promoting a little, telling yourself it needs more time. It costs months and your appetite for the next attempt. What helps is writing down, before you launch, the numbers that count as a yes and the date you'll check them. Numbers you write afterwards tend to find a way to mean "keep going". The launch thresholds card is a one-page version of that.
On the date, hold what happened against what you wrote, then kill it, change direction, or put more into it. If the answer is no after real attempts, it's a cheap no, and what you learned, the people you reached and the skills you built go with you to the next one.
Related
- Launch thresholds, the numbers to write down before you launch
- How to validate an app idea before you build it, checking demand before the launch, so the launch has less to prove
Based on chapter 11, "Ship it", and chapter 12, "Kill, redirect, or double down" of The Code Was Never the Hard Part.
