Launching a new product is no small feat—after all, 40% of them don’t make it past the two-year mark. There are so many moving parts that make the journey from concept to market seem daunting, especially if it’s your first launch.
However, the difference between products that succeed and those that don’t isn’t just luck; it’s the result of meticulous planning, understanding your audience, and deploying smart marketing strategies.
This guide demystifies the product launch process, offering step-by-step insights and strategies to ensure your product launch stands out. From tuning into customer feedback to choosing the right marketing channels, here’s how you navigate the launch process effectively.
What is a product launch?
A product launch is a coordinated marketing effort to introduce a new item. Any time you release a new product into the market, you have an opportunity to connect with people, whether they’re new to your brand or have been loyal for years. Clever product launches engage existing customers, entice new ones, and create urgency.
Why is a product launch important?
Product launches are an affordable way to make sales. You can use the launch as an opportunity to reconnect with past customers, remind them about why they bought from you in the past and encourage them to come around again. Since your target audience is a wide swath of previous, current, and possible customers, you can use a launch to get creative with how you promote your brand. You’ll see what works and what doesn’t by pulling new levers.
When should you consider a product launch?
There is no perfect time to launch a new product. As a business owner, you’ll constantly learn more about what your customers want, what they’ll pay for, and the best way to reach them.
When you launch your product, here are ways to maximize your chances of success:
Your launch can be big, or you can start small
Product launches come in two types: soft launches and hard launches.
A soft product launch introduces a new product or service to a limited audience. Businesses soft launch to gather feedback and user experience, then improve the product before rolling it to the mass audience. For example, a retailer could first release a new product line to VIP customers, gauge the reaction, and decide on a hard launch soon after.
A full-scale rollout is known as a hard product launch. A hard launch aims to promote the product to your entire target audience or customer base right from the start. Ads, press releases, promotional events, influencer collaborations—brands go all out to make an initial impact and make sales early on.
Think of how Apple launches its iPhone every September. The annual announcement is a highly publicized event for the world to see. After the launch, you’re hit with an advertising blitz across social media, TV, billboards, and video ads on YouTube.
You can launch at different times
Launching your product at the right time is essential to its success. Some factors to consider are:
- Seasonality: Some products are in demand at different times of the year. For example, launching a new swimwear line in early summer can help maximize sales compared to the winter.
- Consumer trends: Products need to be relevant and appeal to the market. Remember Google Glass? The wearable smart glasses weren’t aligned with consumer preferences in 2013, and Google discontinued them only two years later.
- Market conditions: The economy and competition can impact the timing of a new launch. If consumers have anxiety about spending, it can lead to a poor launch.
It’s hard to make generalizations about any product launch, and not every factor may apply to your audience. Conduct market research to understand what customers want and need before launching your product to ensure it’s well-received and profitable.
How do you know when you’re ready to launch?
Unsure if you’re ready to launch a new product? Here are a few signs you are:
- You found product-market fit. You’ve found the match between what your product offers and what customers want through product development.
- You’ve tested your minimum viable product (MVP). Your MVP is a simple version of your product that’s ready for use. Testing it means a small group has used it and found it works.
- You have a product marketing plan. You know how to market your product, including prelaunch activities, launch day tactics, and post-launch strategies to keep the momentum going.
How to launch a product successfully
Proper execution is vital to turning a product idea into a successful launch. Here are the essential steps to bring your product to life and into the hands of eager customers.
- Set a launch date
- Determine your launch channels
- Craft your launch messaging and assets
- Market your new product
- Launch the product
- Track and review the results
1. Set a launch date
You’ll work toward your launch date as you develop your marketing copy and assets and establish a plan. It’s also what you’ll work back from and how you’ll know the deadlines you need to hit and when. With a carefully chosen launch date, you can avoid losing any built-up hype, getting into a cycle where you keep pushing the launch out, or, worse, never launching at all.
2. Determine your launch channels
Your product launch channels are the tools and methods you’re already using to connect with customers and make sales, as well as any other channels where your target audience hangs out or expects you to be.
Use your most active channels to launch your new product. Some channels to try include:
- SMS: If SMS is a channel you’re active on, its immediacy can cut through the noise of the many emails and social media posts your audience sees daily, especially for a new product launch.
- Email: Email is a personal and direct channel allowing detailed storytelling about your new product, effectively targeting interested subscribers. It’s measurable, letting you see engagement and interest firsthand. Imagine an announcement email leading straight to a preorder page—a simple yet powerful launch tool.
- Social: Which social media channels are you most active on? Where does your audience expect updates from you? These are the places where you can do the best work to promote a new launch.
- In-person events: In-person events, like a booth at a local farmers market or street fair, excel at creating personal connections with potential customers. They offer a unique chance for people to experience your products firsthand and engage with you directly.
- Influencer marketing: Working with influencers extends your reach and builds trust with your target audience. It also allows people to see your products styled in real life, which can eliminate barriers to purchase, like how big the item is, what color it is in natural light, and if the purchase is worth it.
3. Craft your launch messaging and assets
Creating compelling launch materials is about more than just visuals; it’s about telling a story across all the channels your audience frequents. This includes photoshoots for eye-catching visuals and crafting the perfect copy for social media posts, emails, SMS messages, blog posts, and paid ads.
Before you get started, take some time to answer the following questions:
- How will you position this new product within the market?
- What tone will the taglines and copy take?
- How will messaging vary across channels?
- How many emails, text messages, social media posts, and blog entries are you planning?
- Do you intend to invest in advertising?
- Are your product descriptions catchy and exciting?
After you have the answers to these questions, the next step is to take some high-quality product photography. If you don’t want to spend money on hiring a professional, it’s more than possible to take some great images yourself. Remember, these photos are often the first impression potential customers will have of your product, so make them count.
Selecting the best images and writing captivating copy will likely be time-consuming but immensely rewarding. The right assets can dramatically impact your launch’s success, drawing in your audience and compelling them to act. Think of this process as laying down the foundation for your product’s market entry—it’s your chance to make a lasting impression.
Besides photography, drafting blog posts that delve deeper into your product’s story, crafting engaging social media copy that resonates with your audience, and designing email campaigns that convert are all crucial steps. You can tailor each piece of content to the platform it’s on, ensuring it speaks directly to the interests and needs of your customers.
🚀 It’s your turn! Put together your launch materials, including social media posts, emails, paid ads, SMS messages, flyers, or emails for in-person events, and YouTube videos to start drumming up excitement for your impending product launch.
4. Market your new product
Embracing time-limited launches is a great way to create a sense of urgency and exclusivity to boost interest and sales. When San Francisco street artist Fnnch started gaining popularity, his prints and originals sold out in mere seconds online. While the launches were successful, they left many fans in the lurch, as hungry resellers purchased the coveted items and marked them up for thousands on eBay.
Fnnch realized he could sell more art, please more art enthusiasts, and support local charities by running his future product launches differently.
Many of his product launches now feature prints and originals that are timed editions, like the December 2021 Heart Bear.
Here’s how it works: the editions launch on a particular date and time, like 11 a.m. PT on April 22. The art is then available for a limited period, like one hour or four days. Fnnch will complete however many orders he gets during that time frame.
To inspire more people to purchase, Fnnch has also made particular product launches, “fundraising releases,” where he donates a percentage of the sales to different nonprofit organizations, usually in the Bay Area.
These creative product launch ideas can attract more eyes and build excitement. Here are a few other ideas:
Host a presale
Presales are an excellent way to gauge interest in your new product and give you a better idea of how much inventory to purchase or produce.
Throw a launch party
Sometimes, an in-person event is the best way to launch a new product with a splash. If you don’t have a retail store, it’s also an excellent opportunity for people to see your items in person. Serve snacks, play some good music, and allow people to mingle. Even if the event is free, consider requiring a ticket purchase so you can collect emails and get people to opt into your marketing mailing list.
Make the launch exclusive to members
Some launches are only available to people with a paid membership. For example, if you teach online fitness classes and offer class memberships, you might limit the release of merchandise to your members to create exclusivity and inspire others to opt into a membership when they otherwise may not have.
Gate the launch with a password available only to email subscribers
Handmade fine jewelry shop Young in the Mountains offers its email subscribers early access to sales, letting them shop a day before the public. You can also use this concept for product launches: allow members of your email list to shop the sale early with a secret passcode.
This limited access feels exclusive, enticing more people to sign up for your newsletter. It promotes scarcity (shop one day before because things will sell out!), gives folks a reason to sign up for your mailing list, and allows you to reengage with people post launch.
Create a special edition
Olipop creates unique flavors at different times of the year, like Blackberry Vanilla. The flavor came back “by popular demand” in a limited release.
Trying a limited edition launch can gauge interest in a new product. If folks don’t like it, you haven’t committed to keeping it as part of your permanent collection. It also creates scarcity, enticing more people to convert before it sells out. By selling a limited number of items, your customers will know that when it’s gone, it’s gone.
Put out a collaboration
Join forces with a brand bigger than you, and you’ll attract the attention of its entire audience. Aside from creating a unique product, you’ll get exposure to members of your target audience who may not have heard of you before. The partner promotion from a bigger shop will be invaluable, especially if you’re just starting.
Donate funds to a good cause
Promising a percentage of profits to a worthy cause helps people in need, and it can also inspire customers to support a charity they care about while obtaining a product from you that they’ll like and use. Win-win!
Tease the launch across social media, SMS, and email
Regardless of your launch type, you’ll want to advertise it across your dedicated social media channels, SMS contacts, if you have them, and your email list at least a week or two before the launch. These posts can remind your audience to put the launch date and time on their calendars. It can also convince your target audience to follow you for updates on your new product.
Olipop, for example, posted this to tease the re-release of its Blackberry Vanilla flavor. The team blurred out the flavor name to build interest and added comments from the last launch to create buzz.
You likely already have an idea of your launch messaging and assets, but remember, the more you post on social media, the better. Some brands share images of the new products before they come out. Others, like Olipop, keep them hidden and only reveal small details in the days leading up to launch. Consider what works best for your brand here.
5. Launch the product
The day you and your audience have been waiting for is here: It’s officially launch day and time to make some sales. This is when you’ll release any launch day content, like social media posts, email sends, and SMS messages to your followers to let them know your product is live and available for purchase.
6. Track and review the results
Post-launch, dive into the analytics across platforms to better understand what worked well and what didn’t so you can learn before your next launch.
Take a peek at the numbers on your social media apps and collect the data points that detail how much engagement each one got. If you use a social media tool like Sprout Social or Buffer, it can generate a report for you.
Similarly, review the results from any email or SMS campaigns you sent. What were the click-through and open rates for launch emails? Which subject lines performed better than others?
Then, look at how many sales you made during the launch. If you’re on Shopify, you can dive into your shop’s analytics and measure success directly in your Shopify admin. You can also consult Google Analytics for traffic information to see how many people visited your shop on launch day.
3 examples of amazing product launches
Healthish
Healthish is a textbook example of a great product launch. The brand was launching its signature product, a hydration-tracking water bottle, and needed a way to break into the $8 billion market as a new brand. Founders Emily Chong and Nathan Chan worked with niche influencers to build hype.
Healthish sent free water bottles to fitness influencers, fashion bloggers, vloggers, and other groups related to their niche as part of its marketing plan. If the influencers were happy with the products, they shared them online.
💡 Get the inside scoop on Healthish’s product launch by reading The Prelaunch Strategies of a Million-Dollar Brand.
The Honey Pot
The Honey Pot is a sexual health and wellness brand specializing in feminine care. The brand has built a reputation for having honest and real conversations about sexual health, which has helped make connections with customers. The Honey Pot seeks to work with creators with similar personal or brand values.
When launching a new product, The Honey Pot digs deeper, considering various creator types instead of hiring only beauty influencers. “How about an esthetician, or someone who is experiencing hard skin conditions [who] can naturally segway into talking about products?” asks Giovanna Alfieri, VP of marketing at The Honey Pot.
Listen to Giovanna discuss influencer strategy, event marketing tips, and how to use storytelling to expand your brand’s reach on the Shopify Masters podcast.
Hearth Display
Susie Harrison and her team spearheaded the successful launch strategy of Hearth Display by doing a thorough prelaunch process. Their research identified and addressed families’ needs about scheduling and chores.
To validate the product idea, the team conducted 30-minute interviews with potential customers. Hearth Display’s product design was built on this interaction, which gave them invaluable insight into customers’ pain points and needs. Hearth then ran two campaigns to show market demand:
- An Indiegogo campaign that raised more than $600,000
- A preorder campaign on Shopify that helped raise $2.8 million from investors
💡 Read Hearth Display’s story.
Boost your sales with strategic product launches
Launching your new product is much more than just unveiling a new item in your shop—it’s an opportunity to grab attention, connect with your customers, and boost your sales. It all boils down to how well you know your audience and how creatively you tell your product’s story.
So, as you gear up for your next big launch, remember: those thoughtful touches in planning and marketing can make a difference. After all, you’re not only launching a product, you’re also setting the stage for your brand to flourish and grow.
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