7 Key Factors of Robust Product Launch

The success of every person is not written in the fate. The same goes for launching a new product. You have a great idea, you launched a product, yet it fails drastically without knowing the reasons. You are not alone because as much as 90% of startups fail.

According to Marketing Research Association, 40% of developed products reach to the market and out of those 40%, only 60% will generate revenue.

Launching a product is linked to risks, but how about reaping the reward for years to come by picking the right approach. In this post, you are going to learn about the essential elements to launch a product successfully.

Let’s get started.

Understand the Needs

The companies often ignore understanding the needs of the customers. Without clear goals and well-defined product, you will not get near to the success. According to Harvard’s professor Thomas Eisenmann, the majority of startups are handicapped from the start because they create a wrong product.

How would someone create a wrong product, in spite of being unique? The reason is quite simple; you failed to understand the needs. Product launch is dependent on many factors and research is one of them.

If you are launching a product, make sure you have well researched the needs of the people, and their pain points. Moreover, the competitive environment, the right time to step in the market and target audience are also key elements of research.

Pitch Your First Customer

Before launching your product, you can acquire the customers. How is it possible? You need to develop some interest and eagerness among your customers. It will surely help you gain some search traffic. Develop a landing page for your new product and incorporate email capture form.

People who sign up on your landing page will be the early adopters and excited about your product. These early adopters are vital for your success. After gaining the required information i.e. contact details, make sure to update them about your product frequently. Try to educate them more about your product, offer free giveaways and make them a desire for more.

Get Customers Response

When product development is in the initial phases, you have to collect the feedback of customers. Despite having well-versed designers, engineers and developers, you have to seek for the customer's responsibility.

How would you know whether the product would get any positive response? Simply present the customers with features and unique set of proposition. Whatever the response you get, you will be able to judge whether the product is going to succeed or fail drastically.

Market research can be misleading, but there is something to be said for testing a customer’s response to your product before you launch it.

MVP Development

MVP development is the key to testing the product’s success or failure. Instead of developing the full version of the product, you launch it with the basic features and push them to the prospects. The benefit of developing MVP product is that it brings highest returns on investment as compared to risk.

Imagine yourself being tight on budget and time, you can’t risk yourself spending millions and waiting for years to get it developed. Other features might be integrated in near future after you have seen the positive response and tendency of the customers to your product.

Pre-Launch Marketing Campaign

Many of the startup entrepreneurs believe that once the product is launched, they will whole heartedly focus on marketing. The approach is not an ideal one because you can’t afford to wait anymore after your product is launched fully. You need to recover the finances, pay your resources and meet other expenses.

The early momentum you create through your marketing campaign can ensure success. The best approach of starting a marketing campaign is through email marketing, content creation, building personal relations. Your pre-launch marketing campaign will serve you as a kick-starter as soon as you launch your product.

Select the Right Time to Launch

Timing is very important when it comes to product launch. Before you launch your product, it is important to ask the questions like:

· Is the market ready for your product? The right time to launch your product is when there is a demand for the product.

· Is the product ready for the market? Your product should be mature enough to bring the real buyers.

· Is your team ready to launch the product to the market? The team should be capable and expert enough to transition from the development phase to launch of the product.

Your product launch can largely impact if any of the answers are negative. If you don’t know what is the demand for your product, simply interview potential customers, conduct market surveys or launch beta version.

Expect the Worse

The most crucial and vital part of launching a product is setting expectations. According to Harvard Business Review, James Packett states that the common trap of product launches include expecting things to set off well because they typically do.

Your product can end up in sheer failure, your customers don’t respond as expected or the market showed little to no interest. If you are prepared for the worse, you are ready for anything to happen. Before you fail, make sure to have a backup plan. For instance, if the MVP product did not gain as much hype as you expected, introduce some other features that you planned to introduce in the later version.

Conclusion