It never fails…
We all know that we need to take the time – prepare – plan – especially when a launch is on the line.
But what often happens is someone comes to me with a launch less than 1 month away.
Now – I don’t like being the bearer of bad news – of the “don’t even think about launching” advice, but if you do want to launch with less than 3 months to prepare…here are 4 key elements that need to be strong, clear, and well-defined.
How to launch when you don’t have enough time (or less than 2 months)
1. Make sure your offer is rock solid
Talk about it out loud, tell your mom, your grandmother – get all the kinks worked out. Then, take it on the road with your ideal customers – tell them what you’re doing.
Here’s a hint you may not know – every person you consider a guru out there – shares their ideas with trusted advisors before they launch. Before they put any time or energy into an idea.
Get a second opinion.
Do not – I repeat – do not launch unless there are people asking when the program is coming out, unless you’ve been told repeatedly by people you respect that it’s a good offer, and that your audience has demonstrated they are ready to “click” on TODAY.
2. Take the first step
Take action even if you don’t know all the steps.
The first step is defining your offer, who it’s for and finding out if they will actually buy what you are offering.
For the first 10 steps – grab my launch essentials toolkit and get started.
3. Don’t try to fit a square peg into a round hole – a.k.a. know your strengths
Launching takes many different skill sets.
Design. Communication. Tech. Management. Planning. Writing. Vision. And many others…
Figure out where you are strong – and only do those things. There’s no time during a launch for you to be sitting in paypal figuring out how to make a button for your sales page.
Your head needs to be on the bigger vision – the outcome.
So – if you are bootstrapping – which you probably are if you are here reading this, then do ONLY what you are a genius at and you love.
I’ve seen many people who are amazing at project management flounder through a launch because it was too hard to switch from right brain to left brain activities. It’s flipping hard to be the creator one second and the manager the next. So – STOP IT.
Use the time in between launches to improve that skill – not during.
Which leads nicely to the next MUST HAVE when you have a launch looming weeks or days away!
4. Hire the A-Team
One of the first concepts you learn as you manage projects is – you have 3 elements at your disposal to complete any project.
You have the idea and within that is the scope of the idea, your resources (people or $), and the time you have to complete the project.
If you have a project to execute with lots of complexity but no time – then you must bring out the resources.
That means – hiring a team of people who will bring your idea to life and delivered to the world.
Examples of who’d you should hire with last minute online launches?
- web developer and overall tech person
- administrative help or virtual assistant
- customer service
- project manager
- proof reader – link checker
- copywriter – emails + sales page
- graphics designer
There are several places to find this help and some of these positions can even be combined. But you cannot expect to launch unless you’ve got some help – especially if you have a crunched schedule.
Now – It’s your turn.
I want to hear from you now.
What is the fastest launch you’ve ever done – and how did it turn out for you?
If you launched something quickly and didn’t get the results you wanted, what will you do different next time?
If you ACHIEVED SUCCESS, what did you do to make that happen in such a short period of time?
Psst…
Fearless Launching early enrollment is open again right now! So if you want to learn how to launch – from idea to open cart, enroll today!
I think that whenever I have a client doing a short launch, it turns out to be more of a rolling launch … trickling features out for example, adding more events during the launch, trimming back the idea/scope to bare necessities. And sometimes that is a good thing, as it allows you to test your offer/product/service/software/whatever on a smaller group before you slam it with a bigger (re)launch later on … and gives you a little cash surge to make the second one happen.
Yep – I agree. I like the idea of calling it a rolling launch. Sometimes you need that cashflow, so you put out a series of emails to a very targeted list, all with the intention of trickling out new features, content, etc. Launch is my overarching term for it, but some might call it a promotion, a beta test, or something else. Thanks for sharing this information Nikole. I still want to interview you by the way, so email me a few times in August we can chat!
I think my quickest launch is going to be happening right NOW for my upcoming birthday party on August 28th. Having a live event with launch of several programs on that day. I’m excited and have a team. I’ll email back with results shortly! eeeeeeek
Idea for first paid offer (a live webinar) for our business: July 15
Consulting session with coach to validate & formulate offer plan: July 25
Initial date scheduled to hold webinar: August 28
Revised (committed) date scheduled to hold webinar: September 6
Love your action and putting the plan out there! Will you make any special offers on the webinar?
Love to hear more… 🙂
I don’t agree with “do not launch unless there are people asking when the program is coming out”.
In business utopia, you find exactly what your users want, as your building it, they scream in wait….but that rarely happens. I think most of us need to *stop* analyzing and start doing more. To me, that means be as smart as you can, then Launch. Period. Get feedback. Course correct. Course correct. Course correct. I’m guess what I’m saying is “if you wait for people to do much of anything”…you might wait your whole life.
Steve,
Thanks for your comment! I absolutely agree that getting out and taking action – doing it, launching even when you don’t have all the pieces right is important. This post was more about – quick launches – which I actually think people should think before they leap. If you’ve got no audience, no subscribers, no one clicking, no one sharing, no one responding, what makes you think you could get anyone to buy or even consider buying? That’s a heartbreaking place to be as entrepreneur – especially if you expect to get results in a fast turnaround launch. Going in prepared or at least some inkling that someone/anyone will be there for the party is important. … and on your last comment, I agree – you really can’t wait for people to do much of anything…but you can take action and at least be somewhat prepared for what they might or might not do…
I really appreciate you stopping by and making such a thoughtful comment.
As a designer + developer, the two shouldn’t be separated. That can lead to a very pretty mockup that simply can’t be or can’t easily be programmed. Design should be guided by how programming works and vice versa. So either hire someone that does both, or a team of designers/programmers that always works together and knows the language the other speaks.
I’ve seen far too many projects go a-rye by hiring a designer that doesn’t know how to code, then later looking for someone to code it, only to find out how much isn’t actually possible or based in logic.
that’s just my 2c as someone who does both 🙂
Thanks for your comment. I do actually agree with you. The one thing I will say is that sometimes a designer who has limited developing experience will only design within their abilities.
I always like to work to push the design further even if it means hiring a separate developer. What we did at LKR was had our developer in the loop for the entire design process to ensure that everything was possible and that there were no unknowns on how to accomplish something.
You’re right – nothing worse than a pretty design that can’t be developed into a working website.
Fun to read this again, now that I have my own “short launch” under my belt. I love that I had the ideas brewing last year of how it would be done, with the rolling & slow build, and now it is! Thanks again for all your support in the process, Anne!