Preparing for launch
I'm getting close to launching! The MVP product is complete and I've begun sharing it with family and friends. After being focused on the product and functionality for so long I've had to re-think what a launch might look like and what to work on for the next few months.
It's not groundbreaking, but I thought I'd share a simple framework for how I'm mapping things out.
Overall Concept: The business is not the product. It would be great if I could spend my time just improving the product and adding every cool feature that I've thought of. While the product is obviously important, it's more important to concentrate on other parts of the business. The plan for the medium term focuses on 3 other initiatives, along with a few product improvements.
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Onboarding: The MVP has the most basic signup. The short term goals are to add the components I'll need to understand what's happening (FB Pixel and/or Segment) and try to discover best practices to incorporate. It might take a redesign of my subscription page or a re-order of the steps, but first I need to learn about user behavior.
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Traffic: Before building I validated that FB Ads could drive traffic and collect email addresses, but I really couldn't charge those folks or ask them to use a (non-existent) product. There's a lot to learn about driving the traffic that will actually purchase and I suspect this might take a little time.
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Marketing: When deciding on ideas, my criteria was that the idea should have an inherent viral hook and the idea should throw off content that can be put on social media. Starting with the first, smallest users (mom & dad) it's the time to start thinking about how generate the sharable content.
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Finally, back to thinking about the product. Once we discover that the product is actually usable, it's time to build those next features - the viral hook mentioned above and the ability for someone to purchase as a gift.
I guess the overall point is that now that the product exists, instead of managing one workflow, I'm now initiating four.
If you read this far, I'd love to connect with another builder near the same stage. It would be great to brainstorm and be held accountable by someone else with similar goals. Hit me up in the comments or DM.
