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18 Comments

How NOT to launch on Product Hunt

I have made a mistake by automatically scheduling a launch on 12:01 AM PST.
This means my product was instantly flooded by a dozen of other submissions scheduled at exactly the same time. Some of them already had some upvotes so I landed at the very bottom. I couldn't find my submission myself. I thought it was somehow launched at the end of a previous day.
Leson learned is to submit about an hour after start of new PH day. Then the submission is at least reachable when sorting by new. It is especially important when you don't have significant following and can't get initial boost to get onto the homepage.
What are your thoughts on that? Do you have similiar experience?

PS: If you're interested, product I (unluckily) launched is https://www.producthunt.com/posts/bigmoji

  1. 5
    1. Audience is Key
    2. If you know influencer even better
    3. It must fit to the PH community. PH sometimes sorts out and interferes in voting. Topics that work great, new technology. For example AI.
    4. Be active at PH and not only for 2 days

    Even after 5 launches, once product of the day, once third product of the day, the process is still a Blackbox 😂😅

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      Thanks for your reply :)
      Previously I launched from freshly created account and managed to get to #5. So being active isn't necessary, at least for algorithm. Nevertheless it is advantage for sure.

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        No. Not necessary. But it makes it easier. 😉

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    Hey, @Zdanovi first of all thanks a lot for sharing your experience, I really appreciate reading launch cases because it helps me to understand way better Product Hunt itself. 👌

    From my personal experience (Recently got #1 & #2 with my latest products) I can heartily recommend:

    1- Focus on getting a lot of feedback and support from the very beginning (I usually launch at the first hour). Get yourself a good base of interested users by getting involved in communities (like this one, slack & facebook groups, telegram, etc.). Ask for a lot of feedback around the web, upvote & interact on other products, create a good base of active product makers who may upvote you. Gather all the contacts that you can and get them ready before the launch deadline.

    *Sidenote: You need to have your own "Spam-omether" to don't fall out of common sense, e.g., don't get banned from Facebook (it's easier than you think). That's a withdraw.

    2- Become yourself an active Product Hunt user. It is always good to have well-gained notoriety among other users. Create new goals on your profile, participate in forums, DM other makers. Let Product Hunt note that you're not a bot or that you just created a profile for this launch. Also, involve your colleagues & partners (even neighbors) in the same way, they can also help you to boost the launch from the beginning.

    3- Most people don't consider this a must; still, it certainly helps. Get a conversation with a famous hunter. Yes, you can always hunt yourself, but as long as you get a hunter with a good base of followers, all of them will also receive the notification of your product. And that also sums a lot!

    4- Don't be afraid of trying your recipes & strategies, you can always re-launch if it wasn't satisfactory, every failure includes an even bigger chance of learning 💪

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      Wow, thanks for ton of advice! Good point on finding hunter. This might be a good solution for makers with no audience (like me).

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        This could be a good opportunity to create that audience and generate constant interaction to keep it growing 😄

  3. 2

    I am an old pher and have submitted 35 products so far. From 35, 2 of them are in top 5. From this experience all I can say is make your product good enough that people would love to up-vote and try.

    If your product is adding value then ph staff with feature it and also tweet about it. Trying hacks and getting votes will just satisfy your launch feeling.
    #1 on PH not = Success.

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      Out of curiosity what are those 2 that made top5?

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        1. Kite: Make your own Smartphone.
        2. Hot wheel : The first ever $1 Hot Wheels car that's compatible with GoPro
          you can find them here. https://www.producthunt.com/@mhrnik/submitted
  4. 2

    Producthunt is a tough site to win. I say that, and I was one of those 1201 PST this morning projects and I'm currently #1. I've launched a bunch of things there and some hit, some miss, but the important thing is just generating awareness. Being promoted to the frontpage helps tremendously. I used to try to ping the staff, but that doesn't seem to work anymore either.

    All in all, it's kind of a diceroll. If you have a pre-existing audience they can help tremendously though.

    1. 1

      Congrats! How did you get first upvotes? IMO getting on the the homepage is the key:

      1. You are exposed to majority of product hunters (most of visitors won't click "newest" or "show more")
      2. In result the point gap between featured on homepage and those behind is getting even bigger
      3. I think that as long as you're on the homepage it doesn't matter (that much) which rank you have. #1 and lets say #7 probably have less difference in traffic than #7 and #11 (which isn't featured).
        I hope this comment is understandable, I'm already tired :)
      1. 2

        You're totally right. One thing though, if you get enough votes you can be in the newsletter they send out each week. That's a good one.

        First votes came from the community. It was probably easier for me because I was promoting an existing community :)

  5. 2

    That's an interesting idea, but if you don't have an audience to get them initial upvotes you won't do well from what I have seen.

    I'm not sure how many people actually click new.

    I will be posting at 00:01 tomorrow.

    1. 1

      Audience is big help for sure.
      I neither don't know how often people click new. But with no audience and posting at 00:01 you get no chances for popular section and you land at the bottom of newest. Then it's very hard for people to find your product. That's my personal experience.
      Previous time I launched on PH I used a catchy thumbnail and got a shout-out from PH twitter account. This helped me to get into popular section without any audience. So it's possible but much harder.
      Good luck with your launch tomorrow!

      1. 1

        Ah a shoutout from PH would help a lot :)

        Thanks!

  6. 1

    You weren't able to find your launch because it was in the "newest" tab. To reach on the main page, you need to get about 10 upvotes or be hunted by one of the first hunters who can help you get on the main tab directly.

    If you don't promote, you hardly will be successfull on product hunt, unless your product is a good fit for the audience and is somewhat unique.

    1. 1

      Thanks for your reply Luqa! I'm aware of this fact. This is why I figured out that for makers who can't get initial boost it is probably wiser to wait about an hour to launch. This way you'll at least position higher in "newest".
      This is my personal observation. I wrote this post to hear about different experiences. On my next launch I'll try different approach.

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    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

  8. 2

    This comment was deleted 4 years ago.

    1. 1

      Thanks :)
      I totally agree with you.
      Another point that came to my mind is that launching an hour later gives another advantage. You can already see how many and what kind of "competitors" you have on this day.
      Actually I think I read this advice somewhere so it is not my original observation.

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        This comment was deleted 4 years ago.

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