Keep launching until you make it
10 Lessons from 10 Launches on Product Hunt
This is a short story of how I launched 8 products before finally arriving at #1, and what inspired me to keep launching until I got there.
Here are the 10 key takeaways:
- Learning #1: Plan your launch
- Learning #2: Timing is everything
- Learning #3: Ship is a game-changer
- Learning #4: You never know what people want until you ask (launch)
- Learning #5: Getting on the front page right away is critical
- Learning #6: Ship isn’t a magic ticket to success
- Learning #7: A top ranking on PH isn’t the only measure of success
- Learning #8: Prepare to execute with excellence
- Learning #9: Add value
- Learning #10: Hacking may be required
Launches 1–2: Learning the system
My first two launches were at the end of 2017, and I had no idea how Product Hunt worked, or if it would even help. I quietly launched two products without any planning. As I write this, one has 7 upvotes and one has 8 upvotes. Not great.
Learning #1: Plan your launch
Launch 3: Seedproof Beta
Before launching I subscribed to Product Hunt’s Ship and used the Upcoming Product feature to get about 125 subscribers before I launched. Seedproof Beta launched at 12am on a Saturday and was immediately on the first page of results, where it stayed all day and ended as the #3 Product of the Day.
Launch results:
Here is what that did for Seedproof on launch day:
Learning #2: Timing is everything
- Saturday is a low traffic day — you have better odds of a high ranking, but overall traffic to your product will still be relatively low
- Launching right at 12am is imperative unless you have a huge waitlist
- Having subscribers to email at 12am is important for early upvotes
Learning #3: Ship is a game-changer
Launch 4: “I’ll easily get #1 this time!”
After the successful launch of Seedproof, I decided I would launch another product I’d been working on called Genius Cards. I was certain it would appeal to nearly every PH user and had little doubt it would rank higher than Seedproof did. So I figured I’d launch on a Tuesday for more traffic and the rest would be history.
I built a very small waitlist using Ship and launched on a cold Tuesday at 12am. Genius never even made the front page on Product Hunt. I was stunned. It’s still one of the coolest (in my opinion) products that I’ve built. But I rushed on releasing it and evidently nobody could understand the app.
Learning #4: You never know what people want until you ask
Learning #5: Getting on the front page right away is critical — especially if you have a small mailing list
Learning #6: Ship isn’t a magic ticket to success (still need a good product!)
Launch 5: Cashview
After the humbling launch of Genius Cards I decided to launch another product I had already made. It’s a very simple cash flow calendar that visualizes cash flow of a startup - a simple but useful tool. I launched at 12am using Ship, in the middle of the week with a small subscriber list. Cashview did a bit better than Genius Cards, and managed to squeak onto the front page by the end of the day.
I wasn’t too disappointed. Getting 60 people to vote on my product felt good, and I was starting to realize that making AND launching things was an outlet for my ideas — even if they were small products.
Learning #7: A top ranking isn’t the only measure of success
Launch 6: YC Rejects
One day I noticed that Y Combinator rejection emails were coming out that evening. So about 6pm I hastily made a YC Reject page for Seedproof that was essentially our main Product Feed filtered down to YC Companies that got rejected. I launched the page on PH the next morning at 12am using Ship. I had no subscriber list and no planning.
YC Rejects launch had the most upvotes on launch day of all my launches up to that point. This also resulted in many more people actually signing up on Seedproof and using the site. YC Rejects only finished at #4, but it generated more visits to Seedproof than any other day before that.
Results for Seedproof:
Not bad for a couple hours of work!
This supported my previous learning: Timing is everything.
People were getting rejection letters from YC at the exact same time I launched, so they were ready to talk about it, and get support from other founders in the same situation.
Launch 7: Seedpitch
I created a page for founders to post their investor pitch decks and get feedback from other founders. My thought was this would help the community grow as founders worked together, and would result in more successful investor pitches.
I launched mid-week at 12am using Ship. I didn’t really have a subscriber list for this product, but that was okay because by that point we had a big enough newsletter at Seedproof that I could notify people that way.
But, my hosting provider stopped all outgoing email and my automated newsletter did not go out to Seedproof users. I had reached a threshold without realizing it, and nobody was notified of the launch. I was very upset with myself because a launch is short event — you can’t fix it the next day and move on.
Learning #8: Prepare to execute with excellence
Planning is great, but you have to execute. This means you must make careful preparation and avoid technical issues, etc.
Launch 8: List of Investors
Well, I hadn’t learned lesson #8 very well, because I once again had a lot of technical issues with my newsletter when I launched the List of Investors. But thankfully some emails still went out and the launch wasn’t a complete bust.
I created a list of investors and a list of investment firms complete with commenting, email, social media links, and more. I found a lot of these lists online but they were expensive or required signup to use. I just wanted a simple list and figured others would as well. Turns out that quite a few people did.
The List of Investors didn’t make the top 5 products of the day, but it still brought nearly 4,000 pageviews on launch day, and resulted in a lot more repeat traffic after launch day. Being able to find and email investors for free is valuable, and people continue to come back and use the list day after day.
Learning #9: Add value
I also did something a little borderline on launch day…
I had email addresses for VCs around the world. They hadn’t signed up for my newsletter so I couldn’t add them to my mailing list. But some of these folks have a lot of followers on Twitter. Plus, they reject founders all the time. Why couldn’t I ask them to recommend the list to companies they reject? Furthermore, what if a few of them tweeted about the list? So I emailed them “just to let them know they were on the list”. I never bulk email people without their permission. But I genuinely thought I should let them know they had been added to the list in the event they wanted to edit their information. And it worked. I got so many reply emails that simply said “thanks for including us”. To this day investors continue to use the link from those emails to access the list.
Learning #10: Hacking may be required
Launch 9: One Pager (aka #1)
I made a simple form to help founders clarify their thinking and reduce their pitches to one page. Even though we still need a traditional pitch deck, I knew that the exercise of putting key points onto one page helps ustalk clearly and concisely about our products. So I built a carefully structured form that turns your pitch into a one page PDF.
I thought it would be useful, but had no aspirations of getting a top 3 spot with this. I did not write about this in the Seedproof newsletter, and I had no subscribers for it’s launch. I just used Ship to schedule the launch for 12am on a Saturday and then went to bed.
When I got up at 5:30am it was the #1 Product of the Day and it stayed in that position all day, slowly increasing the gap between #1 and #2 as the day wore on.
Finally!!
This didn’t really bring any new learning, but it certainly backed up some of the other points I learned from the previous 8 launches.
But it specifically reiterated Lesson #4 — you don’t know for certain what people want until you launch.
Launch 10: Can we go back-to-back?
Along this journey I realized that for many people, launching products is what they thrive on — it’s a way to express ideas and get feedback from real users. It’s almost as much about validating the maker as it is about validating ideas. At the same time, I was sure that giving out cash grants
So a few weeks ago we launched the Maker of the Week program on Seedproof to support makers all around the worlds.
There are many people like me who just want an outlet for their ideas. The problem for many of us is that we start the journey on the nights and weekends. Some have student debt. Others have families to support. Not everyone is working on the next Google, but many are working on something.
Maker of the Week is another way we are supporting makers to start making their ideas reality. Each week (in the future it might be each day) we give several makers with the most popular product on Seedproof a small cash grant (equity free). It isn’t a big amount, but it’s enough to get the ball rolling.
By the way — if you don’t think $500 is a meaningful amount, ask someone who doesn’t have it — it can be life-changing!
In summary
Here is the path to #1:
Here are the 10 key takeaways:
- Learning #1: Plan your launch
- Learning #2: Timing is everything
- Learning #3: Ship is a game-changer
- Learning #4: You never know what people want until you ask (launch)
- Learning #5: Getting on the front page of PH right away is critical
- Learning #6: Ship isn’t a magic ticket to success
- Learning #7: A top ranking on PH isn’t the only measure of success
- Learning #8: Prepare to execute with excellence
- Learning #9: Add value
- Learning #10: Hacking may be required
What’s next for you?
- Check out Maker of the Week 💬
- Keep launching until you make what people want! 🚀
🙏 Thanks for reading — I hope this has been helpful!
