5 of the fatal mistakes companies make when launching a new product or service
This is a quick checklist that you can keep referring back to, when you want to sense check if you're avoiding some common issues companies typically face when launching a new product/service. Please see below:
1. Lack of alignment: Not considering how the new product/service is aligned to their overall business strategy. I have seen various businesses keep adding to their product/service portfolio, without thinking about how launching product A instead of product B, will make them diverge from their business strategy and undermine their long-term goals. Don't fall into this trap, or if you do be honest with yourself about it and make the necessary adjustments. Seek outside advice where possible.
2. Bad pacing: Rushing the launch of their new product/service because they get wrapped up in the excitement of the process. This is important to keep in mind because there is a difference between launching a product quickly in a sound lean process, and going so fast that you miss critical steps.
For instance, one key step is to build your tribe of both early adopters and mainstream users of a given offering. However, if you try to go too fast then it's very ease to only think about nurturing one type of tribe or even forgetting to do both. Equally, if you go too slow then you can run into a range of issues including workload and cashflow issues, due to how your other business needs and realities evolve. In short, a balance must be found.
3. Not implementing advice: Not implementing advice regarding their launch from key and experienced people in their team, (e.g. advice from their marketing, operations or finance team).
P.S. This is such an important point that not having a two-way dialogue with your team can cause even successful companies to suddenly fail. If you want to learn more about this and other related factors, then click the button below:
4. Not heeding the evidence: Not using an evidence-based approach to develop and improve an MVP (Minimum Viable Product). Essentially, this is just the minimum version of your final product/service that early adopters would be comfortable with you launching, before you use the experience to build a better final version of the product/service later.
5. Not facilitating success: Not creating/allocating/empowering the right team to develop, launch and manage the product. This is important as sometimes a new product/service needs to be supported by a different/new team, especially if the new offering will require key refinements in how the company would normally promote products, onboard customers or deliver value.
