They say the hardest thing about flying is landing. That made me think about the language we use in product development, in particular the product launch metaphor. Can a term like that in itself drive us to do things we don’t want to do?
There flies your better judgement
To recap, a Product Launch is supposed to encompass a number of coordinated efforts, including things like:
- Optimising the technology for heavy loads
- Going big on marketing
- Omnipresence in press and social media, roadshows, exhibitions, etc
- Community building, content curation, customer service
- (and much more)
Ideally, we are well prepared before the product launch. We may have iterated under the radar with “early adopter” customers, but now it’s finally time to create a big bang and become as instantaneously successful as Pokemon Go, with its more than 10 million downloads within the first week of release. Awesome!
Who needs to iterate when we can Pokemon Go for it
It doesn’t have to be this way. In fact, most experienced entrepreneurs would do anything to avoid it. Aiming for a product launch is a beginners mistake, but in the world of entrepreneurship there are a lot of beginners. Why has the all or nothing approach to product release become an ideal so strong that we continue doing it, or pretend to be doing it, despite overwhelming experiences telling us to work differently?
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