Author: Jeff Walker
My Rating: 3/5
Summary: A small business owner’s interesting and very tactical approach to launching and monetizing new products via content marketing.
My Takeaways
The Product Launch Formula is a system to get your target market so engaged with your product (or business) that they almost beg you to sell it to them. And this all happens before you even release the product.
YOUR MARKET IS A CONVERSATION. So instead of shouting at your prospects, what if you engaged them in a conversation?
Template: Hey, I’ve got this really cool new technique I can use to teach anyone to play one new song each week, and I just had this idea to put together a course that teaches my “secret” method. (Actually, I don’t know if it’s a secret, but I’ve never seen anyone else use this method. I showed it to a few friends, and it works really well—like, I can’t believe the results my students are getting.) In any case, before I create the course, I want to make sure I cover everything. So can you help me out and tell me what your #1 challenge is when you’re trying to learn to play an entire song?
Opening a dialogue with your potential clients is an example of what I call “the shot across the bow,” and it’s a great way to start your Prelaunch campaign.
At its heart, Product Launch Formula is made up of sequences, stories, and triggers.
Our product launches use a series of sequences—the Pre-Prelaunch, the Prelaunch, the Open Cart, and the Post-Launch.
The Pre-Prelaunch is also used to judge how receptive the market will be to your offer and to figure out some of the primary objections people will have.
Prelaunch: This is the heart and soul of your sequencing, where you gradually romance your market with three pieces of high-value Prelaunch Content. You use your Prelaunch to activate mental triggers such as authority, social proof, community, anticipation, and reciprocity, and you do all that while answering the objections of your market. Typically, you release your Prelaunch Content over a period of 5 to 12 days. The format for that content can vary widely, from videos to podcasts to email to written PDF reports to webinars to live broadcasts
Open Cart: This is the big day you’ve been building up to, the day you actually send the offer for your product or service out into the world and start taking orders. I call this “Open Cart” because you’re “opening the shopping cart.”
Post-Launch: This is the cleanup sequence, where you follow up with both your new clients and the prospects who didn’t buy from you. The Post-Launch isn’t as exciting as the other sequences, but it’s important because that’s where you deliver value and build your brand. And if you do it right, the Post-Launch starts to set up your next launch.
If you want to make your business and your marketing memorable, then your marketing needs to tell a story.
There is no better way or better place to tell your story than in your launch sequence. This is one of the hidden weapons of PLF, because the most powerful way to communicate your message is with a story, and the serial nature of your Prelaunch Sequence is a perfect place to tell that story.
Even the launch itself has three primary sequences: Pre-Prelaunch, Prelaunch, and launch.
Those are just three mental triggers: scarcity, authority, and community.
You layer these mental triggers, one on top of another, so you’re not dependent on any one trigger but combining them to create a powerfully influential message. You embed those mental triggers into a compelling and memorable story that cuts through the marketing fog, a story that connects your offer to the hopes, dreams, fears, and aspirations of your future customer. And you deliver that story in a tight sequence that turns your launch into a big event that captures your prospects’ imaginations and builds anticipation toward your launch day.
I want my readers to feel like they have a personal connection with me. That connection is what gets them to open my emails, read my emails, and ultimately click on the links in my emails.
A little surprise bonus or personal touch can really go a long way.
Instead of taking 8 or 12 or 20 pages to tell the story in a long, vertical sales letter, I flipped the sales process on its side. Instead of pages, I used days. Instead of a 10-page sales letter, I used a 10-day sequence. Instead of one superlong letter, I split it up into a series of contacts over a number of days. I call those contacts Prelaunch Content or PLC.
I used great sequential content and the power of story to pull the prospect into my sales message. Instead of delivering the equivalent of a superlong monologue, I turned the whole process into a conversation—a Launch Conversation.
The mental triggers (along with your sequences and your launch story) form the very cornerstone of your successful product launch.
Reciprocity is the idea that if someone gives something to us, we will feel some obligation to give them something in return.
Building trust is the ultimate shortcut to becoming influential in someone’s life.
Time makes it much easier to trust people.
Anticipation is one of the triggers that allow you to cut through the marketing fog. It lets you grab your market’s attention and not let go.
Anticipation is also closely tied to the “event” trigger, where you’re circling a date on the calendar and focusing all your attention on it.
Likability
Community is a very powerful mental trigger.
Scarcity is one of the most powerful mental triggers in existence, period. It’s simple—when there is less of something, we want it more. In reality, it’s the perception of scarcity that motivates us.
There has to be some negative consequence if people don’t take action and buy before the end of the launch (for instance, the price could go up after the launch).
Generally at the beginning of your Prelaunch you start with a powerful piece of content that sets up the overall promise and opportunity of the launch. When you share strong, compelling content at the start of your Prelaunch, you instantly develop authority.
You’re testing the market’s level of interest in your product idea. You’re trying to surface potential objections so you can answer them during your Prelaunch. Finally, you’re gathering information to help finalize your product offer.
Your Pre-Prelaunch Sequence is all about grabbing your market’s attention without actually trying to sell them anything at all. “How can I figure out what their objections are to this product?”
Email Template 1; EMAIL SUBJECT: Quick announcement and a favor… EMAIL BODY: NAME here. We’ll be sending your Trading Update in just a little bit. But first I need to ask you a favor. We’re really close to wrapping up our long-awaited trading manual. We will be releasing it in early January. But before we do, I have to ask you a couple of questions. Can you help us out? You can answer the questions here (and get a little more detail on the trading manual) at this link: www.example.com Thanks and best regards, Jeff
Email Template 2: Hi, We’re VERY close to finishing our long-awaited Trading Manual. We have been working on this for more than four years, but we are finally going to wrap it up. We will be releasing it in early January. This course will be entirely focused on “Support and Resistance.” It will include two printed manuals, eight audio CDs, and one video tutorial DVD. It is going to be a complete brain dump of everything that we know about “SUPPORT and RESISTANCE.” We are going to cover all the ways that we use to generate our support and resistance zones, and we are going to show you exactly how we trade those zones. HOWEVER, we need your help. Before we finalize everything and send it off to the printer, we need to make sure we have covered everything. That is where you come in. Please take a few minutes to answer this super-short survey—there is really only one thing we want to ask you . . . What are your two top questions about Support and Resistance that we absolutely NEED to answer in our trading course?
Your Prelaunch Sequence will generally have three pieces of Prelaunch Content
The framework for the overall story arc is that you start off teaching people about the opportunity for change or transformation. You follow that up with some solid teaching, and you show that transformation or change. Finally, you give the “ownership experience.” This is where you start to pivot to talking about your product and the impact it will make on your prospective client.
Video content often has a higher perceived value than other types of content.
PLC #1: THE OPPORTUNITY (OR THE JOURNEY)
The bottom line is you need to focus on the end benefit that your product will create for your prospect. At the most basic level, you are either taking away some pain from your client, or you’re delivering some pleasure.
People aren’t so interested in the actual tool. The tool is just a means to get that result, and that’s what you want to sell them.
Show the opportunity. Show/tell your prospect how their life is going to change with your product. Position your authority. Show/tell why they should listen to you. Teach. It’s important not to just go on and on about the opportunity; you have to deliver value.
Raise objections and either answer them or promise to answer them in upcoming videos. No matter what your offer is, there will be objections. You need to face them head on. Foreshadow PLC #2. Let them know there’s another video coming, and spark their desire by revealing some of the really cool stuff they’re going to learn in PLC #2. Call to action. Ask for a comment on your Prelaunch pages or in social media.
If PLC #1 is all about the “why,” your second piece of Prelaunch Content is all about the “what”—what is this transformation or opportunity and how is it going to change or transform your prospects’ lives?
PLC #1 was the “why” and PLC #2 was the “what.” Now, in PLC #3, you will start to answer the “how” question.
PLC #3 is about them taking ownership of that future change. It’s about having them really feel and understand that they can have that transformation.
One of the important things you should do throughout your Prelaunch Sequence is to build excitement and tension. Think of it like a movie or a novel.
Express thanks and excitement.
Quickly recap the opportunity and your positioning.
Possibly present a short case study,
Answer the top questions you’ve been getting.
Explain the big view and how to make it happen.
Pivot to your offer and create a soft landing.
Seed the scarcity of your launch offer.
Call to action.
PLC #1: Opportunity PLC #2: Transformation PLC #3: Ownership PLC #4 (or Open Cart): Enrollment
Bottom line, your future clients have to enroll in their new and enhanced future selves. And your messaging during Open Cart has to be about that enrollment.
Email Template; Okay, I just opened up registration for Product Launch Formula. We’re now live: CLICK HERE for Product Launch Formula www.productlaunchformula.com (I opened it up a bit early to avoid any bottlenecks and spread the load on the server.) Best regards, Jeff P.S. Remember . . . you don’t need to panic. I don’t expect to sell out immediately. However, if you want one of those spots at my PLF Live Workshop, then please don’t delay. They’re going to go fast. Here’s the link: CLICK HERE for Product Launch Formula www.productlaunchformula.com
Typically, you will want to keep your cart open somewhere between four and seven days.
There are three primary ways to create scarcity in your offer: The price goes up, Bonuses are removed and the offer goes away.
Here’s the bare minimum Open Cart sequence: Day 1 (Launch Day): Two emails + social media. The first email is the one that opens the cart (see the email above), and the second one, about four hours later, lets your list know that everything is up and running and you’re open for business. Day 2: One email + social media. This is the day after Launch Day. The message will typically be a social proof email, where you talk about the great response to your launch. Your email will have a link that goes to your sales page. Day 3: One email + social media. Send a longer email that answers many of the top questions about the product. Be sure to include a link to your sales page (do this with every email during Open Cart). Day 4: One or two emails + social media. The message starts to shift to scarcity. You are basically giving a 24-hour warning ahead of your close. You should be absolutely clear about when you’ll close (give the date and exact time) and what your prospects stand to lose if they don’t act before the launch offer closes down. Day 5: Three emails + social media. The first email is sent early in the morning reiterating that you’re going to be closing that day (give the exact time). The second email goes out about six to eight hours before the cart closes. The third is a final courtesy reminder, and you should send it about two or three hours before you close.
All-Access Page—This is a page where I’ll put all of my Prelaunch Content. It makes everything super-accessible. If I’m doing a JV Launch (see Chapter 10), then I’ll let my JV partners send their people direct to this page with no opt-in required.
I always have a few extra bonuses that I never mentioned during my launch, and I start sending out those bonuses shortly after the cart closes. In these days when we are so often underwhelmed by our experience after we buy a product, adding something extra makes you stand out in the market.
After the initial survey in your Pre-Prelaunch, your next step is an email follow-up in which you talk about some of the findings and conclusions from your survey. You can share part of your own journey of transformation, such as a few of your early challenges and how you overcame them. At the end of your email, you can talk a little bit about your upcoming class. If you like, this follow-up can be done as a video.
After that, your next email is the one in which you make your offer. Generally, you will want to direct people to a sales letter or sales video. But remember, you don’t need to oversell.
You are going to be recording these classes—and whether you’re doing webinars or live broadcasts, the recording is something that will be built in (and usually happen automatically). If you do five calls and then add a bonus Q&A call, you’ve now created six recordings. And you can get those audio recordings transcribed. Each hour of content will equal about 15 to 20 printed pages, so you’ll have the makings of a book (or PDF or ebook) that’s 90 to 120 pages long. Now you’ve got audio (and probably video) and 90 pages of written content. This is the core of your online course or membership site. Congratulations—you just got paid to create a product!
First, you need to build long-term relationships with your JV partners. And second, you need to create real, long-term value for those partners.
Your Prelaunch should follow the Opportunity/Transformation/Ownership flow that you learned in Chapter 7, and then your Open Cart Sequence should follow the formula in Chapter 8.
Day 1: Prelaunch Content #1 (Opportunity) Day 4: Prelaunch Content #2 (Transformation) Day 7: Prelaunch Content #3 (Ownership) Day 9: Open Cart (Enrollment)
At the start of the launch you showed your prospect an opportunity to change their life. It’s an opportunity (PLC #1) to have either more pleasure or less pain—to be a better parent, to quit smoking, to learn to meditate, to recover from an abusive relationship, to lower their golf score. Then as you moved through your Prelaunch, you showed them how their life would be transformed (PLC #2) if they got that result, and then what it would be like to truly own (PLC #3) that change. That’s your Prelaunch. Now in Open Cart you’re asking your prospect to enroll in that future: to take the next step, to take the action that will give them that future. At the end of the day, for someone to buy from you means they are
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