Launch Planning and Go-to-Market Strategy

The Launch That Almost Wasn’t

In the previous lesson, we explored stakeholder communication and alignment. Now let’s build on that foundation. Here’s a scene that plays out at companies every week. Engineering finishes the feature on Friday. Marketing finds out Monday. Sales learns about it from a customer tweet. Support gets tickets about something they’ve never heard of.

The feature is great. The launch is a disaster.

Product launches fail not because the product is bad, but because the launch itself was uncoordinated. Great PM work means great launch orchestration – and AI helps you build the kind of launch plan that covers every angle before anything slips through the cracks.

The Launch Planning Framework

Every launch, regardless of size, needs these components:

1. Launch Tier Definition – How big is this launch? 2. Messaging and Positioning – What’s the story? 3. Cross-Functional Coordination – Who does what? 4. Timeline and Milestones – When does each piece happen? 5. Success Metrics – How do we know it worked? 6. Risk Mitigation – What could go wrong? 7. Post-Launch Plan – What happens after launch day?

Defining Your Launch Tier

Not every launch gets the same treatment. Tier your launches:

Tier	Description	Example	Activities
T1: Major	New product or transformational feature	New product line, major platform expansion	Press, blog, email, social, sales training, customer webinar, launch event
T2: Significant	Important feature or improvement	New integration, major workflow improvement	Blog, email, in-app, sales enablement, support docs
T3: Minor	Incremental improvement	UI update, performance improvement	Changelog, in-app notification, support docs

Help me determine the right launch tier for this feature:

Feature: [description]
Impact: [who it affects and how significantly]
Strategic importance: [how it fits our goals]
Competitive context: [does this change our positioning?]
Customer demand: [how many customers asked for this?]

Recommend:
1. Launch tier (T1/T2/T3) with justification
2. Required launch activities for this tier
3. Teams that need to be involved
4. Suggested timeline from "ready to ship" to "launch day"

Building the Launch Plan

Here’s the comprehensive launch plan prompt:

Create a detailed launch plan for this product launch:

FEATURE: [description]
LAUNCH TIER: [T1/T2/T3]
TARGET LAUNCH DATE: [date]
TARGET AUDIENCE: [who this is for]

CONTEXT:
- Why this matters: [strategic importance]
- User problem it solves: [the pain point]
- Key differentiator: [what makes this special]

Generate a complete launch plan covering:

1. MESSAGING
   - One-sentence value proposition
   - Three key messages for different audiences
   - Elevator pitch (30 seconds)
   - FAQ (10 questions customers and sales will ask)

2. PRE-LAUNCH (2-4 weeks before)
   - Internal announcement and training timeline
   - Sales enablement materials needed
   - Support documentation needed
   - Beta/early access plan (if applicable)
   - Marketing asset creation timeline

3. LAUNCH DAY
   - Hour-by-hour timeline of activities
   - Who's responsible for each activity
   - Communication channels to activate
   - Monitoring plan (what to watch for)

4. POST-LAUNCH (first 30 days)
   - Week 1: Monitor, respond, iterate
   - Week 2-4: Measure, optimize, follow up
   - Day 30 review: assess against success metrics

5. SUCCESS METRICS
   - Adoption metrics (signups, activations, usage)
   - Business metrics (revenue impact, conversion)
   - Quality metrics (bugs, support tickets, satisfaction)
   - Specific targets for each metric

6. RISK MITIGATION
   - Technical risks and contingency plans
   - Messaging risks (potential misunderstanding)
   - Competitive risks (timing, response)
   - Rollback plan if something goes wrong

Make the plan specific enough that any team member can pick up their
section and execute without further clarification.

Sales Enablement

Your sales team needs to sell this. Give them what they need:

Create a sales enablement package for this launch:

Feature: [description]
Target customer: [who benefits most]
Key competitor response: [what competitors offer for the same need]
Pricing impact: [is this in existing plans or an upsell?]

Generate:

1. ONE-PAGER
   - What it does (3 bullets, no jargon)
   - Why customers need it (pain points it solves)
   - How it compares to competitors
   - Pricing and availability

2. DISCOVERY QUESTIONS
   - 5 questions sales can ask to identify if a prospect needs this
   - Expected answers that signal a good fit

3. OBJECTION HANDLING
   - "We already use [competitor]" -- response
   - "We don't need this right now" -- response
   - "It's too expensive" -- response
   - "We tried something similar and it didn't work" -- response
   - "What if it doesn't deliver results?" -- response

4. CUSTOMER STORIES
   - Template for the story we'll tell once we have results
   - Key metrics to track for case study material

5. EMAIL TEMPLATES
   - Introduction email to existing customers
   - Follow-up email after demo
   - Announcement email for prospects who asked for this

Keep everything concise. Sales people don't read long documents.

Support and Documentation Prep

Don’t forget the team that handles day-one questions:

Create a support preparation plan for this launch:

Feature: [description]
Existing workflow it changes: [what users do today that will be different]
Known limitations: [what it doesn't do yet]
Expected volume: [estimated increase in support tickets]

Generate:

1. HELP CENTER ARTICLES
   - Article outlines for key topics (getting started, FAQ, troubleshooting)
   - Internal KB article for support agents (including known issues)

2. SUPPORT TRAINING
   - Key information agents need to know
   - Common questions to expect (with answers)
   - Escalation criteria (when to involve engineering)
   - Known issues and workarounds

3. MONITORING
   - What patterns to watch for in support tickets
   - At what volume should we escalate (X tickets in Y hours)
   - Who to contact for each type of issue

Post-Launch: The Part Everyone Skips

Launch day gets all the attention. But the real impact happens in the weeks after. Build your post-launch review into the plan from the start:

Create a post-launch review framework for this launch:

Launch date: [date]
Success metrics defined pre-launch: [list with targets]
Actual results: [fill in after launch]

Structure the review:

1. WEEK 1 REPORT
   - Adoption numbers vs. targets
   - Top user feedback themes
   - Bug/issue count and severity
   - Support ticket volume and themes
   - Any immediate changes needed

2. 30-DAY REVIEW
   - Metrics vs. targets (with trends)
   - User feedback synthesis (themes, sentiment)
   - Competitive response (what did they do?)
   - What worked well in the launch process
   - What we'd do differently next time
   - Recommended next steps (iterate, expand, sunset)

3. LESSONS LEARNED
   - Process improvements for future launches
   - Messaging that resonated (and what didn't)
   - Team coordination wins and pain points
   - Updated playbook for next launch

Quick Check: Launch Readiness

Before any launch, run this checklist:

Feature is fully tested and approved for release
Messaging is reviewed and approved by stakeholders
Sales team is trained and has enablement materials
Support team is briefed with documentation and FAQ
Marketing assets are created and scheduled
Success metrics are defined with specific targets
Monitoring plan is in place for launch day
Rollback plan exists in case of critical issues
Post-launch review is scheduled
All team members know their launch-day responsibilities

Exercise: Plan Your Next Launch

Take a feature that’s coming up for launch (or one that recently launched without a plan):

Define the launch tier
Build a complete launch plan using the comprehensive prompt
Create the sales enablement one-pager
Draft the support preparation plan
Set up the post-launch review framework

If you’re doing this for a past launch, do the post-launch review retroactively. What would you change? What was missing? Use those lessons to make your next launch better.

Key Takeaways

Great launches are about cross-functional coordination, not any single activity
Tier your launches (T1/T2/T3) to match investment to importance
Define success metrics before launch to prevent post-hoc rationalization
Sales enablement needs to be concise and focused on objection handling and discovery questions
Support preparation prevents launch-day chaos and protects user experience
Post-launch review (week 1 and day 30) is where you learn what actually worked
Build the post-launch review into the launch plan from the start – not as an afterthought
A launch checklist prevents the “we forgot about support” moments that damage credibility

Next: Your capstone – building a complete product strategy document that ties everything together.