The SaaS product launch checklist: 8 weeks out to the week after

Decide what kind of launch this is

Before the checklist, agree on the size. A new product, a pricing change and a redesign all deserve a full launch. A single feature usually doesn't; it gets a changelog entry, an email and a short video, and our feature announcement video guide covers that smaller version.

Then write the launch goal as a number you'll check in two weeks: trial signups, activated accounts, upgrades from existing customers, or demos booked. One primary number keeps the team from celebrating page views while signups stay flat.

• Name one launch owner who can make the final call on dates and scope.
• Pick the date with engineering in the room, and agree on what happens if the product isn't ready (a slip is cheaper than a broken launch).
• List who hears first: existing customers, beta users, investors, partners, then everyone else.

SaaS product launch checklist by phase

Here is the whole plan on one screen. The sections after it expand each phase. Owners are roles, not job titles; on a five-person team one person may own half the column.

8 to 4 weeks out: positioning, pricing and the plan

This is the phase that decides whether the launch makes sense to anyone outside the company. Write a one-paragraph positioning statement: who it's for, the problem, what it does differently, and the proof. Every later asset, from the tagline to the demo script, pulls from that paragraph.

Settle pricing early. It touches the pricing page, billing setup, sales conversations, the launch email and any launch offer, and a late change ripples through all of them. If you'll offer a launch discount, decide its end date now.

• Talk to five to ten beta users or prospects and note the exact words they use for the problem. Those words go into the headline.
• Write the demo script now, before the UI is final, so the product team knows which screens have to be polished. The product demo script template is a good starting point.
• Decide the channels: email list, in-app, blog, social, Product Hunt, communities you're already active in, partners. Drop any channel you can't do properly.

4 weeks to launch day: assets and readiness

Most of the checklist lives here. Freeze the launch scope so marketing can capture screens that won't change, then build the assets in order of how many other assets depend on them.

The demo video is usually the slowest asset and the one most likely to go stale if the UI shifts late. Recording it last means rushing it; recording it early means re-recording. Building it from the app's code is one way out: DemoVexa reads the code, recreates the real screens, times them to a voiceover and can rebuild the video from the latest code if the UI changes before launch. A careful screen recording after feature freeze works too, if you keep the scope locked.

Launch day and the week after: run of show and measurement

Write launch day as a timed schedule with a name on each line, and share it the day before. People can then work without asking what's next.

1. Before sending anything: deploy, check signup and payment on production with a real card, confirm analytics events fire.
2. Publish the launch page, blog post, changelog and help articles, then the Product Hunt post if it isn't already scheduled.
3. Send the customer email first, then the prospect email, then post on social and tell the communities you're already part of.
4. Staff replies all day: comments, support tickets, social mentions. Fast, specific answers matter more than polish.
5. At the end of the day, write down what broke, what people asked and the numbers so far.

In the week after, follow up with everyone who commented or wrote in, ship the small fixes people asked for, and send a short "what we changed since launch" update. Then compare results against the goal you set eight weeks earlier. Look at signups, but judge the launch on activation and trial-to-paid conversion over the next few weeks, because launch traffic is curious and much of it won't stay. Note which channel brought the users who activated, not just the most visits; that's the input for the next launch.

Questions