How to Bounce Back from a Disappointing Launch

Good morning, everybody. Happy Monday. Welcome to Monday Momentum. I am Sarah Williams. If you're new around here, let me know that you're here. I would love to say hi to you. And if you're not new around here, let me know that you're here and I'd love to know where you're watching from today. And if you're catching this on the replay, let me know as well. Today we're going to talk about something that I think we have to I don't know if I would say normalize, but we have to understand that it happens. So what happens when your launch flops? Um, what happens next? Because it's a real thing. It is happening often right now and we're going to talk about it today and I'm going to give you real practical steps that you can take if you've had a, say, less than stellar launch, um, in the, in the last, you know, 6 months or so. So let me come to the chat. Let me, let me say hi to everybody, and then we're just gonna jump right into it this morning. Again, let me know where you're watching from. I'd love to know where you're watching from. I'm back in Texas this morning. I got back from Colorado yesterday afternoon. I had a great time in Colorado. I was speaking at an event called Evolve, and this event was for people with retail businesses, physical brick-and-mortar stores. And, um, you know, I think the common theme right now is that people are struggling, whether you're online, whether you have a brick-and-mortar store. And, um, I think that it's a common theme throughout what we're dealing with, with our economy, with what's happening in our world, the big elephant in the room, the tariff situation. And so We have to keep moving forward and that's the common theme right now is that no matter what we're dealing with, we always find a way to work through it. So we're talking about that in a different way today as far as launches go, but we have to keep working through it. Okay. Good morning, Crystal. Good to see you. Hey, Dana. Good to see you. Louise is here. Hey, Christina. Good morning, Teresa from Northern Virginia. Good morning. Good morning, Carolyn. Good morning, Rebecca. Good morning, Wanda. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, Laura Lee. Good morning, Victoria. Hey, everybody. Oh, y'all are, y'all are in some cold states right now. I was like, I got to get back to Texas. But what was funny is that Saturday when I was in Denver, I was looking at the temperature and my Weather Channel app has where I'm at and then it has like my home location. So it said 40 degrees in Denver and it said 38 degrees in Wichita Falls, Texas at home. I'm like, why is it colder at home than is in Colorado. This is not supposed to happen. So a little chilly out there. Hopefully we're warming up this week. All right, let's talk about it. I decided to talk about this topic today because it's been on the forefront of my mind in a lot of different ways. My peers, I would, and I would say these are the people that I'm in a mastermind with, that I'm a participant of a mastermind. I have watched over the last several months them go through launches and it be less than half of what their expectations are. And these are people doing multimillion-dollar launches. These are people in the 6 and 7-figure range. These are people doing, like, even one of them did a quarterly launch. I want to say it was last week and he typically gets 250 new members in his group a quarter. He's never gotten less than 100 and this time he got 88. And so when you think about that, I mean, that's the, that's the reality. Also in my mastermind, the one that I host for my students, there's been some conversation over the weekend about how their launches aren't going the way that they had expected. And, and there's a lot of feelings there and, but there's a lot of positivity there. And so I want to make sure we talk about it. Also, I just finished a launch on Saturday night and I got half of the results that I had expected. Um, and I felt like my expectation was very realistic, um, in this launch. Like I didn't overshoot my goal here. And so what I want to talk about is that we're seeing it across the board, whether you're a brand new business owner, whether you are a seasoned business owner, whether this is your first launch or your 15th launch, we're seeing it across the board. So first I want to say that you're not alone in this and that everyone is dealing with this on some capacity. So that first I just want to normalize it, that if you've had a launch recently in the last few months and it didn't go the way you expected, expected, or you got less than stellar results, like, you're not alone, okay? I just want you to feel that from me, first of all. What we're going to do is we're going to talk about what we can do from this point, because there's, there's some things that we're not going to do, okay? We're not going to ghost our audience. I think our initial reaction is that we pull back. When something doesn't go as planned. We've shown up, we've done the launch things, you've pulled the launch plan from the Launch Your Box module, you did, you're like, Sarah, I did all the things. And so instantly our protective nature wants us to hide, wants us to pull back, wants us to not be on camera, right? And so we're not gonna ghost our audience when we're having a less than stellar launch, okay? I want you to stay visible. When we go silent, it creates distance with our audience and it kind of loses momentum. Even if you had the smallest momentum, like me, I had less than half of the momentum. Okay, so I don't want you to stop showing up. Okay, the other thing is we have the tendency, and I've, I've probably said this too often, we have the tendency to just burn it all down. Like, just burn it all down. Um, just burn it all down. Let's start fresh, you don't need to change everything. Okay? We just, we want to throw it all out. We want to throw out our entire strategy. We want to throw out all the things that we've been doing. We would throw out our consistency, throw out our offer. Like we don't need to burn it all down. So don't burn it all down. Don't take it personally. You've got to separate yourself from the numbers. Your self-worth isn't defined on how successful your launch is or not. Okay, so you've got— and it feels so personal, right? It feels so personal because it's our baby. We've put our blood, sweat, and tears into our product, our launches, our business. So we take it super personal when it doesn't work out. But you can't— you've got to separate that from the numbers. Okay. And then the other thing that we're kind of guilty of is making fear-based changes. Okay, I'm afraid right now, and that's a valid thing for us to be afraid right now with the economy and the tariffs and this, you know, every day something is changing, right? And so we have this inherent fear of, oh gosh, these tariffs are going to happen, my prices are going to go up, I'm just going to scrap the whole thing, and I'm making I'm making decisions in fear, and that's never a good thing. That never gets us anywhere, and it's never a good thing, okay? And then here's the last thing that I don't want you to do. I don't want you to assume that nobody cares, that nobody wants your offer, that, that you're not good enough. They just weren't ready yet. Okay. And we're going to talk about that and how we can get them ready. Okay. So let's go through these, these 5 things. Don't ghost your audience. Don't burn it all down to the ground. Don't take it personally. As hard as that is, it's hard. Okay. I'm validating that it's very hard not to take it personally, but don't take it personally. Look at the data, not the feelings. Don't make fear-based decisions and don't assume that nobody cares. Okay? Can we all make a pact? We're in this together. Andrea says, "Guilty on all accounts." We do. That's what we do. We get in our head about it, but we have to stop doing those things. Okay? Now, here's what we can do. Once we admit, "Okay. Yes, I'm guilty of one of those 5 things or maybe all those 5 things." Here's what we can do, okay? Let's start with this. If you're a note-taker and you're like, I've had a crappy launch, I really need to reassess what's going on, here's what we can do. We're gonna call this our bounce-back plan, okay? 'Cause we're bouncing back. We are resilient. We are entrepreneurs, and the best thing about entrepreneurs is that they problem-solve and they don't give up. The best entrepreneurs, the ones that are the most successful, are the ones that problem-solve and they don't give up. So here we're gonna problem solve. Number 1, I want you to review the data. Okay, I'm waiting for all the data from my launch today for me to really review the data and see what it is because that is facts. It's not emotional, it's not a feeling, it's facts. I need to review the data. I wanna look at open rates from my email. I wanna look at click-through rates from the email. I wanna look at clicks on my sales page. I wanna look at conversions on that sales page. I wanna see, How much traffic was driven by my different marketing plans? Was it driven by ads? Was it driven by email? Was it driven organically? Like, where did people come from in this launch? That's what I wanna look at. And then where did they drop off? Because that's an important thing. Like, where did people come from and where did they drop off? All right? What caught their attention? Like, where were they coming from and then why did they not subscribe? I need to figure that out. I need to look at the data, okay? And if you don't have super detailed data, you know, like I've got, I've got a team that does all the data for me. Look at the data that you have. A lot of that is in your email CRM. You can look at your Google Analytics. Look at the data that you have, okay? Number 2, I want you to ask for feedback, okay? I want you to send an email saying, Hey, tell me what held you back from subscribing. Tell me why you didn't subscribe. Just hit reply, let me know. We're finished with our launch. Tell me why. I'd love to know. You can send that to your whole list that didn't subscribe, or you could send that in a poll, or you could post it on social media, get a poll. You could, you could ask just a subset of people, like, you know, that people, the people that opened their email, that would be a good segment Excuse me. If you took a segment of people— what's going on here? If you took a segment of people that opened your emails during— maybe they opened 2 or more emails during your launch but did not subscribe. You could run that segment in Klaviyo. And if you just sent them an email saying, hey, I saw you checked out my launch and didn't subscribe. Would you mind telling me why? Why? Or what would have made the difference for you to say yes? You're going to get a small percentage back of people that will actually reply to you, but even if 10 people reply to you, even if 20 people reply to you, that data that you're going to get back from them is feedback that's going to help you be better. Okay, so what would have helped them say yes? It could be a pricing issue, it could be I don't know what's in your box, um, it— there could be lots of different reasons that you haven't thought of. In your mind right now, you feel like I'm a failure, I burn it all down, I— nobody wants offer, but that's not true. So we need to find out the reasons why. Okay. Then number 3, I want you to reconnect with your audience. You may feel like completely shutting down and that's a valid feeling, but I want you to feel that way and then let's reconnect. I want you to show up live today and, and be excited about the people that did join your subscription. And I want you to continue to show behind the scenes. I want you to continue to be excited about your offer because if they see the the excitement in you, that's going to make them want to become a subscriber in the future. Remember that not all is lost. They just weren't ready right now. You have to treat everyone like they're gonna be back for a subscription. There's a potential there, okay? So build that trust, build that visibility, and when you make that next offer, they're more than likely gonna come join you this time. Okay? Number 4, I want you to make strategic adjustments. And when I say strategic, they're not out of fear, they're not out of panic, they're not out of emotion. Okay? Look at your messaging. Look at your messaging. Sometimes we have to adjust our messaging not only to our ideal customer, but to what's happening in the world. I think that's something I could have done in this launch that I did not do. And I look back at it now and I think I need to adjust the messaging because all of this uncertainty, all of this unrest, all of this things that are happening make people feel some kind of way. And I know my t-shirt club provides the inspiring messages to help you get out of your head when you're feeling that way. And that's the messaging I should have brought up in this launch. I needed to tell them, I needed them to feel what I'm writing on these t-shirts is for them to help remind them every single day when we're in this world of uncertainty, I have a positive message for them. And I didn't bring that up enough in my launch. So when I look at making strategic adjustments, I need to refine my messaging. I might also have needed to refine my timeline. I might have needed to, you know, build this up a little bit more. Sometimes I think I just slap stuff on the calendar and go. I need to build this up. I need to create the momentum. I need to create this feeling instead of just, okay, today I'm launching. All right, and then I need to look at my bonus. Was my bonus in my offer the best bonus it could have been? Okay, so I have to look at that. Like, it was a bracelet stack this time. Last time it was a bonus t-shirt. Am I under the assumption that everybody would want a bracelet stack if they're in my t-shirt club? And so was that the best bonus for me? It was the best bonus because it was the easiest for me. Like, we didn't have to fold t-shirts. It didn't weigh very much. Like, it was easy for us to do this bonus. But was that a reason that people subscribed? And so I need to look at the reality of what I did in this launch from different launches. And then I need to make those improvements based on real factual insights and not emotions. I can't just assume my bonus was terrible. I need to ask, That's why in, in number 2, we ask for feedback. That's how we figure things out. That's how we problem-solve. Okay, review the data factually, not emotionally. Ask for feedback. You're gonna get a lot of research when you ask people why. I want you to reconnect with your audience in an authentic way. Keep going business as usual. Take them behind the scenes. Show up. And then look at strategic adjustments that you can make. That's really, really important. Now, let's talk about making another offer, because here's what I don't want you to do, and I'm thinking about this for my own business as well. I've got, I had ads running, I emailed every day, I was, I don't know if you guys know, but I was showing up in a t-shirt of the day every single day on my page. I have a lot of momentum towards my t-shirt club. Right? And so instead of just saying, well, I got half of what I expected, it is what it is, I'm done, let's move on, like, what else are we selling today? Like, that's— that could be my attitude, but I think that I need to make another offer. I've got them warmed up, okay? They didn't hit the deadline, but that doesn't mean that they're lost forever. And while they're still warm, they've been going through the March t-shirt challenge with me, um, they've been seeing my ads, they've been getting all my emails, they've gotten style guides while they're still warm. Let me make them a second chance offer. You could do this in a lot of different ways, okay? So we could do a second chance sale, second chance offer, limited quantities. Hey, I have 17 boxes left, um, you have 48 hours to snag them. Um, create some urgency with it. Now's your second chance, you missed the deadline on April 5th, but I still have X number. Like, I have all these shirts I ordered for the double. I still have double what I, what I planned for. So I could still get them in in some way. I'm going to have to do a little manual work on the backend because our payments processed yesterday on Saturday, but I'm not going to give up on this. Okay. So second chance offer, limited quantity. You could do a bundle or a BOGO. Maybe you could pair what you have extra with something from a past box and you could do a gift one, keep one. You could do two for the price of one if you have the product, whatever you need to do. It increases, you know, some order while moving out this inventory. If you've planned for extra boxes that you have that you now need to get rid of, you could also say, okay, you weren't ready to subscribe. Let me take everybody that opened my emails for my launch and let me repackage this as a one-time product. Okay, so you didn't subscribe. It's okay. People are hesitant to give you their credit cards and say, charge me every month right now. Right. But I still have this inventory. So how can I repackage this into a one-time offer? This could be an offer to people that didn't subscribe. I also think it's a great offer for your subscribers. Okay, so I would segment two different lists here and the offer to my subscribers, I would say, hey, we have extras this month. If you would like to gift this t-shirt to someone you know, here it is and here's a discount for you for being a subscriber. My subscribers get this for $20, right? So they get the t-shirt for $20. I sell it in my shop for $32. So maybe I say it's $32, but because you're a subscriber, I'm gonna give it to you as a subscriber price. So that is boom, that's an offer. It's a benefit because they're a subscriber. I'm going to give it to you for $20. It helps me clear out my inventory of extras that I have. They can gift it to someone else. That could be the box, that could be the t-shirt, whatever your offer was, send it to your subscribers as a bonus to gift to someone. Perfect for Mother's Day coming up or something else like that. Okay. Sorry, I got talking too fast. I would start there to my current subscribers. Then my second plan of action would be to send this offer to everyone that opened my emails that didn't subscribe. And I would say something. I wouldn't give it to them as a subscriber price because that's exclusive for my subscribers. But I would say, Here's a $5 discount if you want to try our tees one time. Maybe they're unsure about the fit. Maybe they're unsure about the feel. Maybe they don't know that I have the softest t-shirts on the planet and you're going to look great in them no matter what your body type is. Let me get them to make one purchase from me, right? I already have the dang tees. Let them buy it. Let them, let them feel it. Let them see what it's like to get a package from me once that month, whether that's the box whether that's the t-shirt, whatever your offer is, let's give it to them at a discount one time. All the people that engaged in my email list during the launch, let me make them a one-time offer. I already have the product, right? We don't want to sit on this inventory. I want them to get it because that is also another way for them to be a potential subscriber in the future. Okay? So these are just some ideas of ways that you could totally get an offer, make some sales, work through the extra inventory that you have. You need to use urgency, you need to use scarcity, but you need to be authentic in that. They have to have a reason to buy now. We can't just leave it open-ended, okay? So give them some urgency. You can also, if you have the box, uh, and the box has gone out and they didn't subscribe, you could do an unboxing in an email, you could do an unboxing in the video, and then make the offer. Like, if miss this box, I have 25 of them left. The first 25 people that purchase, here's the link. The first 25 people that subscribe, here's the link. I will send you this box first, or something like that. Like, there's an opportunity here to continue to sell in a different way. Okay, so let's— is that giving you some ideas? Are you feeling like your brain, your, your brain is working? Jen says How do you bring me from feeling like a loser to be excited about my business each Monday? That's my job, Jen. That's my— that's what I'm here because I know what you're feeling. I just went through a flop launch. Like, I know how you're feeling and I'm also here to help you. These are the things that I'm going to do. So I am here to help you problem solve because sometimes we can't see things when we're in the midst of them. All right. So let's, let's keep going here. Number 1, this is normal. I want you to just— this— you've got to change your mindset in this moment. This is normal to have less than perfect results. It's hard when you've had success after success after success and then you have a failure. It's hard because you're not used to it. But every business has speed bumps. It's the people that stop and never go over the bump that don't make it. It is our time to get ourselves over the bump and to keep going. Launching is about learning. It's not about being perfect every time. It's not about having, you know, there was a point in time that I felt like everything I did turned to gold. And that was, that was great at the time. But it was very hard when things stopped and it was a hard lesson for me to really learn. But I got to problem solve. What matters in this moment is how you respond in this moment. Persistence is what makes an entrepreneur. And at the end of the day, I want you to celebrate your effort. You showed up, you did the things, you took the time, you went live, you sent the emails, you ran maybe ads for the first time. I need you to celebrate your effort that you made on this. And just know it was not for no reason. A flop isn't a failure, it's feedback, and we have to take it like that. You can recover, adjust, and try again. And every time you do that, you get better, you get stronger, and you get more resilient. So let me know in the chat what's one thing that you're going to do to recover from your last launch. Drop it in the chat. I'd love to hear. I'm gonna go work on some email segments. I'm gonna go make some offers for some t-shirts that I, that I've got sitting around here. I'm not giving up. I'm not letting these extra shirts sit on my shelf forever. We're going to continue and we're going to figure out how to keep going. All right, you've got this. You've got the tools, you've got the community, you've got what it takes and your next launch could actually be your greatest launch ever. All right. Okay. Let's do some work. I'll see you guys soon.