Q: Are launches dying?

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Candidate,

Here is a question I hear a lot: "Do launches still work?"

Tbh, I've asked it myself, too. It's a good question.

Today, I want to answer it by giving you a bird's-eye view of the trends I'm seeing in online business — and some of the mistakes being made. This answer is built on the data I have from hundreds of thousands of subscribers and tens of thousands of customers going back over 12 years.

If you're interested in using a business to build your rich life, you'll want to read this.

In this email:

Launches used to be great
Why launches are a lot harder now
What we've learned about launches (including data)

Alright, let's dive in...

1. Launches used to be great

Back in the day, you'd hear stories about people making millions of dollars in a single launch.

Launches were the "holy grail" of online business — you create a product, follow a "launch formula," and basically print money.

For the very top people, the huge launches almost started to seem routine.

Notice that we don't hear the same stories about launches anymore, do we? Interesting...

Then things changed in 2016.

2. Launches are a lot harder now

In early 2016, if you listened carefully, there were early whispers of launches "not working" anymore.

By late 2016, from conversations with other online entrepreneurs, I could see that launches were in a freefall industry-wide. We even saw it in our own launches, which took a big cut.

Since then, the "secret formula" narrative has been in flux. Every day it seems like there is another BIG THING.

You can actually track this narrative as it evolves...

Make a million bucks with an e-book
You should make video courses
No, you should do a mastermind
Now charge 10x more for your mastermind
Pinterest, guys
No, you should use Instagram
Wait, forget that … you need Facebook ads
Seriously, FB ads are magic, you just throw a dollar in and make $50
Wait a sec, I spent $25,000 and actually lost money
YouTube videos, but make sure they're over 10 minutes long
The new thing is...

Before you can master one strategy, it's already been debunked and suddenly you're missing out on the new "gold rush." It's crazy.

I don't know about you, but I hate having to jump from one thing to another, over and over. How do you balance staying fresh with not being distracted? And how do you know what actually works vs what's just hype?

(Look at the deeper psychology here. The message you hear is "Are you having trouble with TACTIC OF THE MONTH? It's not your fault; that tactic is broken. You need this shiny new tactic over here!" Most people don't have the experience or space to be able to step back and ask: "What's really going on here?")

During this time, we experimented with several new channels like everyone else did. I've been having fun on Instagram, but most channels were outright dead-ends. Very frustrating — and expensive — failures.

Meanwhile, as all this was going on, we kept launching. We knew that launches performed for us. And while launches were harder, we kept testing our assumptions and refining our approach.

While everyone else was abandoning launches altogether, we were quietly perfecting our launch game.

For example, look at the launch of our Advanced Personal Finance course, which made over $552,511 while I was across the country getting married.

BTW, while that picture was being taken, my launch pulled in $51,580 on a Saturday.

One day of sales during my Advanced Personal Finance launch in 2018

No complicated social media campaigns. No paid ads. No hands-on affiliate deals. Not even a webinar (I was busy getting married).

Just a simple email funnel that brought in over $550,000 in about a week.

Hmm … launches might be harder now, but they're not dead.

3. What we've learned about launches

Over the course of 100+ launches, we've learned many key lessons:

Everyone has at least some failures. It's OK. We've had huge launches and flops. Sometimes it's even hard to tell the difference between the two (read: why I killed a $2MM product).
When you find something that works, do more of it.
Minimize complexity and expenses on launches. As we tested our launches, we discovered that there were a few levers that truly drove launch revenue … and a ton that just wasted time and money.

Most importantly, if you offer an online product, you need a reason for people to buy NOW. In a world of infinite choice, if they don't make a decision now, odds are very low they'll come back later.

Those sound simple, but the lessons were worth millions of dollars to us.

In fact, most of our revenue can be traced back to these insights (and others) that we learned about launches.

⅔ of our revenue comes from launches

Over the past three years, 66% of our revenue came from launches.

Even better, these are simple, repeatable launches — full of interesting material (no cookie-cutter, spammy sales) — that we can run without major teams, late nights, or stress.

I'll show you how. Later this week, I'm going to take you inside the 7-Figure Launch Machine that runs IWT and GL. Stay tuned for that.

Today, I want to hear from you:

If you're new to launches: When do you plan to run your first launch? What's your biggest question?
Experienced business owners: How did your last launch go? What is your biggest challenge with launches?
If you don't have a business: Are you thinking of starting one? Why or why not?

I read every response.