Judge launch agencies on one thing: their gates. Ask what has to be true before each stage of a launch proceeds, and what happens when it is not true. Anyone can describe a launch plan. The teams worth hiring can describe the conditions under which they stop.
The short version
- A launch is a sequence of gates, not a calendar. Each stage should be permitted by evidence from the last one.
- Validate with a small quantity first. Two hundred units and $5,000 to $10,000 tells you most of what a full order would.
- A full brand launch takes around seven months. Anyone promising a fraction of that is skipping a gate.
- The outcome to hold a candidate to is profitability inside year one, not revenue by month three.
- Expect to spend 4 to 6 hours a week yourself during the launch window. Nobody launches a brand without the founder.
Ask for the gates before you ask for the plan
Launch plans all look similar on a slide, because the stages are not secret. What differs between agencies is what has to be proven before money moves to the next stage. Below is the sequence we run, with the gate at each step written as a question you should be able to answer yes to before proceeding.
- Market analysis. Is this category large enough, growing, and not owned outright by two sellers. Gate: a written market size and a rating gap you can point at. No gate, no sourcing.
- Differentiation defined. Have we identified the specific complaint pattern in competitor negative reviews that our version fixes. Gate: differentiation drawn from real reviews and the rating gap, never invented in a workshop.
- Supplier selection and samples. Do we have physical samples from more than one supplier, inspected against that complaint list. Gate: a sample that solves the problem, in hand.
- Phase one validation. Order about 200 units at $5,000 to $10,000, and run up to four products at once if the pipeline supports it. Gate: real sales data, not a focus group.
- Listing and creative build. Are the title, bullets, and images built from the keyword set and the differentiation, in that order. Gate: a primary image tested against the top three competitors on a like-for-like screen.
- Launch traffic. Is advertising running with a stage-appropriate budget, plus early review generation through legitimate channels such as Vine. Gate: a target for reviews and rank, with a date.
- The scale, fix, or kill decision. Do rating, conversion rate, and acquisition cost trend the right way over the defined window. Gate: an explicit decision, written down, not a drift into month four.
- Phase two scaling. Only once rating, conversion, and acquisition cost are proven. Gate: the numbers from step seven, not enthusiasm about the product.
That whole run is about seven months for a full brand. An agency that quotes ten weeks is either launching a single product into an established brand or is skipping steps one through four, which are the ones that prevent expensive mistakes.
The outcome benchmark worth holding anyone to
Ask a launch agency what proportion of the brands they launch are profitable within their first year, and how they define profitable. The number matters less than whether they track it at all. Most teams report revenue, ad efficiency, and rank, none of which tell you whether the brand made money.
The majority of the brands we launch at Flapen are profitable within their first year. I quote that because it is the only outcome measure that survives contact with reality, and because it forces an honest conversation about the ones that were not. Ask any candidate about their failures directly. A team that cannot name a launch that did not work has either not launched many or is not being straight with you.
What launch agencies will not tell you
Most launch failures are decided before the first ad ever runs. The category was too small, the differentiation was invented rather than observed, or the supplier could not hold quality at volume. By the time performance looks bad, the money is already in inventory and everyone starts optimizing campaigns to rescue a decision made months earlier.
The second thing: launch services are frequently sold as a fixed package, which creates pressure to proceed through every stage regardless of what the data says. If the agency is paid the same whether stage four says go or stop, notice where that incentive points. Ask what happens commercially if they recommend not launching after validation. The answer tells you how much the recommendation is worth.
Related answers
- Best product launch services for Amazon global marketplaces
- How to launch first product on Amazon
- Affordable Amazon FBA consulting for startups
- Questions to ask before hiring an Amazon agency
- Done-for-you Amazon management: the complete guide
The gate list above is the one we run against, and you can see it applied to your own product at Flapen.
