Simple Product Hunt Launch Guide
Emphasis on *simple*
I launched Compass Calendar on Product Hunt last week. Here’s how it went and how I recommend launching your next project on the site.
How it went - by the numbers
PH Stats
Daily Rank: #17
Upvotes: 81 points
PH followers gained: 50
Comments: 2
Marketing stats
I promoted the launch on my socials and the app’s email list. I also hosted two YouTube livestreams, where I answered questions and showed the launch progress.
Followers gained: 0
YT Live views: 86
Peak concurrent viewers: 17
Conversions
Basically, more casuals. Of the 256 visitors, three went through the full onboarding and then connected their Google accounts.
How it went - vibes
Spam. The product went live at 12:01 AM. By 12:02, I had a dozen LinkedIn connection requests, cold emails, and new PH followers. They all said they loved the product and would be happy to promote it to their audience … if I paid them a fee.
PH disengagement. I was encouraged after seeing a thoughtful comment from a fellow maker, until realizing it was ChatGPT. He went through all the products of the day, posting generic messages to draw more traffic to his launch. I got one comment from a real human, an old friend.
Direct engagement. I got some congratulatory emails, texts, and messages on the livestream. People were more willing to share their support directly, rather than from a PH account.
Recommendations
Of my four PH launches, this one had the best product and marketing. Yet I got the least amount of PH engagement and the most spam. Something just felt off about the PH experience. Then I found that PH is actually dead and has been for a while. It’s sad to see another site I used to frequent be consumed by the dead internet black hole. But it’s not all for naught. I didn’t get the same launch day zeal from the old days, but I got traffic, feedback, and identified a few areas where the product could improve.
So, if you have a product and are thinking of launching on PH, here’s what I recommend.
Keep it simple. Don’t overthink the marketing or launch mechanics. 80/20 it by making the page presentable, but focus most of your efforts on the product. The only way you’ll get organic growth on this day is if real people reshare it, and there are so few real people on the site now that it’s tougher to get them to do that than before.
Don’t try to become product of the day. Doing this would violate the first rule. Instead, just think about the site as a free source of traffic for a day and a bump to your SEO.
Harden your LinkedIn by enabling the setting that requires people to enter your email before making a connection request.
Host a livestream. This is much more natural and fun than trying to get people to sign up for a dead platform and have fake convo in the comments
Set up auto-fixing PRs. Error happens → AI fixes bug → AI merges and deploys to staging→ AI notifies you → you verify and deploy to prod. This will allow you to get some sleep on launch day while also fixing critical bugs quickly. I didn’t do this, but I wish I did, because most of my day was just watching logs.
My PH experience may have been underwhelming, but I’m still a fan of official launches. It allows you and others to celebrate progress. In a field where our projects never really end, having these milestones is good for the psyche.
Good luck.