Let’s face it: creating a stationery launch strategy for your new products can be intimidating at first, especially if you’ve never done it successfully. Don’t worry, if you’re starting your journey toward strategizing your next launch, you’re on the right track. Launching a new product with intentionality is always going to be far more successful than just flying by the seat of your favorite pair of pants.
So, if you’re reading this and wondering how to create a stationery launch plan, you’ve come to the right place. Grab that iced coffee (or tea) and let’s get down to business.
What is A Stationery Launch Strategy and Why Is It Important?
A product launch strategy takes you from just hoping that your new planner for brides-to-be will sell like hotcakes and actually ensures that they will. No matter what product you’ve got in mind, the only thing standing in between you and launch day is a well-thought-out strategy to help you get there.
Think about it as a roadmap that takes you from pre-production all the way to launch day, with a plan of attack on how to position your product, think about how it will help your future customers, and then share it with the world. Take it from us: With some simple planning and intentionality, you can have a successful stationery launch that gets your customers excited and elevates your stationery brand.
Let’s talk about product positioning and segmentation. Who is your customer and what problems will your stationery solve for their lives?
Product Positioning: Questions to Help You Serve Your Customer
To create a successful product launch strategy, you must think about your customers. Let’s say you’re a small business that sells beautiful planners for work-focused professionals, but you want to launch a new product that hits a different group of people. This is how you might go about launching your new product and questions to ask yourself as you walk through the process:
Let’s take the planner idea that we mentioned above. This new planner is for newly engaged brides-to-be who want to start planning their wedding but have no idea where to start.
If you’ve never created or sold planners before, this may be a completely new product line for you. But if you’re already in the planner genre, this may just be a different customer focus.
This new planner solely focuses on helping brides-to-be as they plan their upcoming wedding. It would take them through the process of planning a wedding, help them jot down ideas, and give them time frames to plan around.
Now that you know who your planner is for, how it’s different from what you already sell, and how it helps your customers, it’s time to get into the product launch timeline.
How to Create a Step-By-Step Stationery Launch Strategy
If you’re an artist who doesn’t love creating, a timeline for your stationery launch may sound like the last thing you want to do. But don’t skip this. As you’re juggling all the different marketing efforts at the same time, you’ll thank your past self for all this planning!
Once you have your launch date, you’re going to start working backward from there (just like planning a wedding). If you’re a smaller brand and this is your first launch, you’ll want to give yourself a bit more time than you think you’ll need. Choose a date about eight to 12 weeks ahead of where you’re sitting now. This ensures you have enough time to design and create the product, get your product positioning right, create content and do your product photography, and more. Remember, the goal is to spend launch day celebrating your new product, not putting out fires. Launch day is all about introducing the world to your beautiful new planner (or other amazing products). All you want to do on launch day is … launch.
Now that you’ve chosen the date for launch, it’s time to create the rest of your timeline.
Week 1: Secure your product positioning and start designing.
Weeks 2-3: Finalize the designs for your new product. Choose a printer, decide on paper type and finishes, embellishments, and packaging.
Weeks 4-5: Order your stationery, approve final proofs if needed. Begin developing your marketing plan (what do you want to say about your product? How do you want to describe it?) Start building anticipation and teasing your new stationery through email campaigns, on your landing page, and your social media channels.
Weeks 6-8: Hopefully, you’ve received your brand-new stationery back from the printer by now. If so, this is the time for some quality assurance and then product photography. This is also a good time to create a waitlist for anyone who wants to be notified of when your product will go live on launch day.
Weeks 9-10: Create and post some behind-the-scenes peeks into your new product. Set up your email campaigns and social media posts and schedule them for launch day. Gather a group of influencers to create excitement on their channels for launch day. (Trading a discount code or free product goes a long way here too!)
Weeks 11-12: Make sure your website is ready, product pictures uploaded, and that your shop is ready to receive orders. This is a great time to run orders through to make sure everything is working properly. Ramp up your social media posts, create and build excitement, and get your packaging, printer, labels, and everything ready.
Launch week: It’s finally here! Take a deep breath and watch those orders start rolling in! Use this time to continue the excitement. Capitalize on your influencer’s posts. Create unboxing videos. Highlight why you created your product and who it’s for. Share any outstanding feedback that you’ve received so far. And don’t forget to launch an ad campaign to keep your product front and center for your target customer.
Remember: launch day doesn’t mean the work is over; it just means you get to capitalize on the momentum and keep it going.
Create Your Dream Stationery Product with PrintsWell
If you’ve been dreaming about that special stationery product that would elevate your brand, we’d love to partner with you to bring it to life. PrintsWell has been a forerunner in stationery printing for over 30 years, and we’re passionate about truly partnering with our stationers to help you build and grow your business. If you’re ready to take the next step, we’d love to work with you. Fill out an application today and let’s bring your newest product to life.