Launch day feels like a single moment. It's really 48 hours of small, boring, important jobs: send the email, publish the post, answer the comment, fix the bug, answer the next comment. The people who do well aren't the ones with the cleverest tactic. They're the ones who prepared the boring jobs in advance and then stayed at the keyboard.
This is a plan for those 48 hours, plus where Claude Code helps (drafting) and where it doesn't (anything that gets sent or posted).
If you're not sure the thing is worth launching yet, read Validate before you build first.
The week before: prepare everything
Nothing on launch day should require you to write from a blank page. Have these ready:
- The waitlist email. Written, tested, scheduled or ready to send.
- Your Product Hunt draft, if you're using Product Hunt (details below).
- One post per channel you plan to use, written for that channel.
- A short FAQ for the questions you know are coming: price, who it's for, what's next, how it's different.
- A reply bank: a few honest starting points for thank-yous, bug reports and feature requests. Starting points, not copy-paste.
- Tracking links for your own posts (more on that below).
Fix the obvious bugs, check signup on a phone, and make sure someone besides you has paid or signed up successfully. If you're taking money before something is fully built, make it refundable and check your local consumer rules.
Hour 0: email your waitlist first
Your waitlist asked to hear from you. They're the warmest people you'll reach all day, so they hear first, before any public post.
Keep it plain:
- Subject: say what happened. "It's live" works.
- One paragraph: what it is and who it's for.
- One link to try it.
- One ask: reply with what confused them, or what they'd pay for.
Send it from your email tool so the unsubscribe link and your address are included. If you're on Product Hunt, you can tell your list you're there and invite them to have a look and leave feedback. Don't ask them to upvote; more on that next.
Product Hunt, by its own rules
Product Hunt publishes its own launch guide. A few things from it that matter:
- Timing. The homepage runs on a 24-hour cycle in Pacific time, and Product Hunt suggests 12:01 am PT for makers without other constraints. You can schedule a launch up to a month ahead. Their stated view on which day: the one you're most prepared for.
- No upvote requests. Their FAQ says you cannot ask people directly to upvote. Ask people to visit and comment instead.
- Hunt it yourself. Their guide says there's no advantage to a third-party hunter. Company accounts are prohibited; launch from a personal account.
- Assets. Tagline up to 60 characters. Description up to 500. A square thumbnail (240×240 recommended, under 3MB). At least two gallery images (1270×760 recommended). Video, if you have one, must be a YouTube link. Co-makers need their own Product Hunt accounts, so set those up early.
- No short or tracking links. Product Hunt doesn't accept bit.ly-style links or UTM-tagged URLs.
- Post a first comment. Product Hunt says about 70% of Product of the Day, Week or Month winners had a maker's first comment. Cover who it's for, why you built it, and any launch offer, and ask for feedback.
Product Hunt also reports that weekend launches got 15% more "Visit" clicks than weekday ones, though larger companies tend to launch on weekdays.
Post where your audience already is
A launch post works best where people already know you. In rough order:
- Your own channels: newsletter (done), LinkedIn, X, YouTube, wherever you've been posting.
- Communities you're already part of. Read the rules first. Many forbid self-promotion, or allow it only in a specific thread. If you've never contributed there, a launch post is a bad first impression.
- Hacker News, if it fits. "Show HN" is for things people can try, and its guidelines say it's best when they can try it without signups. Landing pages and fundraisers aren't allowed, and it explicitly says not to ask friends to upvote or comment.
Write each post for its place. A LinkedIn post about why you built it, an X post with a short demo, a community post that asks a real question. The same link pasted into ten places looks like what it is.
Reply to everything
For 48 hours, replying is the job. Every comment, every email, every DM.
- Thank people specifically. "Thanks for trying the import" beats "Thanks!!"
- Answer the actual question, then ask one back. Replies turn into conversations, and conversations turn into your next feature list.
- Bug reports: thank them, fix it if you can, then tell them it's fixed. That last message wins fans.
- Criticism: agree with whatever is true. Don't argue in public.
Block out time for this. If you launch at 12:01 am PT and live in London, that's 8:01 am for you; plan your sleep around when your audience is awake.
Measure what matters
Pick four numbers and write them down at 24 and 48 hours:
| Number | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Signups (or trials) | Did people care enough to try it? |
| Activated users | Did they reach the moment it's useful? Define this before launch. |
| Paid (if you charge) | Did anyone value it in money? |
| Replies and conversations | Who wants to talk? These are your first real users. |
Upvotes, likes and impressions are nice. They're not the business.
To know which channel worked, add UTM tags (small labels on the end of a link, like ?utm_source=linkedin) to links in your own posts, and use a plain link where tracking links aren't allowed, like Product Hunt.
Use Claude Code to prep and draft
Claude Code is useful in the week before and during the replies. Keep one rule: it drafts, you send.
Before launch, write a one-page product brief (what it is, who it's for, what it costs, what's coming) and ask Claude Code to draft your assets from it: the waitlist email, a Product Hunt tagline of 60 characters or fewer and a description of 500 or fewer, a first comment, one post per channel, and the FAQ. Ask for three options of each and pick. If you'll do this again, save the instructions as a skill (see Skills are the new SOPs).
During launch, paste the questions and comments you need to answer into a file and have Claude draft replies in one go:
claude -p "Read launch/brief.md and launch/inbox.md. For each comment in the inbox, draft a short, warm, specific reply in my voice. Only state facts that appear in the brief. If you don't know an answer, write [ASK ME]. Output markdown, one reply per comment." > launch/replies.md
claude -p runs Claude Code once without the interactive screen and prints the answer, so here it lands in launch/replies.md. Read every reply, change what doesn't sound like you, and post it yourself. Don't let an agent post, upvote or send DMs for you: it breaks the platforms' rules and it reads as fake, because it is.
The launch checklist
The week before
- Waitlist email written and tested
- Product Hunt draft complete: tagline, description, thumbnail, 2+ gallery images, first comment, co-makers added
- One post written per channel
- FAQ and reply starting points ready
- Signup and payment tested on a phone
- UTM links made for your own posts
- Refund policy written, if taking money
Launch day
- Waitlist email sent first
- Product Hunt live and first comment posted
- Own-channel posts published
- Community posts published, following each one's rules
- Replies checked every hour you're awake
Hours 24 and 48
- Four numbers written down
- Every comment, email and DM answered
- Bugs fixed and reporters told
- Thank-you note to your waitlist with what you learned
Sources
- Product Hunt Launch Guide: preparing for launch (Product Hunt)
- Product Hunt Launch Guide: FAQs (Product Hunt)
- Show HN guidelines (Hacker News)
- Run Claude Code programmatically (Claude Code docs)
- Extend Claude with skills (Claude Code docs)