Why you keep pushing your launch back, and how to stop doing that

Today I'm talking about why you keep pushing your launches back and how to stop procrastinating them, how to stop pushing them back so that you can finally launch.

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How to stop procrastinating your launch

When I talk about pushing your launches back, I am guilty of this as well. When I first launched Launch Magic in November 2020, that was about 12 months of intending to launch it, intending to launch it. And I kept procrastinating it. I couldn't figure out why.

I knew I wanted to launch this thing. I knew I could help people with it, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it, so I can relate to this feeling of just constantly procrastinating. And what I've learned from observing my students and from my own launches is there are a couple of key reasons why we tend to push our launches back.

 

#1. Waiting for clarity

Everyone is waiting for that magical moment where the light bulb illuminates and suddenly they have clarity on what they're creating and what they're launching. But it doesn't happen like this, the clarity doesn't just suddenly turn up.

It might feel like more researching, waiting, thinking, and planning will give you more clarity. But in my experience, these things only create more confusion. And this is one of the big ways that I delayed that Launch Magic launch from November, 2019 through to November, 2020. You know, what does create clarity though? It's action.

I think about when Archie, my little puppy and I went on a van trip around Australia back in 2021. I was so excited about this trip, and I tried planning exactly where we would go day by day. But what happened was that once I actually started driving, I realized just how much I didn't know. I didn't realize that I didn't have to book a campsite a week in advance. I could book them that morning to stay in that night. I didn't realize how long it would take for me to see all of the things I wanted to see while driving between each stop each night.

I didn't realize how big Australia is and how far apart things are. And I'd planned everything down to the tiny details. But on about day four or day five, one of the states that we were going to drive through, Victoria, went into lockdown and I had to completely change my plans so that we would drive around it instead of through it. And that wiped my plans completely. From there, I just took it day by day and actually had so much more fun. There were places where I stayed, I thought, let's stay two nights here instead of just one. And that's where the clarity comes when you figure things out as you go along. Yes, you might make some mistakes in your launch, but each mistake is a lesson that helps you to create more clarity and brings you closer to your goal.

So, if you are waiting for that moment of clarity before you launch, this is me telling you that it won't happen. And it's me giving you permission to start taking action instead.

 

#2. The belief that you're not ready

The next thing that is keeping you pushing your lunch back is the belief that you are not ready, maybe you think you're not qualified. You don't know enough. All of those beliefs that come up, the imposter syndrome. Here's a question for you. When will you be ready? You're never going to feel completely ready to do anything. That is a growth thing. Planning then becomes procrastination because procrastination feels comfortable, whereas doing this thing that we're not ready for feels uncomfortable.

Procrastination planning becomes a substitute for taking action. We do it because it feels safe. It doesn't require the discomfort of change. Waiting to feel ready to launch is a little bit like waiting to get your driver's license before you start learning how to drive. You're never going to feel like you know everything, you're going to learn it as you go.

 

#3. The belief that you have to finish creating your digital product before you can launch it

 

Maybe you're waiting for the perfect idea to strike, or you've already started working on your product and you're waiting for it to be 100% perfect.

Either way, this is a stalling tactic. This is your brain keeping you safe. It's not about having the perfect idea or the perfect product. It's about creating something and launching it or launching it and then creating it, and then refining it, relaunching it and improving it as you go. Because a product that is 70% perfect, but available for people to buy has a bigger impact than a product that is 99% perfect, but you haven't sold it to anybody because it's just not quite perfect enough yet.

When I think back to the first time I launched Launch Magic, I sold it before I'd even created the first lesson. I had outlined the slides and I'd outlined what I wanted to teach each week. But I taught it weekly as I went. So when the second time came around, I knew exactly which changes I needed to make. And even though it wasn't perfect that first time round, it helped a lot of people to launch.

And then the second time that I launched it, it helped even more people. And only this third time that I launched Launch Magic did I actually pre-record the lessons.

 

#4. You aren't making it a priority

The time to create it isn't going to magically show up. You have to make the time for it.

I know that it seems easier to wait for the right time, to wait until you have space in your calendar in March or November or whenever. But the reality is you're going to be just as busy in March or November. And until you prioritize it, you're never going to find the time for it. We find time for the things that we prioritize.

If you consistently aren't finding the time to launch it, then maybe it's not a priority and that's fine. If you want to keep running your business as is, there's no judgment that you don't have to launch a digital product just because everyone else is doing it. Just because that's something I'm teaching doesn't mean that it's the better way to run your business or anything like that.

But if you are not happy with the way things are in your business, then something needs to change.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” – Albert Einstein.

You can keep running your business as it is, but you can't expect things to change just by doing the exact same thing in your business over and over again. Excuses aren't going to change things.

Everyone has a lot on their plate. For example, one of my Launch Magic students, I think she has five or six children and she's looking after her kids as well as running a business. And she still managed to find the time to launch because she prioritized it. And that's not to say that you aren't busy. I get it. You are 100% busy.

But at some point, you have to take that ownership and be honest with yourself. Am I prioritizing this thing that I want to do, or am I coming up with other things to do? Because it's very easy to find other things that aren't priorities to fill our time. We can watch Netflix. We can scroll through Instagram. We can spend an hour writing an Instagram post because it feels like we're being productive.

But until we start prioritizing what we really want, we won't get that now. And yes, disclaimer, I don't have children and I know that I do have more time than most of you because of that. That has been to my advantage. But when I created my first online course, I was working three days a week in a job, where I was working with marketing clients as well. And I was traveling, so I was spending some of my time working with clients and I was spending time of my time exploring Europe. But what I did was I spent every weekend for months working on the course that I wanted to launch. Instead of going out with friends, instead of watching Netflix, instead of mindlessly scrolling through Instagram, I made it my priority and that's how it happened. That's a bit of tough love that you might need to hear.

 

#5. Your fear of failure

We all have this, but let me point out that not launching is failure. It says just as much of a failure as if you launch and nobody buys it. And at least if you launch it and nobody buys, you are one step closer to success.

Because you have something you can work with. It doesn't mean that people don't want it. It just means that maybe you need to tweak your messaging, maybe your launch content wasn't right. Maybe you didn't send enough emails during your launch. That's one of the biggest ones is I don't see people sending out enough cart open emails, and then they wonder why nobody bought.

And that's a huge reason why inside Launch Magic I teach you to send out a heck of a lot of cart open emails, and I tell you what to put in each one. The thing is when you are afraid of failure, you tend to act from fear. Which then leads you to subconsciously create the future you are afraid of.

I always like to think of a friend of mine who, whenever she's been in a relationship, she's so afraid of the person breaking up with her, that she does things like text them 24 7. And if they don't reply, she calls them 15 times because she's so afraid that they're going to break up with her. And that inadvertently pushes them away and leads to the result that she was afraid of them breaking up with her. You can't beat fear to the finish line. Worrying that your launch is going to fail is just giving energy to the thing that you don't want to happen.

You can choose to spend that energy worrying about your launch failing, or you can choose to put that energy into making your launch successful. You can adapt if it fails, you'll figure it out. I've had a few failed launches in the past too. And one of my failed launches, after a little bit of tweaking, ended up becoming a product that sold more than $US750,000 worth.

Think about if your launch were to fail, what is the worst thing that could happen? Probably not much. You've just put a bit of time into something. And now you can refine it and tweak it. I'm sure there are other things in your business that you've poured a lot of time and energy into that haven't had the results you wanted. So why is launching any different to that?

 

#6. You have no idea where to start

The thing is that action creates clarity. We've talked about this already. When you take action, you start to figure out what those next steps are. That part begins to reveal itself with each step that you take. You don't need to know all of the steps that you're going to take. You just need to know the first step. And that can sometimes be the hardest part. Like where do I start? And honestly, even just taking one small step, whatever that step is, it doesn't have to be the right first step, but even taking one small step is moving you closer. It's moving you in the right direction.

Join me for my free masterclass: Launching Simplified – How to profitably launch (or relaunch) your group program, online course or membership with ease.

 

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