You’ve spent weeks getting ready for your launch.
The emails are written. The sales page is polished. You’ve put together a webinar you’re actually excited about.
And now you’re crossing your fingers… hoping enough people buy to make all that work worth it.
Sound familiar?
Maybe your last launch blew past your goal, and the one before it barely covered your costs. Or you invested in a funnel that was supposed to bring in consistent sales, and it just… didn’t.
And the most frustrating part?
You’re not really sure WHY one launch worked and the other one didn’t.
Launching takes a huge amount of time, energy and effort. Of course you want to know that all that hard work is going to pay off.
So imagine going into your next launch knowing it’s going to hit your revenue goal (or exceed it).
You’d have consistent revenue and income instead of it going up and down all the time. So you could actually plan, hire and scale.
You’d have more confidence in your business AND your offer. Because that’s what happens when you can consistently sell.
And you’d have more time for other parts of your business, because you wouldn’t have to reinvent the wheel every launch. You’d have a repeatable system that works.
In this post, I’m going to walk you through the 3 steps I use with my clients to find what’s holding their launches back, fix it, and build a launch they can repeat.
Let’s break it down.
Step 1: Check your data to see where you’re losing sales
When a launch doesn’t hit its goal, it’s tempting to start changing things straight away.
Rewrite the sales page. Redo the webinar. Add more emails. Try a whole new launch strategy.
But here’s the thing…
It’s hard to know what to fix if you don’t know where the problem is.
You could spend weeks rewriting your sales page when hardly anyone is clicking through to it.
Or pour money into getting more leads when you’ve already got plenty of people in your funnel… they’re just not buying.
So when I start working with a client, I normally start with their data.
Conversion rates. Email open rates. Click-through rates. Webinar watch rates. Everything they have.
Then I work backwards to see where the numbers are too low. That’s where the leaks are, and that’s our starting point.
What should you be looking at?
It depends on how your launch is set up, but this is what I look at first:
- Landing page conversion rate: How many people who visit your opt-in page actually sign up?
- Email open rates: How many people are opening your launch emails?
- Email click-through rates: How many are clicking the links?
- Webinar registration and show-up rates: How many people register, and how many actually turn up?
- Webinar watch rate: Are people sticking around long enough to hear your offer?
- Sales page conversion rate: How many people who land on your sales page buy?
These numbers show you where people are dropping off.
Say you’ve got loads of people signing up for your webinar, but very few are showing up.
That’s a completely different problem to lots of people watching your webinar, clicking through to your sales page… and then leaving without buying.
Both end in disappointing sales. But they point to very different places to look.
You don’t need to fix everything in your funnel. You need to find the changes that will make the biggest difference.
How I do this inside Designed To Scale
This is where we start.
After 1000+ funnel reviews, I can normally see pretty quickly where the gaps are. So I look at the data you already have and find the biggest gaps between what we’d like to see happening and what’s actually happening.
Sometimes those gaps are obvious. Sometimes we need to look a little closer.
Either way, instead of making random changes and hoping they work, we’ve got a starting point based on what your numbers are actually telling us.
But knowing where people are dropping off doesn’t tell you why.
That’s Step 2.
Step 2: Pinpoint What’s Actually Causing the Problem
Once we know where the leak is, it’s much easier to pinpoint the problem.
Let’s say your sales page conversion rate is low.
Your first instinct is probably to rewrite the sales page. Right?
But a low sales page conversion rate doesn’t always mean the copy is the problem. (And yes, I’m an ex-copywriter telling you that.)
Sometimes it’s something a bit more subtle.
This is one of the biggest mistakes I see. Coaches spot a number they don’t like, assume they know what’s causing it, and start changing things.
But a low conversion rate is a symptom. It doesn’t tell you what’s causing it.
Your sales page might be really well written. But if the people landing on it aren’t the right people for your offer, even great copy isn’t going to get them to do anything.
So I use the data to work out where the problem could be. Then I use my experience as a messaging and offer strategist to look at 3 things.
1. Your messaging: Are the words you’re using actually speaking to the people you want to buy?
Do they recognise themselves in what you’re saying?
Can they see that you solve a problem they actually want solved?
Do they understand why your offer is relevant to them, and why now?
Sometimes a small shift in how you talk about your offer makes a big difference.
For example, maybe most of your sales page is using a lot of industry-related jargon. But your ideal clients don’t understand or resonate with that language.
Nothing you’re saying is wrong. It’s just not saying it in the right way for your audience.
2. Your offer: Is it clear, easy to understand and positioned to solve a problem your ideal client has?
Even great copy can’t sell an offer people don’t understand (at least not consistently anyway).
So I want to know:
- Is the result of your offer clear and easy to understand (in 3 seconds or less)?
- Is it immediately clear who it’s for?
- Does it solve a problem your ideal clients are willing to pay good money for (without needing to jump on a call to “clarify a few things”)?
- Can they see how it’s different (and better) than the other options they’re comparing?
Sometimes your audience does want what you’re selling. The way it’s packaged or positioned just makes it harder for them to see why it’s right for them.
That doesn’t mean you need a brand new offer. It might mean changing how you describe the outcome, getting clearer on who it’s for, or shifting what you put the emphasis on.
3. Your customer journey: Does everything leading up to your offer make sense?
This is the one that’s easy to miss.
Are you attracting people who are likely to want what you’re selling?
Does your free content or lead magnet naturally lead people towards your paid offer, or is there a disconnect?
Say your lead magnet is bringing in loads of new subscribers. Sounds great.
But what if it’s on a topic that’s only loosely connected to your paid offer?
Or (the sneakier one), it’s TOO closely related. You’re giving away so much for free that they don’t have a reason to pay for your offer anymore.
You end up with a growing email list full of people who love your free stuff… and have very little interest in buying.
The same thing can happen with your social content, your webinars and your email sequences. If what attracts people to you doesn’t match what you’re asking them to buy, your conversions will suffer.
That’s why I look at the whole journey, not just the sales page.
How I help clients get to the root of the problem
The data gives us clues. Then we use those clues alongside a proper look at your messaging, offer and customer journey to find what’s really going on.
Inside Designed To Scale, we work through this together.
Rather than assuming you need to rewrite everything or rebuild your whole funnel, we look for the changes most likely to move your numbers.
Sometimes that’s a messaging tweak.
Sometimes it’s how your offer is positioned.
And sometimes it’s making sure the content leading up to your offer is attracting (and preparing) the right people to buy.
Step 3: Adjust and Test
Once you’ve pinpointed the problem and decided what to change, the best bet is to change it and then TEST it (as much as you can).
Testing is the only real way to know whether your audience will respond to the changes you’ve made.
Because nobody is a mind reader. And nobody (me included) can tell you with 100% certainty what your audience will respond to. Only your audience can do that.
You probably don’t have to change everything
The great thing is you probably don’t have to change everything in your launch.
I’ve helped people go from a 1% conversion rate to 15% just by changing the headline on their sales page.
One headline.
Now, don’t get me wrong. Not every headline change is going to do that.
But imagine spending weeks rewriting your entire sales page when the headline was the thing holding people back.
Sometimes a bigger change is needed. You might need to restructure your webinar, reposition your offer or rethink the journey people take before they ever see your sales page.
Just make sure you’re making those decisions based on what you’ve learned, not changing things for the sake of it.
Change one thing at a time
I also recommend you don’t change everything at once.
Because then it’s very hard to know what actually helped and what didn’t.
Say you rewrite your sales page, change your webinar, update your emails and add new bonuses. You launch again and your sales go up.
Amazing! But what made the difference?
The webinar? The sales page? The bonuses?
You don’t know. And if you don’t know what worked, it’s a lot harder to do it again.
So wherever you can, make one meaningful change at a time and measure what happens.
Small improvements add up
You don’t have to fix every part of your funnel in one go.
Start with the biggest opportunity. Make a change. Test what happens. Then move on to the next one.
More people sign up for your webinar.
Then more of them show up.
Then more of them click through to your sales page.
Then more of them buy.
Each improvement means more of the people already in your funnel take the next step. Which means more sales from the leads you already have, without needing to constantly find more leads or spend more on ads.
How we do this inside Designed To Scale
I don’t make a massive list of everything that could be improved and expect you to tackle it all at once.
I find the biggest opportunities, priortize the ones that will make the biggest difference to your conversions and revenue and then support you to implement them one by one.
Refine. Test. Repeat.
Every round of improvements gives you a clearer picture of what works for YOUR audience.
And that’s what makes your launches predictable. Not because every launch will make exactly the same revenue. But because you’ve got someone helping you look at your data with clear eyes, make strategic decisions, follow through without spiralling and improve every step of the way.
“But What If I Don’t Have Enough Data?”
You might be reading this and thinking:
This all sounds great, but I haven’t really been tracking my numbers. Can I still do this?
Absolutely.
You don’t need perfect data or an expensive tracking system to start identifying opportunities for improvement.
Most email marketing platforms already give you useful information, including email open rates and click-through rates.
And most website and course platforms will show you how many people visit your pages.
If you know how many people visited a page and how many completed the action you wanted them to take, you can calculate your conversion rate.
For example, if 500 people visited your webinar registration page and 150 signed up, your conversion rate would be:
(150 ÷ 500) × 100 = 30%
That’s a useful starting point.
You can use the same calculation to work out what percentage of your sales page visitors purchased your offer.
And while email open rates aren’t always completely accurate, they can still be one piece of the picture when considered alongside clicks and other engagement data.
The key is to start working with the information you have rather than waiting until you have perfect data.
“How Do I Test If I Don’t Have Enough Traffic, or I Only Launch Every 3 Months?”
This one comes up a lot.
If you only launch a few times a year, it can feel like you don’t get enough chances to test anything.
But there’s still loads you can learn between launches.
You can:
- Test your email subject lines to see which ones get more people opening (and clicking).
- Try different hooks and angles on social media to see which messages your audience actually responds to.
- Sell smaller offers, like workshops, to test different topics, bonuses or ways of positioning your offer before your next big launch.
These smaller tests won’t tell you exactly how your next launch is going to go. But they’ll give you some really useful clues about what your audience cares about.
Then, when your bigger launch comes around, make the most important change your priority.
So if your webinar is the biggest opportunity, focus on restructuring that for your next launch.
Just make sure you keep track of when you made the change, and how many people went through the new webinar vs the old one.
That way you can actually compare the results… and keep learning from every launch.
More Profitable, Predictable Launches Start With Finding the Leaks
If you’ve been putting a huge amount of time, energy and effort into your launches without seeing consistent results, the answer isn’t to work harder.
And it’s definitely not to change your entire marketing strategy (because that could be months of work).
The truth is, the biggest opportunities are often already sitting inside the funnel you have.
You just need to know where to look.
So remember the 3 steps:
- Look at your data to find where people are dropping off.
- Pinpoint the real problem by looking at your messaging, your offer and your customer journey.
- Adjust and test, one meaningful change at a time.
When you follow these steps, you stop guessing.
You know what’s driving your sales, where your biggest opportunities are and how to keep improving.
And that means more consistent revenue you can actually plan around. More confidence in your offer. And more time back, because you’re not reinventing the wheel every single launch.
Want Help Finding (and Fixing) the Leaks in Your Launch?
If you’ve just finished another launch that didn’t hit your goal, and you’re not sure why, you don’t need to start again.
You need to know what’s working, what’s not, and where to focus first.
That’s exactly what I help you do inside Designed To Scale, my private consulting program.
I’ll look at your data and help you figure out where your biggest opportunities are. Then we’ll look at your messaging, offer and customer journey to find what’s holding your conversions back.
And then we work through the changes one by one. Testing, improving and increasing your conversions as we go (without dumping a huge to-do list on your desk).
Ready to find out what’s holding your launches back?
