The Complete Product Launch Checklist

A failed product launch rarely comes from building the wrong thing. It comes from the right thing shipping while everyone else is out of position: sales unaware, marketing three days late, and support fielding questions without documentation.

The feature shipped on Friday. Jira tickets closed. Engineering moved on. Monday morning, sales gets a customer question about the new feature and has no idea it exists. Marketing’s email goes out on Wednesday, announcing something customers already found on their own. Support has been improvising answers all weekend.

Product launches involve multiple teams working independently on overlapping timelines. When coordination fails, launches feel chaotic even when the product itself is solid.

This checklist covers the cross-functional coordination required for successful product launches, organized by phase and function so nothing falls through the cracks.

Why product launches go wrong

Failed launches are rarely caused by a single catastrophic mistake. They come from accumulated small oversights across teams that are each doing their jobs but not coordinating effectively.

The information silo problem

Each team has its own tools and communication channels. Engineering tracks work in Jira. Marketing plans campaigns in Asana or monday.com, and even connecting monday.com to Jira only solves part of the problem. Sales manages their pipeline in Salesforce. These systems do not naturally share information, so teams operate with different views of what is happening and when.

When the engineering timeline shifts, marketing may not find out until their scheduled launch date passes. When marketing’s messaging changes, sales may still be using old talking points. Information silos create coordination failures even when everyone has good intentions.

The “it’s someone else’s job” problem

Launch coordination falls into gaps between team responsibilities. Engineering’s job is to build and deploy. Marketing’s job is to build attention. The sales team’s job is to sell. Nobody’s explicit job is to ensure these activities happen in the right sequence with the right information. The PM often becomes the implicit coordinator, but without a clear process, things slip.

The timing mismatch problem

Different teams work on different timelines. Engineering commits to sprints. Marketing plans campaigns weeks in advance. Sales forecasts quarterly. A launch date that makes sense for engineering may not align with marketing’s campaign calendar or sales’s quarterly push.

When these timelines are not reconciled early, teams scramble to adapt. Marketing compresses their preparation. Sales gets last-minute updates. Support writes documentation the day before launch. Rush creates errors.

The product launch checklist framework

Rather than a single flat checklist, organize launch preparation into phases. Each phase has its own timing and stakeholders. Completing each phase creates a checkpoint before moving to the next.

Phase one (four to six weeks before launch)

Planning establishes who does what and when. This phase happens before serious launch preparation begins.

Define launch scope and type

Not every release needs the same level of launch. Define the launch tier:

• Tier One (Major): New product, significant new capability, or strategic repositioning. Requires full cross-functional coordination, press, and customer communication.
• Tier Two (Moderate): Meaningful new feature or significant improvement. Requires marketing announcement, sales enablement, and support documentation.
• Tier Three (Minor): Small enhancement or bug fix. Requires release notes and support awareness, minimal marketing.

The tier determines which checklist items apply and how much lead time each team needs.

Establish launch date and dependencies

Confirm the target launch date with engineering. Identify what must be true for that date to hold: feature complete, QA passed, staging validated, performance acceptable. If any dependencies are at risk, adjust the timeline now rather than scrambling later.

Assign launch roles

Who is responsible for each function? Explicit assignments prevent the “I thought you were handling that” problem.

• Launch lead (usually PM): Overall coordination, decision-making, escalation
• Engineering lead: Technical deployment, monitoring, rollback if needed
• Marketing lead: Messaging, campaign execution, content creation
• Sales enablement lead: Training, collateral, objection handling
• Support lead: Documentation, team training, escalation procedures
• Customer success lead (if applicable): High-touch customer communication, early access coordination

Create launch communication channels

Set up a dedicated channel (Slack, Teams) for launch coordination. All launch-related updates flow through this channel. This prevents information from scattering across email threads, DMs, and meeting notes.

Draft the launch brief

Create a single document that captures:

• What is launching (feature description, screenshots, demo)
• Why it matters (customer problems solved, strategic value)
• Who it’s for (target users, use cases)
• When it’s launching (date, time, timezone)
• How teams should prepare (links to detailed plans by function)

This brief becomes the source of truth that all teams reference.

Phase two (two to four weeks before launch)

Each team executes its preparation based on the launch brief. The launch lead coordinates but doesn’t do everything personally.

Engineering preparation

Feature code complete and merged

QA testing complete with sign-off

Performance testing complete (if applicable)

Deployment plan documented

Rollback plan documented

Monitoring and alerting configured

Feature flag strategy confirmed (if using)

Database migrations tested (if applicable)

Marketing preparation

Messaging finalized and approved

Launch blog post drafted and reviewed

Email campaign created and scheduled

Social media content prepared

Website updates ready to publish

Press release drafted (Tier One only)

Customer case study or testimonial lined up (if available)

Internal announcement for company-wide awareness

Sales preparation

Sales talking points documented

Demo environment updated with new feature

Objection handling guide created

Pricing impact documented (if any)

Competitive positioning updated

Target account list for proactive outreach

Sales team training scheduled

Support preparation

Knowledge base articles drafted

Internal support documentation updated

Support team briefed on new feature

Escalation path for new-feature issues defined

FAQ prepared based on anticipated questions

Macros or templates updated for common responses

Customer success preparation (if applicable)

High-touch customers identified for early access or heads-up

Customer communication drafted

Onboarding materials updated

Success metrics defined for new feature adoption

Phase three (one week before launch)

Validation ensures everything is ready before committing to the launch date.

Technical validation

Staging environment demo confirms feature works as expected

PM sign-off on feature completeness and quality

No critical bugs open against launch items

Deployment dry run completed (for complex deployments)

Content validation

All marketing content reviewed for accuracy against final feature

Screenshots and demos reflect actual functionality

Sales materials reviewed by PM for accuracy

Support documentation reviewed for completeness

Coordination validation

All teams confirmed ready for launch date

Launch sequence documented (who does what, in what order)

Rollback triggers defined (what would cause us to delay)

Post-launch monitoring plan confirmed

Go/No-Go decision

One week before launch, hold a go/no-go meeting. All functional leads attend. Review readiness against checklist. Make an explicit decision to proceed, delay, or scope-down. Document the decision and communicate to all stakeholders.

Phase four (launch day)

Launch day should be execution, not preparation. If you are scrambling to prepare materials on launch day, something went wrong earlier.

Pre-launch (morning of)

Final confirmation that deployment is ready

All content staged and ready to publish

Communication channels monitored

All hands on deck for their assigned tasks

Deployment

Feature deployed to production

Smoke testing confirms the feature works in production

Monitoring confirms no errors or performance issues

Feature flag enabled (if using)

Announcement sequence

Execute the announcement sequence in order. Typical sequence:

1. Internal announcement (all-hands email or Slack)
2. Support documentation published
3. In-app announcement or changelog updated
4. Customer email sent (if applicable)
5. Blog post published
6. Social media posts
7. Sales team notified to begin outreach

Monitoring

Engineering monitors for technical issues

Support monitors for customer confusion or complaints

Marketing monitors for social engagement and questions

PM monitors for unexpected behavior or edge cases

Phase five (one week after launch)

Post-launch review captures what went well and what to improve for next time.

Metrics review

Adoption metrics: How many users have used the new feature?

Performance metrics: Any degradation in system performance?

Support metrics: Increase in related tickets?

Marketing metrics: Email open rates, blog traffic, social engagement?

Retrospective

Hold a brief retrospective with functional leads:

• What went well? What should we repeat?
• What went poorly? What should we improve?
• What did we learn that affects future launches?

Document the retrospective findings and update the launch checklist template.

Cleanup

Archive launch materials to shared location

Update product documentation with final feature details

Close launch-related Jira tickets and tasks

Send thank-you to contributing teams

Keeping launch activities coordinated

The checklist provides structure, but coordination requires ongoing communication.

Single source of truth for launch status

Everyone involved needs to see the same launch status. This might be a shared project, a dedicated Jira epic, or a dashboard that aggregates status from multiple tools.

If marketing tracks their tasks in Asana while engineering tracks theirs in Jira, someone needs to consolidate the view. Integration platforms can sync launch tasks across tools, creating visibility without requiring everyone to work in the same system.

Launch stand-ups

For Tier One and Tier Two launches, hold brief daily stand-ups during the week before launch. Ten minutes, all functional leads. Three questions: What did you complete? What are you working on? What is blocking you?

These stand-ups catch coordination issues before they become launch-day surprises.

Escalation paths

Define how to escalate if something goes wrong. Who has authority to delay the launch? Who decides whether an issue is launch-blocking? What is the communication plan if launch is delayed?

Having these decisions made in advance prevents chaos when problems emerge.

Adapting the checklist to your team

No checklist works perfectly for every team. Adapt based on your context.

Adjust by launch tier

Tier Three launches do not need four-week preparation. Scale the checklist to match the launch significance. A minor bug fix might need only release notes and support awareness. A major product launch might need everything on this list and more.

Adjust by team size

Small teams may have one person covering multiple roles. The checklist items still apply, but one person may execute several. Large teams may need additional coordination layers and more explicit handoffs.

Adjust by launch cadence

Teams that ship weekly need lighter-weight coordination than teams that ship quarterly. Frequent launches justify investing in automation and templates that reduce per-launch effort.

Capture what you learn

After each launch, update the checklist based on what you learned. If you always forget something specific, add it. If a checklist item never applies, remove it. The checklist should evolve with your team’s experience.

Making product launches repeatable

A successful launch is not the goal. Repeatable successful launches are the goal. That requires a process that scales and improves.

Invest in templates, automation, and coordination tools that reduce per-launch effort. Document what works. Train new team members on the launch process. Treat launch coordination as a capability to build, not a burden to survive.

When launches are repeatable, teams spend less energy on coordination and more on making the product great. Customers experience consistent, well-communicated releases. Stakeholders trust that launch dates are meaningful. And nobody finds out about a new feature from a customer complaint on Monday morning.

If you are ready to coordinate product launches across your tools, see how Unito helps product and engineering teams stay aligned.

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