Launching a New Product Is Like a Job Interview.

You only get one chance to make a first impression.

If you rush to the interview with your clothes a mess and arrive sweaty and stressed out, you won't get the job. The same thing is true with a new product.

If the product has quality problems, if the packaging design is sloppy, if the instructions are poorly written, it will make a poor impression on potential buyers in two ways. First, if it looks bad, few people will buy it. Second, if the quality is low and it's hard to figure out how to assemble or use, buyers will give it bad reviews.

There are many pressures to get onto the market quickly. Being first matters. Getting a return on investment is critical. But rushing to market is almost always a mistake. In today's world...

Bad reviews for a new product = product death.

We have delayed the roll out of our Kling KONG phone accessory by over a year specifically because of product quality issues. We learned after our first production run that a key part cracked after 1-3 months of use. Now, with design change, new materials, a new mold (and another $15,000 invested), we're ALMOST ready to launch.

For another product, we realized when writing user instructions that the instructions would be too complicated and would lead to high returns. So we've delayed the launch of that product and are now doing a massive redesign from the ground up.

So it goes. All typical in the world of inventing and product development.

*Thanks to Jim DeBetta for inspiring this post!

- Mike