You’ve been working on your website but you need to know how to plan a successful website launch for your Showit site. Obviously you want to make a big splash about it, and we want to help you do that!

If you are one of our amazing Type A friends who like to have a plan for everything under the sun, and you haven’t actually started your Showit site yet, then this website checklist is for you! You can also watch this great webinar we did with Jeff, from the Showit team. He walks you through launching your site in about a day!

Create a timeline from the date you want to launch and work backwards.

Some people like to launch their sites on their birthday, or their business’ birthday, or on a plain ol' Tuesday. None of those dates actually matter to anyone else but you. But pick the date you want to launch because that sets up an automatic deadline for you, and helps you to create a timeline. 

Two simple things you need in order to launch are a DOMAIN NAME (yourcompany.com or something like that) and a Showit subscription. If you have a website and blog with a different host, we cannot begin the migration process until you are paying for your hosting with Showit. 

Once you have your launch date set, you want to consider some of Showit’s timelines:

• To launch a Showit Site with no blog: Self-connected by user via DNS* (can take up to 24 hours for DNS changes to propagate). If you have no idea what a DNS is, don’t worry about it! This article will help you.
• Launch Showit Site + New Blog Setup (no migration): 1 – 3 Business Days
• Launch Showit Site + Blog Migration** : 2 – 4 Business Days
• Domain Name Change: 2 – 5 Business Days depending on if you have a blog or not

If you are a designer submitting your clients’ website to go live, then check out this great article to make sure you are following the right steps.

How to avoid website launch delays.

Wrong information is the #1 reason for launch delays. Always double-check your domain registrar login details by actually logging in to that account. It is best that your website be live and up and running BEFORE you announce your launch. We understand you want a dramatic entrance for your website, but it’s better to have everything up and running properly and to fix up any errors before you announce it to the world. 

Have 2-3 friends check out your website for your soft-launch. Have them click all the buttons! Have them check it out on mobile and desktop. On Androids and Apple phones. On tablets. On Chrome and Safari. The whole shabang. Showit sites are all optimized for desktop and mobile and are visible on all website browsers. But if you have forgotten to move a certain element that was only meant for your desktop site off of your mobile view, you want to catch that before the masses see it! This is a big step that people overlook in how to plan a successful website.

Create a Coming Soon page.

You can create a custom coming soon page. Or simply purchase one in our design market! This is another great tool to help you while you are getting ready to launch your site. You can have your site be live, and still capture people’s emails, and let them fill out your contact form, while you are working on your site behind the scenes. 

This template is available in the Showit Design Market 

Create hype!

This piece is a fun one and can be as crazy as you want it to be. Some people like to tell their audience that a fun surprise is coming soon. And then they do a countdown. Just make sure your site is already live and ready before the date that you have chosen as your announcement date. 

We often get customers coming into our emergency queue that are angry that their site isn’t ready to launch the second that they want it to. If you have a blog that needs to be migrated, that takes time. If your DNS isn’t connected, or the wrong information was provided, that will slow down/halt our ability to help you launch your site! 

Showit is here for YOU!

At Showit, we are nerds so you don’t have to be!

We want your site to be live and bring in all the clients you want. So at any point that you need help, we are ready to jump in! If you are ready to launch right now, let us know! 

We want to celebrate your launch with you as well. You can fill out this form and we will celebrate your launched site with you! We won’t be able to accommodate posting about your site the day you are launching, but tag us in stories and we will try our best to share that! 

Don’t forget that launched is always better than perfect. So don’t be intimidated by the PUBLISH button. Consider that as your portal to booking your dream clients, not as an opening for people to come and judge you and the things you didn’t add to your website. Your Showit site will grow with you, so release it into the wild, and keep pruning it and adding to it as you see fit. 

We hope this has helped you to plan a successful website launch, and we cannot wait to see what you create, friend!

We are here cheering you on!

*What is DNS: The Domain Name System (DNS) is the phonebook of the Internet. Humans access information online through domain names, like nytimes.com or espn.com. Web browsers interact through Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. DNS translates domain names to IP addresses so browsers can load Internet resources. Thanks, Cloudflare for this simplified explanation!

**To learn more about blog migration, check out this handy article