Ask HN: What are the best dates in 2011 for a product launch | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What are the best dates in 2011 for a product launch

10 pointsdanshapiro3 comments

There are pros and cons to launching around a major event, but it's good to know the options available. Let's collect a list of key opportunities for product launches next year. Please supply the dates, the event that coincides with it, and the category of startup for which it's best suited. Here's a few to get things going:

CES: Jan 6-9 (Consumer electronics)

3GSM World Congress Barcelona: Feb 14-17 (Mobile)

Spring Demo: Feb 27 - March 1 (General)

CTIA Las Vegas: March 21-24 (Mobile)

I will post a summary of responses on my blog so you can subscribe if you'd like to see the results (http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/feed).

Three thoughts come to mind:

1. Launching at a big event means taking the risk of getting lost in the noise.

2. Launch when it's ready.

3. Really, when you talk about launching at a big event, aren't you really saying, "I want to launch at a time when I can maximize press?"

Also, agree with the point on target market. There's no point in launching a consumer web app at a mobile conference.

Finally, I might suggest launching at a non-tech conference. Let's say you were going to create a consumer web site for helping people make shopping decisions about a certain type of product. You could launch that at SXSW. Or, you could go to an industry conference for that type of product, and launch it there. I would venture to suggest that you'll more attention at the later (or is it latter?) event.

Doesn't this depend on your target market? The ideal launch date will be different for programmers, cardiologists, and bakers.

Depending on your marketing budget, the ideal 2011 launch dates could include Jan 1 — Dec 31, in monotonically decreasing order of goodness.

SXSW - March 12-21 (interactive March 11-15). Media focused with the music and film festivals taking place. Twitter and Foursquare both launched at 'South By'.

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