Jeff Walker Launch Book Review
If you want to start a business online and products, then you need more than just a blind hope and prayer that you’re going to succeed. You need a strategy.
I am always looking for better ways to make money online. One product that many marketers talk about is a book called launch by Jeff Walker. I read this book in December, and in this article will give a review of it and some of the key points that are made in the book.
Jeff Walker Launch Book Review.
Let’s talk about the parts I found annoying first. The book is quite good and Jeff Walker seems to be okay as make money online writers go, but there are some annoying quirks that I think you should know about if you intend buy this book.
Firstly, the book starts with testimonials and then various case studies about the efficacy of the product. This is quite common among marketing books, and it is very irritating. I have already bought the book, I don’t need to be sold on it further. That’s how I think of it at least.
Secondly, Jeff Walker understands and espouses the value of using storytelling to get a point across and sell your product. Whilst this is good advice, he also does it throughout the book; instead of just getting to the point and telling the reader what to do, he will talk about some former customer of his and get the point across that way. This is long winded.
If you can bear those two things, then the book is quite a few good points. Let’s talk about those.
Firstly, despite some of the stories and case studies which were longwinded, the book itself isn’t too bad. It’s under 200 pages so you should be able to read it in a couple of hours. If you’re a note-taker you can condense the material into a cheat-sheet for yourself pretty easily as everything is well explained and quite simple.
Let’s look at some of the lessons in detail:
- Every product launch is broken down into a four-step sequence. The pre-pre-launch, the pre-launch, the launch and the post-launch period.
- There’s a big focus on storytelling – especially your story and case studies in the pre-launch section.
- List building is possibly the most important thing in the whole process.
- You should split your lists in two: buyers and prospects. Buyers are worth more.
- You should A/B test your squeeze page. (I recommend split-testing everything, but you know that.)
- If you’re particularly diligent, you can work out the value of each visitor, subscriber and buyer. This is a good set of values to know as you can see where the drop off is and target increasing the value of each.
Use “Sideways Sales Letters.”
Essentially, these are long-form sales letters broken down into multiple steps in a subscriber sequence. For instance, you might use an email autoresponder and write a single long form video sales letter which you break down into several videos:
- Introducing yourself and your problem
- How you overcame the problem
- What’s missing from the market
- How a secret thing made you break down the problem and solve it
- A few tips people can try for FREE to alleviate the problem
- Pivot towards introducing a premium solution that solves all their problems
Another thing I found particularly interesting is the idea of a pre-pre-launch.
The Pre-Pre-Launch: Using Your List To Make Your Business
The pre-pre-launch is an interesting concept. Whenever I’ve started a business, I’ve sat and planned it all out and researched the needs and processes I’d have to address to give something of value to the target market.
Jeff Walker’s process of the pre-pre-launch kind of skips that. He’ll create a freebie and use that as a lead magnet to get a list of interested customers for a target market. Then he’ll add in surveys and questions as part of his initial email sequence to ascertain what it is his target market wants. Then he’ll create the product based on that information. It’s quite clever, and I’ve ever thought of doing that. I’ll try it out at some point though to see how reliable it is.
Other Stuff & Final Thoughts
Jeff Walker’s Launch is a good book that’s filled with nuggets of information. I’ve only really scratched the surface in this article. I’ve tried to pick elements that are new to this site, but there’s also stuff about creating scarcity, building authority and all kinds of other goodies.
If you’ve been copywriting for a while or involved in internet business, you’ll find that this book is a very easy read. It’s pitched at people who are new to the whole make money online idea, so it goes through the real basics (like why you need an email list) and a lot of other basic information.
That said, the system itself is useful and it’s easy to follow. If you launch online products, then it will contain information that’ll make you more money.
For $10, it’s easily worth the purchase. You can get it from Amazon here.