Never launch on a Friday: When is the best day to launch a new website?
You might think Friday’s the perfect day to launch a website, right?
It’s like planning a big party for the weekend.
But hold on a second!
Imagine you’re opening a new restaurant.
You wouldn’t do it when all your staff is off, would you?
That’s kinda what happens when you launch a website on Friday.
Sure, launching your site feels awesome.
It’s like finally finishing that puzzle you’ve been working on for ages.
But here’s the thing – it’s just the start!
Weekends are when everyone’s online, scrolling, and clicking.
Sounds great, doesn’t it?
Well, if something goes wrong, your team won’t be around to fix it. Yikes!
It’s like inviting people to your new house before you’ve checked if the plumbing works. Not a good idea.
Don’t get me wrong, launching your site is a great milestone. Even we get excited every time we add a new page to our site.
But the work doesn’t end with the launch.
If anything, you might find more problems with your site after you launch and have people start to use it.
So, when should you launch?
Let’s talk about that and find the best day for your big website launch.
Trust me, it’ll make your life way easier!
Testing and debugging your new website
Feature testing is usually done after launching a website.
You can certainly do some pre-launch checks but some issues don’t really appear until you’ve launched your site.
This testing includes all aspects of the site, such as e-commerce functionality, page load speeds, mobile responsiveness, contact form operation, and email integration.
These are all important to make sure your site runs smoothly and provides a good user experience.
Imagine if you launched an e-commerce site on a Friday to get more people, but there was a bug with the checkout process.
Your team might be able to debug and fix it somehow, but you might already be losing a lot of sales from potential customers.
It’s best to do testing and debugging when there is less traffic on your site.
You’re less likely to be scrambling around to solve things that way.
Traffic is higher on the day you launch a website.
Weekends often see different web traffic patterns compared to weekdays.
Other than the increased traffic of people who are browsing casually, they can also be more critical if they encounter issues on your site on the weekend than on any other day.
Think about it: if you’re browsing a site on a busy workday, you might not bother to report any issues you see.
You’re too busy and tired to bother.
You might try again when you’re no longer busy.
Meanwhile, on weekends, you have all the time to send in reports and complaints.
You might think, “I waited all week to do this, and it isn’t even working properly.”
Launching a new online store on a Friday could mean that early weekend shoppers who encounter bugs will have an instantly negative perception of your brand.
They might not bother to come back and try again on another day.
You will need customer support on launch day
Users will always have issues with a site, especially if it is new and unfamiliar to them.
Unexpected issues can arise, no matter how well-prepared you are.
It is important to have customer support ready to assist your new customers in maintaining user satisfaction and site functionality.
However, launching on a Friday means that your team may not be fully available to address these issues over the weekend.
Unless you have 24/7 customer support, no one will be there to help with the high influx of customers on your site!
Your software engineer and internal team may not be available
Launching a website requires the immediate availability of your web development team to handle any issues that arise.
And, trust me, there are going to be a lot of issues.
Forms might stop working, links might lead to the wrong pages, videos and photos might not load, etc.
Everything can go wrong all at once, even if you prepare well.
This is why the internal team should be available to fix any reported issues.
However, team availability can be limited over the weekend.
Most internal teams only work Monday through Friday.
This can delay critical fixes and adjustments.
If you have a crucial feature break on a Saturday, your team will not be available to fix it until Monday.
Imagine the prolonged downtime with a massive influx of users.
Yikes.
Hosting support is limited if you launch on a Friday
Just like your company, many hosting companies also have their teams working on weekdays only.
Although they are still running on weekends, they might scale back their operations with fewer members of the team online.
This means that if you have any technical problems with your website’s host, they can take longer to resolve.
This reduction in support can leave your website vulnerable to extended downtime or unresolved issues, impacting your business and user experience.
Never launch when your external support is limited
Beyond hosting, other third-party services and tools you use might also have reduced support over the weekend.
This can include payment gateways, email services, and various integrations critical to your site’s functionality.
Imagine if you had a limited team running customer support, a high influx of complaints about specific third-party features, and limited support from all of these third-party services. That’s nightmare fuel right there!
When is the best day to launch your site?
Now that you know not to launch on a Friday, when is the ideal day of the week for you to launch your site?
It’s a good idea to go for a mid-week launch, such as on a Tuesday or Wednesday.
This allows enough time for post-launch testing and issue resolution before the weekend traffic comes.
This approach ensures that your team is fully available to handle any problems that arise and make necessary adjustments.
The Admin Bar, for example, recommends Tuesdays as your launch day.
You are not as busy as Mondays and you still have the start of the week energy levels to catch up on tasks.
Have a comprehensive launch checklist
Before launching, go through a detailed launch checklist.
Here are some of the things we often check before launch:
- See what your competitors are doing for their sites
- Pick a website host
- Purchase your domain name
- Prepare your logo design and brand guidelines
- Prepare your website pages
- Write a privacy policy
- Customize your 404 pages
- Proofread your content
- Test for broken links
- Optimize your photos
- Optimize on-page SEO
- Set up your navigation and site map
- Scan for accessibility
- Test for usability and user experience
- How is your website speed?
- Set up a live chat
If you have an e-commerce site or want to set up a newsletter, there are additional steps to add to this checklist to minimize the risk of post-launch issues.
Make sure to track your analytics when you launch a new site
Implement real-time monitoring tools and analytics to track site performance immediately after launch.
These tools can help you quickly identify and resolve any issues, ensuring that your site runs smoothly.
You can set up real-time monitoring tools like Google Analytics to track site performance after launch, so you can easily identify and resolve any problems.
Clear communication and contingency planning
There will always be issues, whether you are launching a new site or updating an existing one.
It’s important to stay ahead and maintain clear communication with your team to resolve any potential issues.
Have contingency plans in place and key team members on standby so everyone stays aligned on who to contact for emergency support.
Choosing the right day to launch a website
Launching a website is a critical step that requires careful planning and consideration. It’s the beginning of your website!
From both a design and development perspective, launching on a Friday is generally a bad idea due to reduced support availability, increased risks of unresolved issues, and a potential negative impact on the user experience.
By choosing a mid-week launch, conducting thorough pre-launch testing, and having contingency plans in place, you can ensure a smooth and successful website launch.
Are you planning on launching a new website?
Here are some guides we’ve made to help you:
➡️Building a website from scratch? 5 pages every website needs
➡️Top eCommerce website design tips for boosting traffic, engagement, and conversions
➡️Everything you need to learn about SEO for web design to create a high-ranking website
➡️Website image size guidelines: The best image sizes for your website
We also make web design so easy with Deer Designer!
Just send in a request and our dedicated designers will create the designs for you.
Key takeaways
- While it may seem like the goal is to end your week with a site launch on Friday, this can produce so many problems for your site and team.
- Testing and bug fixes are better done when there are fewer people and you are not scrambling around responding to multiple complaints.
- Other than higher site traffic on weekends, users are more likely to have complaints and take bugs as negative experiences.
- Your customer support, internal dev team, site host, and third-party services may have limited availability on weekends, so there may be a delay in fixing any technical issues that might arise.
- You’re better off with a launch on Tuesday or Wednesday when it is the middle of the week and everyone is available.
- Have a launch pre-launch checklist to limit the potential problems on your launch date.
- After launching your site, you will want to keep track of your analytics and have contingency plans in place to resolve any issues.
