Launch Your Business
Built is not launched. Launched is when buyers find you.
Go live with your website, get found in search, send your first emails, and bring your first customers in — with purpose and momentum.
You built something real. Now the question is whether your buyer can find it when they search.
A business that is built but not launched is still invisible. Your buyer is already searching. This stage puts you in front of them.
Grace Irene
SEO Strategist. Indigenous entrepreneur. She knows what the moment feels like when a stranger outside your community finds you online for the first time.
Read Grace's Story →The Moment Your Business Becomes Real
There is a moment that every Indigenous entrepreneur remembers. It is not the moment they registered their business. It is not the moment they finished their website. It is the moment a stranger — someone outside their family, outside their community, someone they have never met — finds them online and buys.
"The moment your website goes live and a stranger finds you — that is when your business becomes real. That stranger did not know you existed yesterday. Today they trust you enough to pay you."
That moment happens because of the work you do in this stage. The SEO, the Google Business Profile, the email list, the content — none of it is complicated. All of it is cumulative. Every small action you take in the next thirty days builds the foundation for a buyer to find you six months from now.
Launch is not a single day. It is a habit of showing up consistently until your buyers can find you — and then showing up again after that.
Pre-Launch Checklist
Check every box before you go live. A broken launch is harder to recover from than a late one. Ask one person outside your family to test your site before you press publish.
- All pages load correctly on desktop and phone
- Every link on the site works — no broken links
- Contact form submits and sends to your email
- Payment process tested — complete a test purchase
- SSL certificate active — site shows https
- Site loads in under 3 seconds on mobile
- Images have alt text for accessibility and SEO
- Home page headline is clear and specific
- About page tells your story and community connection
- Services or products page shows clear prices
- At least one testimonial from your validation stage
- Land acknowledgement in the footer
- All social media links point to correct profiles
- Email sign-up form is working and connected
- Google Business Profile verified and complete
- Indigenous-owned attribute turned on in Google
- Page titles include your main keyword
- Meta descriptions written for key pages
- Sitemap submitted to Google Search Console
- Business listed in at least one Indigenous directory
- First blog post published and indexed
Seven Tasks to Get Found and Get Paid
Work through these seven tasks in order. Each one builds your visibility with a different group of buyers. Together they create a consistent flow of people finding your business.
Finalize and Test
Your website needs to work perfectly before you send anyone to it. One broken link or failed form loses a buyer forever.
- Test on your phone — if it does not work on mobile, fix it first
- Ask a stranger to visit and tell you what confuses them
- Complete your own purchase process start to finish
- Check every form submits and arrives in your email
Optimize Local Presence
Your Google Business Profile is the single most powerful free tool available to you. Complete it before anything else.
- Verify your Google Business Profile — go to business.google.com
- Add five or more photos of your workspace and products
- Turn on the Indigenous-owned attribute in Google
- Ask your first three customers to leave a Google review
Implement SEO Strategy
SEO is how buyers find you when they are already looking. These actions compound over time — start them on launch day.
- Use your main keyword in your home page heading
- Write meta descriptions for your home and services pages
- Submit your sitemap to Google Search Console
- Add alt text to every image on your website
Content Marketing Plan
Content is how buyers find you before they are ready to buy. One helpful piece of content per week builds authority faster than any ad.
- Choose your format — blog, video, podcast, or email
- Write your first blog post answering one real question
- Share your launch story — why you built this for your community
- Plan four pieces of content for your first month
Launch Email Campaign
Your email list is the only audience you own. A five-email welcome sequence turns a new subscriber into a buyer over ten days.
- Set up your welcome email — deliver your lead magnet
- Write your story email — share your community connection
- Write your offer email — clear ask with one button
- Set the sequence to send automatically
Leverage Social Media
Choose one platform and show up consistently. Share your launch, your story, and the cultural significance of your work.
- Publish your launch announcement post with your website link
- Share the story of why you built this for your community
- Post once per day for your first two weeks
- Reply to every comment and message in the first 48 hours
Monitor Analytics
Track three numbers only. Everything else is noise until you are consistently making sales.
- Weekly website visitors — are people finding you?
- Conversion rate — are visitors taking the main action?
- Email open rate — are subscribers reading your emails?
- Review weekly — adjust what is not growing
The Launch Blueprint Workbook
A 13-page workbook with checklists, templates, and step-by-step guidance for every launch task — from your pre-launch checklist to your five-email welcome sequence to your press pitch template.
- Pre-launch checklist — 21 boxes across three categories
- Website testing guide — four specific tests before going live
- Google Business Profile completion checklist
- SEO launch strategy with fill-in prompts
- Five-email welcome sequence with subject lines
- Social media launch post template
- Analytics — the three numbers to track and nothing else
- Press and outreach kit with pitch email template
- Maria Runningwater spotlight — the first stranger-sale story
Three Numbers. That Is All You Need.
You do not need to understand Google Analytics deeply to make good business decisions. Check these three numbers once a week. Everything else is a distraction until you are consistently making sales.
Weekly Website Visitors
How many people are visiting your website each week? A growing number means your content and SEO are working. A flat number means you need to promote more or publish more content.
Conversion Rate
What percentage of your visitors take your main action — buying, signing up, or contacting you? Divide actions by visitors and multiply by 100. Even 1 to 2 percent is a healthy starting rate.
Email Open Rate
What percentage of your subscribers open your emails? The industry average is 20 to 25 percent. If yours is lower, test a different subject line or send at a different time of day.
The First Stranger-Sale
The moment a stranger outside your community finds you online and buys — that is when your business becomes real. This is what that moment can look like.
Maria had been making jewelry since she was twelve years old, learning from her grandmother on the Navajo Nation. She sold at community gatherings and occasional markets. She knew her work was good. She just had no way to reach the people outside her immediate community who were already searching for exactly what she made.
She worked through the Idea and Validate stages, confirmed her price point with three pre-sales, and built her website using the Digital Foundation Workbook. It took her two weeks.
"On a Tuesday morning I pressed publish. My website went live."
By Thursday she had a notification she had never seen before. Someone in Denver — a woman she had never met — had found her through a Google search for handmade Navajo silver jewelry. She had seen that the shop was Indigenous-owned. She had bought two pieces without contacting Maria first.
"A stranger in Denver found my work, trusted it, and paid for it — because I had built something that Google could find."
That first stranger-sale was the moment Maria stopped thinking of her jewelry as a hobby and started thinking of it as a business. Not because of the money — though that mattered — but because of what it proved: her community's work deserved to be found. And now it was.