A practical checklist for post-launch support

This is one of those topics that looks small until it costs you something. Run through this the next time post-launch support comes up.

The projects that go badly are rarely the ones with the hardest technical problems. The version that survives contact with a real deadline is the simple one.

The checklist

• Launch is the beginning of the maintenance period
• Decide who owns fixes before you need them
• Budget for it or it comes out of goodwill
• Someone is named as the owner
• There is a date to review it again

The reason this keeps coming up

Launch is the beginning of the maintenance period. That sounds obvious written down. It is still the thing most often skipped. The failure mode is not doing it wrong, it is doing it once and assuming it stays done.

The short version

Clear scope protects the client at least as much as it protects the agency. Three things worth confirming about post-launch support before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• Launch is the beginning of the maintenance period — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

None of this needs a rewrite. Most of it is a morning's work once someone decides to do it.