Typeface launch strategy

Rodrigo Saiani

I would really love to hear your launch strategy once you’ve “abandoned” aka completed your typeface.
I’m messy and confused and sometimes anxious about releasing it in a way that I don't take my time to do it well, but here’s what I have tried to date, with different granularities of success:

• Contact known names in the graphic design/type sectors, the ones who have blogs and influence a big audience for example.
• Create specimens which is somewhat a given
• Create a hotsite with a theme that makes it fun for me and possibly for more people. (http://plau.co/tenez being the first and only example)
• Send courtesy copy of my fonts to my design heroes with no expectation of return, just to be able to get in touch with them (I guess this would count more as fandom than strategy, oh well). Maybe if they do their next design with it would count as strategy.
• Show examples of the font in use @ fonts in use
• Be pushy with the distributors so they create a post or something about my typeface. Sorry dear distributor people.
• Send emails to your contact base with the release
• Do reasonable discounts (30% or so)
• Do medium posts about it
• Create a typeface project on Behance
• Talk to friends
• Create this post and other posts on type drawers
• Cry, beg and scream… you know you've done it too!

Anyway, assuming there’s so many more variables than just what you do to get the word out, what has been your approach to this crucial moment in typeface production?

Thanks for sharing!

Khaled Hosny

I just put it on GitHub (early in the development usually) and tweet about it. In the olden days I’d also write a blog post, I don’t do that anymore.

Laura Worthington

Wow, this is an impressive list! Thank you so much for starting this thread! I do most of what you've mentioned, plus…

Postings to Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Dribbble, Flickr, Tumblr. Get as many images out there as possible, I believe people are more likely to look than read. A good mix of imagery can be based around process, inspiration, planning, feature/benefit, examples and ideas of use.

I also have a Dropbox account where I store all of my typefaces and I've invited friends and acquaintances to share the files who use my typefaces and are good at promoting… Cross promotions and projects with designers and/or makers who use your typefaces.

I create blog posts and send out newsletters about the release and what makes it unique, feature/benefits, sales/offers. I've also made short videos that showcase the features of a release and offers up tips - a mini tutorial of sorts. User Guides are good too - showing a full character set, examples of features and their use, technical information and resources.

I have found that getting involved with different Facebook groups that are representative of my audience has been a great way to get to know my customer base, what they want/need from typefaces and what they're all about on a more personal level. And it's a great way to make new friends

StephenRapp

Glad to see this thread. I've never enjoyed the marketing aspect of type design, but do want to get over that. Laura is my hero when it comes to marketing. :-)

One thing that I've noticed (that I think might be a marketing strategy) is that some people break their fonts down into smaller versions. I was just looking at one where you can buy a pro version with everything for about $50 bucks, or any of 10 or more breakdown versions for $25 each. I broke a font down not long ago into Pro, Basic, Small Caps, and ornaments. That seemed like a logical breakdown for anyone who didn't want or need to spend as much. I even added in the description that if you bought the pro version all that other stuff was in it. People still sometimes bought the pro and the breakdowns. The idea of having versions for each alternate character in a script seems like a way to take advantage of people who can't deal with Open Type. They end up paying about five times as much and have to work twice as hard just to use the type. There is no kerning between separate fonts so that is another issue. That type of marketing ploy seems more like a hack job, IMO.

Fernando Díaz

We do a pre-release only in our site, for two weeks and we send it to our mailing database. This way we give our clients the exclusive news, and we get 95-75% of the earnings. After that we send it to all the distribuitors, and it doesn't affect myfonts ranking, because we have like 30.000 emails, and they have gazillion customers haha... (This also helps to get blogs to post the font liked directly to our site).

I would put special enfasis on the posters... sometimes we take like two weeks in designing them, they are a key component in font marketing. 

And another important marketing strategy, is that when you release a new font, all (or most) of your other fonts should be in offer as well. This increases not only your sales but the sales of your foundry in general a lot.

Talking with the owner of an important foundry in AtypI he told me that since he put his fonts in free trial, his sales of licences are 3 times more. He also told me that 80% of his sales are now custom fonts. So it's always good to have buttons like "custom fonts" and also "custom licences" on your website for OEM and big licences just in case, we do get them sometimes.

PS: Rodrigo I'm waiting on Tenez to be in offer so I can buy it, I'm in love since you gave me the poster at AtypI, hope to see you soon!

Fernando Díaz

Two more,
We are starting to suggest which font from our foundry goes well with the one we are selling, we usually have this kind of questions from the buyer.

And, we are giving discounts to people who send us our fonts in use... but it doesn't work very well, only 2 uses per font... I wish we could see our fonts in use somewhat more easily.