Before you launch or pay for traffic
How to launch a SaaS product: the path first
A launch sends a crowd through one sign-up path in a few hours, and that path is often the part nobody walked as a new user. This page sets the order to check before traffic arrives, and simulated visitors walk it from a launch link.
How do I launch a SaaS product so new visitors can actually sign up?
Before you send any traffic, walk the path a new user takes: the launch link, the sign-up form, the confirmation email and the first screen after it. Use a fresh address you have never used on the product, and check each step on a phone as well as a laptop. A simulated test walks that path from a public address and shows the step where each visitor stops, with a screenshot. It does not tell you which channel will bring buyers.
What this looks like in a report
“I signed up and the page said to check my email. The email has not come. There is a second tool open in another tab, so I will try that one instead.”
The fix. Send the verification email from a sending domain with its records set up, and make the resend button wait a few seconds before it works again, with a line that says the email can take a few minutes. Then sign up from a new address on a laptop and a phone, and confirm the email arrives.
An illustration. Run a test to see your own.See a real sample report
A launch sends the sign-up path a crowd at one time
A quiet product can hide a broken sign-up for weeks, because a few visitors a day reach the form and the founder fixes each problem as it comes up. A launch changes the timing. A post, a newsletter or a forum thread sends many new people to the same form within the same hour. Their confirmation emails queue behind one another, a limit on sign-up attempts gets hit by the crowd, and a verification step the founder's own account skips becomes the wall.
- The launch link: does it open the sign-up page directly, with no detour to a waitlist?
- Sign-up with an address the founder has never used on the product
- The confirmation email: does it arrive, and does its link work on a phone?
- The first screen after sign-up: does a new user know their first step?
- The pricing page, if one is linked: does it show the price a new user will pay?
How it works
- 01
Open the launch link as a stranger
Use a private window, no saved login and the exact link you will publish. A link that redirects to a waitlist, or to a page with a second sign-up button, loses people before the sign-up starts.
- 02
Sign up with an address you have never used
Enter a name, an email and a password the way a new user would. Note each error message, and any field that forgets what you typed after a failed try.
- 03
Open the confirmation email and follow its link
Read the sender, the subject and the link. The link should open the product, or a clear page with the next step. A login page for an account that does not exist yet is a dead end.
- 04
Reach the first screen and stop there
Note whether a new user knows what to do first. An empty screen with no sample item is where a launch visitor decides the product is not for them.
Order the launch checks by where the crowd enters
A post, a newsletter or a directory listing sends people to whatever URL you gave it, and that URL can be a page you forgot existed, such as an old beta sign-up or a launch page that still says coming soon. Open each URL in a private window before anything goes live, and follow its sign-up button. Then check the sign-up, the confirmation email and the first screen, in that order, since each step only matters to someone who got past the last.
The verification email is the wall a launch hits first
A launch often loses people at the confirmation step, not at the form. The email has to leave the product, reach an inbox and arrive while the visitor still wants the product. A sending domain that is new or unverified can route messages into spam, and a crowd sends many at once, which can trip limits at the sending service. Test it the way a new visitor does: sign up, leave the page, read the email in a separate inbox and press the link. A visitor who presses resend several times sends several emails, and the crowd will do exactly that.
The founder's account skips the path the crowd takes
The founder's account was created long ago, before the verification step was added, before the terms changed and before the first screen was rebuilt. It logs in cleanly, so the founder believes the product works. A new visitor takes the full path from a blank state, and every change made after the founder's account was created stands between them and the first screen. Keep one account that you create the day before launch, from a new address, and walk it through the whole path each time you change the sign-up.
What you get with Mimiq
- 01
Run it by hand, or on every pull request
Paste a link and a task in the app and watch the visitors work. Or run them on every preview deploy: the GitHub Action comments on the pull request, any other CI can call the MCP endpoint, and your coding agent can run it too.
- 02
Bugs and usability problems in one report
The browser records errors and failed or slow requests on the step they happened. The visitors say where the wording or the steps confused them, and where they left.
- 03
Visitors that behave like your audience
Each visitor is a different profile with a reason to be there, matched to who the page is for, described by you, or built from your own customers.
- 04
A prompt to fix each problem
Every problem comes with a fix to paste into Cursor, Claude Code, Lovable or any coding agent, and one prompt hands over the top problems at once. Then send the same visitors through again.
- 05
Follow every visitor
See each visitor's whole path, step by step with screenshots, and what it was thinking at every step. Ask any visitor a question.
The browser records relevant JavaScript errors and failed or slow app requests encountered during the run, attached to the step where they occurred. The visitors are simulated: they find problems, they do not predict how many real people will convert.
A second launch wave can reach a sign-up flow changed since the first
A launch rarely happens once: a product update, a second community post, a listing on a directory a month later, a new pricing page. Each wave can reach a sign-up path that changed after the last walk. Before each wave, sign up again from a new address, read the confirmation email, and compare the first screen with the one the last wave saw.
Starter
Try it on one launch
About 4 tests of 5 visitors
- Visitors on your landing page, signup and checkout
- Where they left and why, with a fix to copy for each problem
- Run it in the app or on every pull request
- Ask any visitor a question, included
- Test accounts and protected previews
Builder
Test every build
About 20 tests of 5 visitors
- Everything in Starter
- Credits refill each month, and what is left rolls over once
- Cancel anytime
Pro
Test every release, as a team
About 60 tests of 5 visitors
- Everything in Starter
- Credits refill each month, and what is left rolls over once
- Cancel anytime
Scale
Test at scale, every day
About 240 tests of 5 visitors
- Everything in Starter
- Credits refill each month, and what is left rolls over once
- Priority support
- Cancel anytime
Questions
Is a simulated test a launch plan?
No. It checks the path a new user takes, from the link to the first screen, and shows where a visitor stopped. It does not decide your pricing, your message or your channels, and it does not predict how many people will sign up on launch day.
How many visitors do I need to test a launch?
One clean walk per path is the start, on a laptop and on a phone. A simulated test can run several visitors through the same path, which shows whether a step fails for more than one person. It is not a load test, so it cannot tell you whether the product holds under a real crowd.
Should I launch with a waitlist?
That is your call, and the test cannot make it. A waitlist collects emails before the sign-up opens, but it also sends the launch crowd to a page that does not let them in yet. If you use one, check that the link in the post goes to the page where the sign-up actually is.
What if my launch traffic comes from a channel I have not tested?
The path stays the same, but the first sentence a visitor reads changes. A community post, an ad and a newsletter each carry their own promise. Check the link from each channel as a stranger would, from a fresh browser, and read the first screen against what that channel said.
Can the test complete a paid sign-up?
No. A simulated visitor can reach the payment step and stop there. Make your own test payment on a new address after the walk, because the card step is the one part no simulated visitor can finish.
Keep reading
Send visitors and see what breaks first.
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