Product Launch Plan Template
Seven documents and four sheets that tie every messaging claim to the requirement it rests on, then order the calendar by what you can take back.
Free download · No account needed
Claim to Requirement Map
Eleven claims, nine requirements, one scope cut
| Claim | Req | Status | Verdict | Surfaces |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inspect a unit with no signal at all | R1 | Complete | Clear | 3 |
| Mark the damage on the photograph itself | R2 | Complete | Clear | 3 |
| The renter signs on the device | R3 | Complete | Clear | 3 |
| Damage costs priced before the renter drives off | R4 | Cut at T-11 | Blocked | 4 |
| An end to disputed damage invoices | R4 R9 | Cut, partial | Blocked | 3 |
| The report reaches the renter before they leave | R6 | Email only | Narrow | 3 |
| Conflicts resolve themselves on reconnect | R5 | Complete | Clear | 2 |
| Every inspection in the fleet in one view | R7 | Complete | Clear | 3 |
| Scan the unit and the record loads | R8 | Complete | Clear | 2 |
| Charges post straight to the ledger | R9 | Read only | Blocked | 2 |
| Cuts inspection time in half | none | No requirement | Unsourced | 4 |
| 11 claims across 7 surfaces | 6 complete, 2 partial, 1 cut | 6 clear, 1 narrow, 3 blocked, 1 unsourced | 32 |
Four bad claims are thirteen sentences
The three blocked claims and the unsourced one appear thirteen times across six of the seven surfaces. Counting claims makes this a morning. Counting instances makes it a two-day job with six owners, which is the truth.
The gap that produced all of it
Messaging last edited on the Wednesday of week 8. Scope cut on the Monday of week 10. Fifteen days in which finished-looking copy was wrong and no review cycle would have caught it, because the review happened in week 9.
One surface was clean: the in-app notice, four claims, all clear. It was written in week 10 by an engineer looking at the running build.
Ashwell Systems cut a requirement from Rental Fleet 4.0 eleven days before ship. The messaging document had last been edited fifteen days before that, and nobody read it again, because re-reading finished copy is not on anybody's list. A launch checklist does not catch this. The checklist ran, every box got ticked, and four claims across six surfaces were still asserting a capability that had been removed from the release.
So this pack traces rather than reviews. Every claim carries the identifier of the requirement it rests on, and a requirement that changes status turns the claims standing on it into a list of files and slide numbers. Eleven claims, seven surfaces, thirty-two instances: six clear, one narrow, three blocked, one unsourced. Thirteen sentences had to be cut or replaced, not four, and thirteen is the number that decides whether the fix is an afternoon or a fortnight.
Then the calendar gets ordered by what can be taken back. The launch email sat at nine on day one, when a seven day phased release had reached one percent of the iOS base, 184 devices, against 12,600 app users on the list. Apple notes an update in phased release can still be downloaded manually by anyone, so the email would have made the phase decorative. It moved to day five. Installs into the marketing workspace beside the rest of the template library.
What's in the pack
Claim to Requirement Map
One row per claim, not per document, with every surface it appears on and one of four verdicts against it.
Launch Calendar
Owner, reversibility class and how each activity is taken back, with the irreversible rows dated last.
Readiness Tracker
Thirty-four items where every open one names what breaks and who notices first, in that order.
Asset Checklist
Per surface: audience, size, claims carried, edits needed and reversibility, so the fix list has owners.
Messaging
Each claim with its requirement and verdict, keeping every struck-through original visible above its replacement.
Comms Plan
The sequence with device counts at each rollout step, and one sentence on why every moved activity moved. A price or package change riding along gets its own ceiling and comms plan rather than a line item here.
Enablement Note
The two questions a cut requirement generates, the words to use, and the sentences that are now false. Whether the shipped capability is actually adopted once it reaches a new account is a separate content problem this pack does not try to solve.
Reversibility Sequence
Five recoverability classes, and the staged rollout mechanics that decide where the announcement goes.
How to use it
- 1
Open in River, or take it blank
Open the pack in River and send your requirements and your copy, or download the Word documents and CSV sheets and build the map yourself.
- 2
Send the requirements with their status
Status is the field people leave off and the field the whole space runs on. Complete, partial or cut, with a date against each one.
- 3
Compare two dates first
When the messaging was last edited, and when the scope last changed. If the second is later, there is copy nobody has read since it stopped being true.
- 4
Count instances, then sequence
Verdicts multiplied by surfaces gives the real size of the fix. Then put the things you cannot take back behind the things you can.
Frequently asked questions
Is this template free?
Yes, with no account, no card and no email gate on the download. Edit with AI is the optional half: River reads the requirements and the copy, builds the map, and routes the blocked claims to surface owners with replacements drafted. Every pack sits in the template library.
What format are the downloaded files?
Seven Word documents and four CSV sheets, in a zip. The documents open in Word, Pages and Google Docs. The sheets open in Excel, Numbers and Sheets. Nothing needs converting, and the sheets are real spreadsheets rather than tables flattened into a document.
What if there is no PRD, only a ticket list?
A ticket list works, as long as each item has a current status. What the map needs is the identifier, one sentence of what it does, the status and the date that status was last true. If you want a real one, start from a PRD.
Is this different from an announcement kit?
Yes. The feature announcement kit writes four surfaces that agree with each other for one small change. This coordinates a whole launch: nine requirements, seven surfaces, six teams and a go/no-go, and it starts from what product wrote rather than from a brief. The blocked claims it finds also sit on the competitive battlecards, which is where a false claim survives longest.
Why order the calendar by reversibility?
Because the reversible activities are the ones that surface a problem, and running them first buys the chance to fix it. An in-app notice comes back with a flag. An email to 41,300 contacts comes back as a correction, which costs more credibility than the announcement bought.
Does it replace the go/no-go meeting?
It changes what the meeting looks at. Percent complete gets quoted and open blockers decide, so every open item carries what breaks and who notices first. An item that cannot answer both is a task, and moving it out is what makes the count mean something.
What does Edit with AI actually do?
It signs you up, installs this pack as a private workspace, and starts with the claim map. Send the requirements and the copy, and the finding comes back as a count: how many claims no longer have a requirement behind them, and how many surfaces they sit on.
Find the claims that lost their requirement
Take the Word documents and CSV sheets blank, or open this exact pack in River and send it your requirements and your launch copy.
Edit with AI