Go-Live Clearance

SaaS · pre-launch · indie teams

SaaS Pre-Launch Checklist

Launch day for a SaaS is not just about the product — it is about whether the landing page, signup flow, and payment pages survive first contact with real visitors. Paste your production URL — we check the things that lose signups, then stamp CLEARED / HOLD / DENIED.

SaaS launch failures we catch

These are the ones that do not break the app — they just lose the traffic you paid or posted for.

  • Landing page still has noindex

    Your Product Hunt or Hacker News link sends thousands of visitors, but Google never indexes the page. Future organic traffic = zero.

  • OG image missing or broken

    Your launch tweet shows a blank card instead of your carefully designed hero. First impression: unpolished.

  • Privacy / Terms pages 404

    Footer links to /privacy and /terms that return 404. Ad reviewers flag it. Paid users bounce. Trust damage on day one.

  • No HTTPS on payment or auth pages

    Stripe or OAuth callbacks on HTTP. Browsers show mixed-content warnings. Some users abandon signup.

  • Missing analytics on day one

    You launch and have no idea if the PH upvote converted. Days of blind optimization follow.

SaaS go-live fixes

Fix the blockers before the launch email goes out.

Remove noindex from landing page

// app/layout.tsx
// Remove or conditionalize the robots directive
export const metadata = {
  // robots: { index: false }, ← DELETE THIS
  // Default is indexable — just omit it
}

Add trust pages (Privacy + Terms)

// app/privacy/page.tsx
export const metadata = {
  title: 'Privacy Policy — Your SaaS',
  description: 'How we handle your data.',
}
export default function PrivacyPage() {
  return <article className="prose">{'/* Your privacy policy */'}</article>
}

// app/terms/page.tsx — same pattern

OG image + metadata for launch

// app/layout.tsx
export const metadata = {
  metadataBase: new URL('https://yourdomain.com'),
  openGraph: {
    title: 'Your SaaS — One-Line Value Prop',
    description: 'What it does, who it is for.',
    images: [{ url: '/og.png', width: 1200, height: 630 }],
  },
  twitter: { card: 'summary_large_image' },
}

Still check by hand

  • □Smoke-test signup and payment flow on production (not localhost)
  • □Verify email notifications deliver (check spam folder)
  • □Confirm Stripe/OAuth redirect URLs are https://yourdomain.com
  • □Set up error tracking (Sentry free tier) before launch traffic arrives

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