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LaunchDarkly perfectly encapsulates the essence of its brand and software service in its introductory YouTube video:
“Physics tells us that in order to stay in orbit, an object must go fast enough to keep from falling into the object it’s orbiting. Developing software is the same way; go too slow, and you’ll either go nowhere, or worse, crash. LaunchDarkly was developed with this in mind.”
Music to my ears.
This apt analogy not only outlines how LaunchDarkly views the problem that its platform addresses, but it also underscores a key dynamic across tech industries with ever-increasing markets—to win, you need to move fast and be mistake-free.
Mistakes are inevitable, of course, but cementing that message in the minds of enterprise product teams and executives helps make the LaunchDarkly value proposition even more enticing, not to mention memorable. What if you could move fast and keep your mistakes hidden in the dark from the vast majority of users? Or launch specific features based on the needs of a certain segment? Or address the countless other user-centric use cases available exclusively for digital products?
Launched not-so-darkly in the mid-2010s with funding from the likes of Uncork Capital, Threshold, and Redpoint, the company has leveraged its position in the uniquely valuable feature management space to great success. Here’s some of what LaunchDarkly has achieved in its nine years on the market:
- #62 on the Forbes Cloud 100
- A $3-billion valuation as of 2023
- $330 million in venture capital as of its most recent Series D
- CODiE award for “Best DevOps Tool” for 2023
- A client roster that includes names like IBM, Atlassian, and HP
In this week’s case study, we’ll take a stroll through the feature management niche to learn how LaunchDarkly leverages a strong brand and the 4 Es of content to position itself at the top of a fast-growing industry.
But in order to understand the excellent branding exhibited by LaunchDarkly, we need a quick primer on feature management (I know I did before writing this).
Feature Management—Cornerstone of Tech Development
In the ever-evolving landscape of the tech industry, providing a seamless customer experience while keeping pace with competitors and industry trends is a tall task. That’s why feature management has emerged as a pivotal process for DevOps and Product teams.
At its core, feature management is a method that facilitates the controlled release and management of software features, allowing for a more flexible, secure, and efficient deployment process. Each new feature is controlled by a feature flag, or toggle, which determines the circumstances for where a piece of code is executed.
Feature management brings a level of automation to flag management and releases while adhering to an organization’s specific DevOps policies. It’s these workflows and automations that help, in LaunchDarkly’s words, “unlock modern software development.” These workflows are equipped with built-in guardrails that allow teams to schedule code alterations in advance, designate an approver for the changes, and automatically retract the changes if they induce issues in the production environment.
Founder Edith Harbaugh perfectly summarized the benefits of feature management back in 2015, shortly after LaunchDarkly’s debut:
“We’re separating out the business logic from the actual code. You don’t have to hack behavior any more; you have a way to control it. You can turn a feature on and off for an entire country, which is a pretty standard best practice — if you launch a feature in Canada first, and it goes well, you launch it in North America.”
This collaborative approach not only fosters innovation but also ensures that every team member can contribute to enhancing the customer’s digital journey in a significant manner. It empowers various teams within an organization to contribute meaningfully to the development and delivery of software products:
- Developers can ship code at their convenience
- Operations engineers have the ability to disable malfunctioning features swiftly
- Product managers can independently conduct beta tests
This systematic approach ensures that the release process is both streamlined and compliant, reducing the risk of errors and facilitating a smoother transition from development to production.
However, as the number of flags increases, managing them can become a daunting task. LaunchDarkly addresses this challenge by offering tools that streamline feature flag management at every stage. Features such as Code References, Flag Archive, and Flag Status Alerts assist teams in tracking every flag in the system effortlessly, enabling the quick removal of outdated flags and maintaining good code hygiene.
Last year, LaunchDarkly surveyed 1,000 tech executives for the 2022 edition of its State of Feature Management Report. It reveals just how much this oft-overlooked niche is poised to grow over the coming years as more and more leaders catch on to the importance of more efficient software development. Just take a look at some of the key findings:
- 69% believe investing in feature management capabilities is a high priority
- 74% of executives believe the budget for feature management needs to increase by at least $100k
- 60% of those using feature flags began implementing them in the past 12 months
- 98% of IT professionals agree feature management delivers a demonstrable ROI
The techies of the tech industry already know that feature management is critical to success in the industry moving forward. So, the bigger challenge for LaunchDarkly is explaining the benefits of this DevOps tool to stakeholders who may not be as familiar with concepts like feature flags and workflows.
LaunchDarkly Cements Its Position as the Go-To Feature Management Tool with Brand and Content Excellence
LaunchDarkly’s overall traffic numbers don’t exactly jump off the page, especially not compared to some of the major brands we regularly profile. But that’s okay; unlike the more popular software niches, feature management is still a relatively undeveloped field. This means there’s lots of opportunity for established brands to determine their position in the pecking order as the demand for this niche expands in the coming years.
Strengthening Market Position with the Perfect Brand Name
We all know how dynamic the software industry is. The digital infrastructure upholding our new ways of working seems relatively stable, but they are constantly changing under the surface. That’s exactly why the brand name “LaunchDarkly” is so perfect for this brand.
The name itself is tongue-in-cheek. It turns the concept of a dark launch—where brands roll out a new software feature to a small subset of its users—on its head. It’s almost like an inside joke that speaks directly to its DevOps end users, establishing an immediate connection.
But more importantly, LaunchDarkly defines the essence of feature management that the brand embodies.
The “launch” component of the name mirrors the brand’s facilitation of a seamless and continuous deployment process. It empowers teams to ship code whenever they desire, fostering a culture of innovation and rapid development. On the one hand, this aspect of the name embodies the brand’s commitment to enabling a swift and efficient release process, where new features can be introduced to the market without delay, thereby staying ahead in the competitive tech landscape.
On the other hand, the term “darkly” encapsulates the brand’s emphasis on risk mitigation and control. It signifies the ability to roll out features in a manner that is almost invisible to the end users, allowing for testing and refinement before a full-fledged release. This cautious approach ensures that any potential bugs or issues can be addressed promptly without affecting the overall user experience. Moreover, it allows for features to be disabled swiftly if they exhibit any malfunctions, ensuring the stability and reliability of the software product.
Together, “LaunchDarkly” paints a picture of a brand that perfectly marries speed and caution, innovation and control—offering a feature management product that stands as a beacon of reliability and efficiency in the tech industry. It embodies a philosophy of delivering excellence while navigating the complexities of software development with grace and agility.
SimilarWeb identifies direct traffic as a strong indicator of a brand’s strength and recognizability. Considering that nearly 80% of its total web traffic comes via this method, it’s clear that the LaunchDarkly brand itself does a lot of heavy lifting for the company.
According to SimilarWeb, direct traffic is an “effective barometer” of a brand’s awareness and demand—how strong it is in the market. While there are plenty of factors that contribute to direct search metrics, including plain old misattribution of the source, there’s no denying that this volume of traffic signifies the stickiness of the LaunchDarkly brand.
By picking this clever name and brand scheme, LaunchDarkly has a perfect vessel for tying its product to taglines, slogans, and other bits of copy that sit at the top of the funnel—punchy phrasing like:
- “De-risked releases”
- “Shrink the time-to-value”
- “Move fast and succeed at scale”
And, most importantly, “balance speed and safety.”
But once you’ve piqued interest with this effective branding, there’s still some heavy lifting to be done in terms of explaining the problem, highlighting the solution, and proving its value.
This is where LaunchDarkly relies on part of the 4 Es of Content Excellence Framework. Specifically: educate, engage, and empower.
Educational, Engaging, and Empowering Content
Educational content is crucial for niche brands like LaunchDarkly (LD). Firstly, it bridges the knowledge gap in feature management, introducing potential users and decision-makers to its core principles and benefits. By elucidating its unique features, LD can effectively communicate its value proposition. This content not only showcases the platform’s capabilities but also demonstrates real-world applications, aiding in driving adoption. Once users are onboarded, educational resources empower them to maximize the platform’s potential. Furthermore, by presenting informative content, LD establishes itself as a thought leader, building trust and credibility in the market. This approach also fosters a community around LD, encouraging feedback and innovation. Lastly, educational materials, such as tutorials and guides, smooth out implementation challenges, ensuring a seamless user experience. In sum, for LD, educational content is essential to ensure market understanding, product adoption, and optimal utilization.
Essentially, LaunchDarkly creates content for three key audiences:
- ) The DevOps professionals who will regularly use the feature management platform
- ) Managerial stakeholders who will directly oversee its use
- ) Decision-makers in leadership who will give DevOps departments the green light
It’s a tough task to make sure that there’s the right mix of content out there for each audience segment, but the LaunchDarkly team covers its bases by speaking to these different segments with assets that educate, engage, and empower.
Applying these three of the 4 Es ensures that all the content LaunchDarkly creates is useful to someone within the organizations it targets—from the frontline developers to the executives holding the purse strings.
And so far, it’s working—every month, nearly 30,000 visitors reach the LaunchDarkly site through this organic content. The best part? It’s high-quality traffic with an estimated value of $168,000.
Now, let’s take a look at exactly how LaunchDarkly educates, engages, and empowers its audience.
Educating Stakeholders and Decision-Makers with ToFu Blog Posts
In the more technical software niches, it’s not uncommon for brands to invest more heavily in educational content. After all, while most everyone who works at a desk has come across project management tools like Monday.com or a messaging platform like Slack, a significantly lesser percentage has experience with the tools from the DevOps realm.
I experienced this myself when I came across LaunchDarkly’s top blog post—a ToFu piece explaining the concept of feature flags.
The piece brings in over 2,300 visitors every month while saving the brand nearly $15,000 in paid advertising spend. Let’s take a look at what makes this educational content so effective.
1.) It Gets Straight to the Point
When you’re looking to learn about a new topic, there’s nothing more frustrating than having to dive through a long preamble. The LaunchDarkly team does away with unnecessary fluff and gets straight to the definition of the term in question: Features flags let you modify and test new software components without changing or restarting the entire program.
And then, in a big, beautiful subheading, it spells out the definition again in a more memorable fashion—“decoupling deploy from release.” It may not mean much to you at first (it certainly didn’t for me), but this is the core function of the platform.
2.) It Ties Feature Flags to the Gold Standard of Software Development
To keep things short and sweet, continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) is the software development model used by pretty much every major tech company. It’s why the developers who write and integrate new software and the operations teams who ensure the proper delivery of software are now referred to as DevOps. The two tasks now essentially happen simultaneously, thanks to cloud technology.
So, by tying feature flags to CI/CD, LaunchDarkly is hitching its wagon to the gold standard of software development. Not a bad idea when you’re trying to impart the importance of your product to tech executives.
3.) It Defines Its Use Beyond DevOps Teams
LaunchDarkly’s feature management solution, underpinned by feature flags, extends its reach beyond just development or engineering teams. While, traditionally, these flags are rooted in code and primarily adopted by DevOps, their integration into a feature management platform democratizes access across various departments. This means QA teams can validate changes in real time, sales and customer support can adjust entitlements, product management can control beta program access, and marketing can synchronize releases with campaigns or conduct A/B tests. By making flag toggling intuitive, LaunchDarkly empowers diverse stakeholders to actively participate in the release lifecycle, fostering a more collaborative and holistic approach to product releases.
4.) It Positions LaunchDarkly as the Go-To Feature Management Solution
After an in-depth review of the specific use cases and benefits of feature flags, the LaunchDarkly team explains how technical debt is a common and costly outcome of improper flag use. This provides the perfect segue to introduce LaunchDarkly’s feature management platform-as-a-service offering.
The one area where LaunchDarkly could improve this piece is by closing it out with a stronger CTA. As of now, the end of the article doesn’t really scream “try this software” to the reader. Fortunately, it’s a quick fix for an otherwise outstanding piece of educational content.
Engaging and Empowering Decision-Makers with Key Enablement Assets
As effective as this blog page is for bringing in traffic and educating potential users about the product, there’s a lot more that LaunchDarkly needs to do in order to qualify leads.
That’s why the team has invested in a number of stand-alone assets that help build off the momentum from its strong branding and educational content. Let’s take a look at a few of those now.
1.) Dedicated ROI Landing Page
LaunchDarkly’s landing page on the ROI of feature management is by far one of its most impressive. Honestly, it’s something that any self-respecting SaaS marketing department needs to add to its arsenal. And this one hits you right off the bat.
Immediately underneath the title, the landing page hits potential customers with a simple, compelling point: “There’s a clear link between software and business performance.” It’s nothing groundbreaking, but it gives DevOps leads a thesis they can bring to stakeholders when it comes time to make a purchase decision. Like any good thesis, there’s lots of data to support the argument, from hard numbers on annual ROI and operational savings to improvements in feature release and deployment times.
But it doesn’t stop there. LaunchDarkly’s ROI page goes on to check off basically all the major boxes for high-quality content:
- Quote from users at high-profile accounts like IBM and Loom, which include a case study link
- An embedded video explaining how feature management can help maintain revenue during a downturn
- Additional data points about the benefits from its State of Feature Management report
- Calls to action for product demonstrations and email signups
Although the page gets little to no traffic through organic search, LaunchDarkly makes sure that this mid-lower funnel piece finds the right eyes. According to Ahrefs, there are over 950 internal backlinks directing site visitors from other web pages to this key asset. This is the perfect way to get an asset to an audience when keyword volume or difficulty poses a barrier.
2.) Comparison Page with Top Competitors
In terms of presence within the Feature Management niche, it’s something of a two-horse race between LaunchDarkly and Optimizely. Despite lagging behind in terms of overall and organic traffic, the LaunchDarkly team focuses on the metric that matters most—conversions.
By creating a comparison page pitting its feature management product against that of Optimizely, LaunchDarkly levels the playing field by highlighting its superior product.
Again, for all the importance we put on web and social traffic metrics, these numbers really just convey how effective SaaS brands are in getting people to notice their product. One company can have vastly superior marketing, bring in plenty of leads, convert customers at a high rate, and then lose them to a better product from another.
LaunchDarkly hammers home this message by outlining just how much better its platform is at feature management. In a table of nine core subfeatures available with LaunchDarkly, only three of them are included with Optimizely. Write all the blogs you want; it’s tough to overcome that large of a feature gap.
As you saw in the comparison page header, LaunchDarkly leans heavily on its #1 G2 ranking in this piece. Tastemakers like G2, Capterra, and Trust Radius provide a level of objectivity that any internal assets can’t reach, so taking advantage of any materials from these sources is a must. Particularly in LaunchDarkly’s case—not only is it the top feature management platform of 2022, but it’s also won G2 awards for leading the industry, easiest setup, and meeting customer requirements.
The ROI landing page and Optimizely comparison are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of LaunchDarkly’s mastery of educational, engaging, and empowering content. The brand serves as another reminder that the primary goal of your content isn’t a top SERP position or shoutout on LinkedIn—it’s giving your leads and customers the information they need to solve a problem in their day-to-day lives!
