How operators actually launch.
Not motivational. Operational. Write the SKU, budget the real stack, stand up partners and e-commerce, then reconcile cash every day.
Hover a line. Click to pin. Then do the work in that order.
A vendor that forces an 8/5/10 card is selling their catalog, not your firm.
1. Write the SKU first
Targets, drawdown bases, consistency on or off, time limit or none, news/EA/weekend, price, resets, refund-on-pass, payout cadence, split steps. Per-asset physics if you run FX next to futures or crypto. Then pick software. Phase-2 rules that do not match the site are how you lose arguments you should have won.
2. Budget the real stack
Headline licenses are the small line. Model: monthly SaaS, terminal/data, per-account fees, 3–8% payment processing, affiliate 20–40% of challenge revenue, CRM/support, and — largest — trader payouts. Indicative 2026 WL bands sit roughly $2k–$15k / mo plus data. Firms that scale ads without a payout model sell themselves into a cash crunch.
3. Partner layer on day one
Last-click widgets are how you lose YouTube and Discord. Partner-owned codes, S2S postbacks, clawbacks, a ledger separate from trader payouts. Thin boxes underpay serious IBs or overpay junk. Design this before you buy more ads. Direct paid in prop is expensive.
4. E-commerce is the back office
Checkout, coupons, retries, resets, scaling fees, pass refunds. One ledger with the portal. Manual billing is how support explodes. High-risk MCC will bounce the first PSP — stand up more than one.
5. Contest before more ads
A time-boxed prize fills the dashboard and the CRM. Then a flow sells the paid SKU. Risk still runs. A contest that ignores HFT and copy rings is a giveaway to the wrong people.
6. Reconcile daily
Payouts and partner commissions. Not at month-end. If split math lives in a spreadsheet, finance will not survive the first dispute week. Export exists. Use it.
Bring the SKU you actually want to sell.
We will map it onto plan objects in the demo tenant.