Here's when to relaunch, and when to think again. Software companies pray their new version 4.0 will entrench their market dominance or rein in the industry leader.
Newspaper executives look to relaunches to attract the younger, hipper readers they lack.
Television producers declare that their popular old show, relaunched for the 2000 season, will prevent or arrest a ratings slide. But nowhere is the relaunch so popular as on the Web. Yet the evidence suggests site relaunches carry heavy risks. Most Web site visitors want to do something or find something. Make them change the way they do things at your site, and you may confuse or discomfit them to the point where they leave.