The Launch Directory

Overview

The Launch Directory is a web publication that files startup and product launches into numbered weekly editions and keeps every entry online as a permanent, dated page. The site is operated by Zinn Digital Ltd, registered in England and Wales, and it is free to read. Founders submit a launch, signed-in readers vote on it, and the resulting listing stays in an archive that runs back week by week. Each entry carries the product's Ahrefs Domain Rating, refreshed daily, so visitors can judge whether a launch has link equity behind it. The stated ambition is durability: a page that Google, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Claude can read, quote and cite after launch week has gone to press. It is built for founders, indie makers and marketing leads who want a record rather than a traffic spike.

Key Features

• Permanent dated listing pages. Every accepted launch resolves to its own URL in the /launch/ hierarchy, stamped with the edition week it first appeared in. The page holds the product name, logo, section, one-line description and the running Domain Rating, all in semantic markup that crawlers and AI connectors can parse without a browser.
• Weekly editions with a navigable archive. The front page represents one week at a time. Week 44 of 2026 covers 26 October to 1 November and links backwards to Week 43 and forwards to Week 45, which is still in press. The archive shows the volume behind each edition, from 34 launches in Week 40 down to zero in Week 39.
• Community vote leaderboard. Listings are numbered by votes cast by signed-in readers, with Week 44 running from six votes in first place down to one vote at eleventh. A separate standings panel repeats the top five. The site states that votes cannot be bought and that ordering comes from readers rather than payments.
• Daily Domain Rating tracking. Each entry shows an Ahrefs Domain Rating with a direction marker, such as DR 48 rising four points or DR 6 falling one, plus the date of the last check. The publication's own record is printed as DR 70, Majestic Trust Flow 11 and Citation Flow 19, each with a verification date attached.
• Paid Billboard kept off the vote record. A labelled advertising column sells notices from five dollars, ordered by the total sum contributed rather than by merit. The copy separates that paid ranking from the community ranking explicitly, and the full Billboard has its own leaderboard page.
• MCP connector for AI assistants. The address /mcp can be added as a custom connector in Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or VS Code, after which an assistant can search launches, compare alternatives and submit a product inside the chat. Developer documentation and API keys sit alongside the endpoint.
• Section index and founder pages. Launches are grouped into sections such as Directories, Launch and Discovery with 16 entries, Education and Learning with 8 and SEO and AI Visibility with 4. Founder profiles, a Monday email dispatch and a set of rival comparison pages round out the editorial package.

How It Works

A founder files a launch through the submit form, chooses a section and supplies a name, logo and short description. The entry lands in the edition currently open, which at the time of writing is Week 44 of 2026. Readers who sign in can vote, and the vote count decides the running order from first place downward. Voting itself requires no payment.

Money enters at two points instead. A billboard notice costs from five dollars and appears in a column marked as advertising and sorted by money contributed. A front page slot for a full week costs nineteen dollars. Both are walled off from the vote-based ranking, and the site repeats that separation in the leaderboard footer.

Once a week closes, the entry does not vanish. It moves into the dated archive under a week number, keeping its URL, description and Domain Rating, and the rating continues to be checked daily. A reader browsing Week 43 today sees the same page that existed while that edition was current. A Monday newsletter then gathers the week's top launches and any Launch of the Week winners into a single email.

The least conventional path runs through an AI assistant. Adding the MCP endpoint as a connector lets Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or VS Code query the catalogue directly, so a founder can ask an assistant to surface launch directories above a given Domain Rating instead of scrolling a list.

Use Cases

• An indie developer ships a side project and wants a link that does not evaporate. Filing the launch produces a dated page that stays crawlable, and the Domain Rating column shows whether neighbouring listings in the same section carry authority.
• A marketing lead planning a launch week needs to compare venues. The site publishes a ranked list of launch directories plus head-to-head pages such as Product Hunt versus Uneed, so the choice rests on measured Domain Rating rather than word of mouth.
• An SEO consultant checks whether a directory justifies a submission fee by reading its own Domain Rating, Trust Flow and Citation Flow figures, each carrying a check date instead of a vague claim of strength.
• A researcher working inside Claude or Cursor needs a shortlist of directories that accept free submissions. The MCP connector answers in the chat and returns listings with their current ratings attached.
• A bootstrapped SaaS team with a fixed budget buys one week on the front page for nineteen dollars and pairs it with a free archive entry that outlives the paid placement.

Who It's For

The publication suits early stage founders, indie makers and marketing generalists who treat a launch as a long-lived asset rather than a one-day event, and who care whether a listing will still be indexed in two years. It also fits SEO practitioners who want a directory whose own metrics are printed on the front door with dates attached. Against high-volume venues such as Product Hunt, the weekly intake here is small, with editions ranging from zero to roughly thirty entries, so the browsing pool is thinner. The trade is permanence and transparent measurement over sheer volume.