Every Kairo project goes through a structured pre-launch audit before a single page goes live. This is the Notion template we use internally — adapted for external teams with owner assignment, status tracking, and a sign-off column so nothing reaches production without deliberate approval.
Why a Notion Template, Not a PDF
PDF checklists get ticked once and forgotten. A living Notion template becomes part of the project — it holds status, owners, notes, and sign-off in one place. It can be linked from the project brief, referenced in standups, and reviewed asynchronously by client and agency without a meeting.
The template is structured as a Notion database with a Board view for visual status and a Table view for bulk review. Each checklist item has: Status (Not Started / In Progress / Pass / Fail / N/A), Owner (person responsible), Due date, and a Notes field for issue details or links to evidence.
Template Structure
- Section 1 — Technical Foundations (8 items): SSL, DNS, 404s, robots.txt, sitemap, API key scoping
- Section 2 — Forms and Core Flows (6 items): all forms end-to-end, payment flows, auth, search
- Section 3 — Performance (8 items): Lighthouse scores, Core Web Vitals, image formats, CDN, font loading
- Section 4 — SEO (8 items): title tags, meta descriptions, H1s, OG tags, canonicals, alt text
- Section 5 — Design and Content (8 items): placeholder removal, copy proofread, images licenced, 404 page, legal pages
- Section 6 — Accessibility (7 items): contrast, keyboard nav, focus states, form labels, alt text, colour-only content
- Section 7 — Analytics (6 items): tracking verified, conversion events, session recording, cookie consent, Search Console
- Section 8 — Cross-Device QA (6 items): real iOS Safari, Android Chrome, viewport breakpoints, touch navigation
How We Use It on Projects
We duplicate the template at project kick-off and assign each section to a team member. Engineers own Technical Foundations, Performance, and Forms. Designers own Design and Content, Accessibility, and Cross-Device QA. The project lead owns SEO and Analytics. Each owner reviews their section independently, then the project lead does a cross-section review before sign-off.
Team Protocol
No project goes live with any Section 1 or Section 2 item in a Fail state. Sections 3–8 target 80% Pass before launch; any remaining Fails are documented with a post-launch resolution date and owner.
Customising for Your Stack
The template ships with generic criteria, but the Notes field is designed for stack-specific detail. If you use Vercel, your CDN check looks different from a team on AWS CloudFront. If you use a headless CMS, your robots.txt configuration is more complex. The Notes field is where you document the stack-specific validation step rather than changing the item itself — so the checklist stays reusable across projects.
Issues found vs ad-hoc QA
Before
Ad hoc review
After
This template
Post-launch critical fixes
Before
Without audit
After
With audit
Time to complete audit
Before
Ad hoc (avg 4.5 hrs)
After
Structured
Downloads to date
Before
After
Notion template
“We duplicated this template on our last three projects. The section-owner model means nothing gets lost in handoffs — every person knows exactly what they're responsible for and there's one place to see the full launch readiness picture.”
— Engineering Lead, Digital Agency