Escape velocity

“Escape velocity” is a physics term referring to the speed at which a body must travel to break free from or “escape” the gravitational pull of another, larger body. In simpler, more down-to-earth terms, it is the minimum speed at which a rocket must travel to reach space by “escaping” Earth's gravitational pull.

I constantly witness the creation and collapse of new businesses of every kind, from bars, restaurants, and shops in the neighborhood where I live to digital projects and client startups. Many times these failures occur because the business never achieves that “escape velocity.” A rocket trying to leave Earth uses all its power, all its fuel, during those first moments of the journey. In the same way, a business should use all its resources for “liftoff.”

What happens is this: many business owners—if it is even fair to call them that—or “entrepreneurs,” as everyone wants to call themselves now, invest time, effort, and money before starting the business, but not at the moment of launch. I have seen premises remodeled and even built, decorated, fitted out, and left in perfect condition for opening a new store or restaurant, but when launch time comes, the owners no longer want to spend a cent on promotion and advertising. Without investing in advertising, how do they expect to gain traction?

Physical businesses are at least there on the street for people to see, but digital businesses are not, so they are in an even worse position. For some reason, business owners have bought into the myth that putting their product or service on the Internet will expose it to millions of people and make them rich without any further effort. Orders will come in from all over the world; they will have more work than they can handle. The reality is completely different. You can have the best product or service, promoted or sold through the best website in the world, and nobody—absolutely nobody—will see it. Without a proper advertising campaign, preceded by a promotional strategy, nobody will hire your service or buy your products.

Not long ago, we dealt with a startup participating in a business incubation program at Universidad Panamericana. They wanted a website to promote their product—the nature of which I cannot reveal—which, despite being useful and innovative, is not aspirational. After several proposals, and several weeks, trying to adapt to their needs without exceeding their budget, we reached an agreement, substituting some things for others to make it work. At that point, they told us that in 20 business days they needed to present their project to a university board and had to have the website ready for that presentation. This was not ideal. Rushing things is never ideal, especially a design, but it was possible. The worst part, however, was that supposedly one requirement they had to meet when presenting their project was already having people interested in the product who had contacted them through the website. So this prospect's logic was that they wanted us to build the website in 10 days, then keep it online for 10 days to receive inquiries. THEY ARE CRAZY! I had to explain that their goal was impossible: even with the website ready in 10 days, they could not attract anyone interested during the next 10 days—not even in six months or a year if they did not conduct an online advertising campaign for their product. “OK, and how much would that cost us?” they asked.

What kind of question is that? It is not about how much it will cost you; it is about how much you plan to invest. You should allocate an advertising budget for one year and, based on that budget, examine the options for investing it. I cannot tell you how much to invest. It is not my bank account. If you ask me how much, my answer will be as much as you possibly can, and I do not know how much that is for you. I can tell you the best way to invest your budget, but I do not know the balance of your bank account. And suppose they had told us, “OK, we have one million pesos to invest in advertising.” It would have made no difference, because 10 days is not even enough time to plan a strategy, much less launch an advertising campaign, much less generate leads or inquiries from interested people. Naturally, we had to stay out of that project. We cannot do impossible things, much less promise them. I do not know what became of that startup, but I know its future does not look very promising.

Without escape velocity, no business can succeed. It is important to understand that, when it comes to business, one factor in escape velocity is time: how long can you sustain enough power to gain traction, to reach inertia? In a business, you must manage that power so you can remain at escape velocity for as long as possible. For example, an advertising campaign costing one million pesos will generally be more effective if that million is spent over a year rather than over 10 days—at least as far as online advertising is concerned. Why? Because over time you acquire intelligence about user behavior. You discover which kinds of ads generate more traffic, which keywords are more appealing, and which website structure produces more conversions, et cetera. Even the color, size, and position of a button can be changed to produce more conversions—prospects becoming clients—thanks to information gathered over months of managing a campaign.

We have missed out on many projects and lost many potential clients by trying to make business owners understand this reality. When they ask us to quote a website, one of the first subjects we raise in the initial meeting with the prospect is how they plan to promote the website so it receives traffic and therefore produces conversions. The vast majority of these potential clients—almost all of them—do not have the slightest idea. In fact, it had never occurred to them that they would need to promote it, as though they did not know how the world works, as though they had just been born and were only beginning to discover it.

So we explain that without promoting the website, they will not make a single sale, and that almost automatically rules us out for them. Some of them, as if a blindfold had suddenly fallen from their eyes, understand that they do indeed need to advertise. Then we explain that a year-long campaign needs to be planned, that it is not magic, and that months will pass before they see results. They will see them, but they will not be immediate... and that almost always rules us out for many more potential clients.

And some—only a very few—decide to continue the process and work with us. From my point of view, it is better to work with a few clients whose businesses succeed than with many clients whose businesses fail.

Sadly, business owners end up either trusting in luck, entrusting themselves to the Virgin, or working with an agency or studio that promises them fast, cheap results that are, of course, false.

And that is how we have ended up surrounded by business owners and entrepreneurs who constantly open businesses only to close them before the year is over because they never achieved that escape velocity. Confused, without a clue what they did wrong, they blame luck, the market, or the country's eternal “financial crisis,” which they always hide behind.