the goose

In 1997, a freshly minted Saatchi & Saatchi were handed a brief by the Conservative government to discourage teens from smoking via the all-powerful medium of advertising.  Setting about the task, running focus groups and unleashing their creative juices, they started to realise a basic flaw in the traditional model.

Millions upon millions of pounds were spent, worldwide, telling young’un’s that “Cigaretets Kill”. Something we all know but mostly only those in their 30’s or older pay much attention to.

Why?

Dissonance

Telling young people that they will die from smoking contravenes a rather self-evident truth:  young people don’t die.  Certainly not in general and you would be unlucky to have reached the age of 13 (when most people start smoking) to have known anyone in your peer group that had passed on.

Saatchi & Saatchi changed tack and instead started running advertising pointing out how gross your breath smells after a cigarette.  Something that rings true and is oh so important when your still trying to get off your mark with Priscilla in 6b.

So here is the rub.  Entrepreneurs in Ireland don’t make it big.  We don’t really celebrate the successes and I think there is a tendency to expect failure.  This is especially acute when it comes to funded businesses.  At least two founders who raised multiple millions of dollars have both told me that they tell their founders that there was a 90% chance of failure.  Accurate and laudable as it may be – the intention can’t be helpful towards achieving success.

How can we plan on building world-class ‘google’ type businesses when there is no precedence for it?  It doesn’t make sense to encourage people to startup when the expectations for success are so low.

Contrast this with a plumber/accountant/solicitor/carpenter setting up a new business.  While they may be more ’self-employed’ than ‘running a business’ – it seems far more real and natural that these types of business make it.  We all know successful people in these fields.  Meanwhile I’ve been trying to build an online business for the last 10 years and I’ve met only a handful of successes (and believe me I had to dig to find them).

To encourage startups and avoid talking out of both sides of our mouths, we need to reset expectations of indigenous startups towards success.  Online businesses have a heritage in high risk funding backed ventures, but things have changed and the web has become more mature.  There is no reason that 90% of ventures should fail.  The business models that work are out there and available to be exploited.  Beyond that, even if individual ventures do not succeed, subsequent ventures by the same entrepreneur can and probably will.