Before your buyer is ready to buy, they need to be prepared for change, as Ian shares.
The "Velocity" bit we get, they said, but the"B"? Ian explains our company name.
When we first shared our company name, the obvious question we were asked was: What is the B for? The Velocity is pretty obvious.
It's inspired by Series B - typically the second round of funding for a new company, at which point the pressure is on to scale.
The point in a company's early life when it’s captured all the beachhead early adopter customers from the founding team's immediate network, and it’s time to get serious about sales and marketing, and carve out some of the mainstream market.
It’s a precarious time for a growing company. The chances of survival for early-stage companies (pre-series B) are not good. According to PwC in 2024, startups (companies they consider pre-series B or similar) accounted for 46% of total company insolvencies, so getting fueled for the leap into growth is essential. There is little wiggle room in execution.
Typically, at this point, the product vision and development have been proven with early adopters. The product is viable; now it’s time to realize its potential, deliver a return on all the hard work and investment, and find that broader market.
Reaching a broader market means reaching and then engaging a more mainstream buyer, a buyer that is likely to be more conservative than those gung-ho early adopters. It will involve a process and more stakeholders. So we move from an empowered champion making a decision to a buying group.
A group that will need persuading. After all, any B2B product or solution is actually selling change, and in the mainstream, everyone loves change, except when it happens to them.
Our B is Business
Many growth companies face this same inflection point.
Not just young companies seeking Series B funding; established companies often face this critical challenge, perhaps after an investment injection, a product pivot, a leadership change, or a market shift, when awareness or revenue is in focus.
It is a time when sales and marketing execution is critical, when the business needs to gain some velocity.
In short, it’s time to get serious about sales and marketing.
So, the B we referred to earlier is not Series B, but Business.
Which is handy, as our specialty and our hard-won experience is in B2B.
It’s time to create ART - build awareness, create revenue, and develop trust in the market.
