Not all growth is created equal.
There is growth that is a result of manipulation and growth that is a result of the syndication of truth.
Today in #agtech, many have forgotten this.
Now that capital is hard to come by, companies are looking for someone to help them “growth hack” their business before they’ve sufficiently proven their value.
- “We just need more leads.”
- “How can we get more demos booked?”
- “We need to hit $10M in ARR.”
- “WE NEED TO GET THE WORD OUT!”
The issue with this type of thinking is that it tends to happen out of order.
1. First, you need a contrarian insight - what is the secret that you, your customers, and your investors are in on together?
2. Then, you need to figure out how to deliver value inside your established framework. Who benefits from this? Who is the user? Who will the buyer be? How do you communicate with them so that they see the world the way you do?
3. Then and only then can you turn your efforts towards actual growth strategies.
The problem for most companies is that they skip the first two steps and jump straight to number 3.
They solve an obvious problem that everyone understands. They give away a few free trials and make some small sales before jumping into “growth mode.”
Then they run out of money. The problem is that they never validated their value hypothesis.
And as a result, they turn their marketing into a manipulation exercise rather than a mentoring opportunity.
It’s the difference between an evangelist and a carnival barker. Both are selling something, but it’s a very different experience with a very different outcome.
If you’re running an enterprise sales motion like almost every agtech company, you’re not at a place for testing your growth hypothesis until your sales contribution is equal to the cost to field the sales team.
This is Mark Leslie’s famous “Sales Learning Curve.”
- Until that point, marketing means building a story.
- Until that point, marketing should be predominantly organic.
- Until you have moved up the sales learning curve, you need to refine your message to teach the world to believe what you believe.
That’s how you change the future and realize your long-term vision. But it takes an extraordinary amount of courage.
What will you choose?
Make something different. Make people care. Make fans, not followers.