Daily Lab: “Scrubs are cheaper than booms.”
It’s never too late to improve your launch.
When it’s time to launch (a campaign, a product, an announcement, a promotion, a new service, or a new business), the pressure to just finish the thing builds exponentially toward the end.
After all that work, we often just want to get it over with, get it out there, and move on.
Usually, the last thing we want to do is find a reason to stop, or even pay attention to the building reasons to slow down and re-think things.
Like behavioral scientist Katy Milkman says, “If you’re going to fail, research shows people often feel they might as well do it with a bang.”
But remember the words of David Ogilvy: “It’s never too late to improve an ad.”
After billions of dollars and years of effort, when it’s time to put a rocket into space, the pressure to just launch is enormous. And the stress of being the person to say, “No, it’s not ready yet,” can be debilitating.
But as space industry commentator Tim Dodd put it so eloquently, “Scrubs are cheaper than booms.”
Usually, the only price we pay for scrubbing the launch—delaying a marketing or business announcement—is a social and emotional one, paid to our peers, our colleagues, and ourselves.
But the price we pay for launching something that isn’t right, isn’t good, or isn’t finished is paid in money, time, and opportunities.
So remember: Scrubs are cheaper than booms.
Launch it when it’s ready, but don’t launch what can’t take off.
