I believe if everyone who was against the current oligarchy started placing guillotine stickers everywhere, like you might for a favorite band, people would feel less isolated in their distaste for the current system.
And in an ideal world those who the guillotines are for might realize just how much they are in the minority.
That depends on how you define success. It also depends on how you define revolution. If the French Revolution can be defined as ending when Napoleon crowned himself Emperor, then I think that qualifies as a failed revolution.
But there’s been successful revolutions, so the cycle of violence does not always escalate.
The cycle will escalate until it is broken. How long it runs before it gets broken might be a useful part in defining “successful revolution”: the successful ones break the cycle of violence as early as possible.