Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
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Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
1–10 of 18 posts
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#2I always thought this was obvious. The early adopters are the ones who are most likely to try a new service. Also since the majority of them will be in the programming field, they are most likely to be patient with your mistakes and give you invaluable advice and feedback. So, you can solve early issues and sort out the kinks.
Finally, if the service is good enough, they are the ones who will pass it on to their non-techie friends and families.
For the most part, the average person learns about a product or a service from their tech friends.
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#3I always thought this was obvious. The early adopters are the ones who are most likely to try a new service. Also since the majority of them will be in the programming field, they are most likely to be patient with your mistakes and give you invaluable advice and feedback. So, you can solve early issues and sort out the kinks. Finally, if the service is good enough, they are the ones who will pass it on to their non-…
While I agree with the post I think it's an error to assume the Innovators and Early Adopters will be programmers or even tech people.
There are Innovators and Early Adopters in every market and part of the job while wearing your Marketing hat is figuring out exactly who those Innovators and Early Adopters are and what they want. It's different for every market and every product.
I am an Early Adopter in some markets (Things I'm passionate about) and a Laggard in others (Televisions). It's an error to assume that all Early Adopters for all products share the same traits and background (Programming). Someone marketing a new TV to me is wasting their time, I'm not an Early Adopter of TVs. A better target for them might be the 20 something that plays a lot of video games - that person doesn't have to be a tech person just keenly understand the unique attributes of the TV that make it special to them and thereby an Early Adopter of that TV.
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#4Early adopters in any market are the people that have the most to gain and (more importantly) the least to lose by using your product.
For business-to-business products, the early adopters are often the underdogs (small or losing companies looking for any advantage against the market leaders).
For consumers, look for the hardcore fans of your market. The people that get an intellectual or emotional high from products in your space. Look for the crazy obsessed people.
Journalists are not early adopters (even ones that cover your market).
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#5I always thought this was obvious. The early adopters are the ones who are most likely to try a new service. Also since the majority of them will be in the programming field, they are most likely to be patient with your mistakes and give you invaluable advice and feedback. So, you can solve early issues and sort out the kinks. Finally, if the service is good enough, they are the ones who will pass it on to their non-…
While I agree with the post I think it's an error to assume the Innovators and Early Adopters will be programmers or even tech people. There are Innovators and Early Adopters in every market and part of the job while wearing your Marketing hat is figuring out exactly who those Innovators and Early Adopters are and what they want. It's different for every market and every product. I am an Early Adopter in some markets…
Sure, I was thinking primarily about software and web services.
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#6The question I've always had was, "how do you find the early adopters?" for any particular market or product. It's easier to note, when you know where they hang out to talk about the topic (forums, HN, etc). I've also seen the approach of taking out ads, online or offline.
Do you guys know of other ways to find early adopters?
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#7I think this guy is spot on. I just read the lean startup book last week and Eric Ries makes the point that if you can't get early adopters excited, yes excited then it's time to pivot.
But I think this quote by Trevor Owen says it best:
Building crack for a small group of users is much better than candy for a large group
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#8Malcolm Gladwell talks about this in "Tipping Point." Early adopters tend to be disproportionately passionate about the platforms they sample (they wouldn't be early adopters otherwise), and as a result more likely to share and report about their positive experience to friends, family, professional contacts, etc. as well as provide the most valuable customer feedback.
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
While I agree with the post I think it's an error to assume the Innovators and Early Adopters will be programmers or even tech people. There are Innovators and Early Adopters in every market and part of the job while wearing your Marketing hat is figuring out exactly who those Innovators and Early Adopters are and what they want. It's different for every market and every product. I am an Early Adopter in some markets…
Sure, I was thinking primarily about software and web services.
I am as well, actually. Unless you are building tools for programmers or techies I think it's dangerous to assume the Early Adopters of your software are also programmers or techies.
They could be but it's far from default.
Re: Why aren't you building your startup for early adopters?
#10I'd rather make crack for a few, than candy for the masses.