Understanding Customer Adoption Patterns
- Post by: Griggs Zollinger
- January 17, 2021
- Comments off
Customer adoption patterns are important to understanding how to introduce and deliver new products and innovations. Without a clear understanding of what each type of adopter values, it can be difficult, if not impossible to deliver the necessary value throughout your organization.
In his book, Diffusion of Innovations (1962), Everett M Rogers the communication scholar and sociologist, describes five types of adopter for new innovations and provides insight into each type.
The 5 Adopter Types for New Products and Innovations
Rogers presents a social system for adopters of recent innovations; and the dynamics of adoption vary throughout the course of the product-life cycle as shown in the diagram above.
- Innovators
- Early Adopters
- Early Majority
- Late Majority
- Laggards
Innovators
Innovators are the first customers to try a new product. They are, by nature, risk takers and are excited by the possibilities of new ideas and new ways of doing things. Innovators typically have some connection to the scientific discipline in which a new product is created and will tend to socialize with other innovators in their chosen industry categories.
It’s also important to realize that innovators are comfortable with taking substantial risk. They are aware that some products they adopt will not deliver the benefits that are promised or will fail to win mass market appeal.
Early Adopters
Early adopters are the second wave of product purchasers following innovators. Early adopters are often the most influential people within an industry or market segment and they will often be seen as thought leaders by other potential adopters. They actively communicate with others in their social system, and often create industry buzz around new products they strongly like or dislike.
Early adopters will normally have high social status, access to financial resources, high levels of education and a willingness to accept risk. However, they do not take as many risks as innovators and tend to make more reasoned decisions as to whether or not to become involved in a particular product. They will try to obtain more information than an innovator in this decision-making process.
Early Majority
As a product begins to achieve mass market appeal, the next class of adopter is the early majority. This class of adopter prefers to avoid unnecessary risk and wants to be sure that their limited resources are spent wisely on new products. They are generally people with better than average social status and while not thought leaders in their own right – they will often be in contact with thought leaders and use the opinions of early adopters when making their adoption decisions.
Late Majority
The late majority is generally more skeptical about new products and innovations than the first three classes of adopters. They tend to put their resources towards tried and tested solutions only and are risk-averse. In general, this category of adopter has lower social status, and less interaction with innovators and early adopters than the other groups of adopters.
Laggards
Laggards are last to arrive in the adoption sequence and their arrival is typically a sign that a product-category is entering decline. Laggards value traditional methods of doing things and consistently avoid both change and risk. Typically, laggards rarely seek opinions outside of their own limited social set. In some cases, laggards are older people who are less familiar with technology than younger generations.
Biggest Misunderstanding
It is important to realize that these categories are useful for generic planning or market strategy development and should not be used to stereotype individuals.
The biggest misunderstanding related to customer adoption patterns is: a given person is not necessarily in the same adopter group in all situations. In other words, a person might be an early adopter of says mechanical innovations, but a late adopter of biological innovations.
This is why you will never identify an early adopter with a survey or through an online questionnaire. The past behavior of an early adopter means nothing in terms of future behavior.
Adding Customer Adoption Patterns to Your Corporate Strategy
If we know that the path taken for adoption runs from innovator to laggard with three stops on the way, we can optimize our market strategy accordingly.
Innovators will ideally come to you based on learning about your new technology through scientific channels. Your objective will be to gain the interest of these people, involve them in early user trials and generally win their support.
Early adopters will learn about your new product from innovators. You will need to support early adopters with additional technical insights and behind-the-scenes perspectives of development to encourage them to share their thoughts with those who follow their thought leadership.
The mainstream market must see the results obtained by early adopters, mostly through word-of-mouth communication.
The late majority will probably arrive as product differentiation occurs and the product has established itself as a standard in a particular market.
Laggards will adopt your product after it is going into decline, and they can get it for almost nothing in terms of cost and adoption risk. Low prices and imbedding the product into something else will most likely drive adoption from this group.
The Take Away
There are five types of adopters for new products; innovators, early adopters, the early majority, the late majority and laggards. Understanding how different adopter types influence the product lifecycle is the key to market leadership and sustained business success.
In all cases, it is far better to adapt a technology to the user than to force the user to adapt to the technology. The ultimate key to customer adoption is reinvention, which means to completely reinvent the product so it is acceptable to each adopter type.