You must "cross the chasm"

Hello everybody!

Just wanted to say

to you all and to the old quarter that has almost gone away...

Now we have to cross the line and then, immediately we'll be starting a new competion, the next quarter!!!

We are going to attend three classes on the next quarter. Among these is a very customized (just five of us!) class that will be focused mainly on how to prepare an appealing business plan.

The classes will be taken by Mr. Guillaume Decitre.

He's French but he has been living in California together with his family in the next 9 years. He's a venture capitalist.

He's really a nice person. We had french/italian breakfast with him while going through the syllabus... Europe sweet Europe...

He suggested us that we should read the book "Crossing the chasm" [by Geoffrey Moore] before our classes start .

Moore's basic thesis works off this picture:

The area of each segment corresponds roughly to the number of people who fit its profile.

The technology enthusiasts are the sort of people who jigger the microwave so they can cook their hands to "see what it feels like". (I know someone who did that. He said it feels weird.)

Visionaries are less oriented to exploration, more to exploitation. They are people who see breakthrough potential in some technology and are willing to brave hell and high water to realize that potential. From the vendor's point of view, the nice thing about both groups is that they're not too bothered by the fact that the product doesn't work. They're willing to make it work.

Pragmatists want a product that works. They are not interested in debugging it. They want to be able to hire people who've used it. They want to find books about it in the bookstore. If there's customization that's needed, they want to find third parties who can do it. Better yet, they want to buy third-party packages written for people just like them. In short, they don't just want a product. They want a 100% solution to their business problem. If they get the 80% that delighted the visionary, they feel cheated, and they tell their pragmatist friends.

Conservatives buy products because they really have no choice. They want products that are cheap and do their job as unobtrusively as possible. They are not reassured by the existence of books about the product, because it implies the product isn't simple enough to use.
Skeptics are not going to buy, though they may talk other people out of buying.

Technology adoption is supposed to go from left to right. The technology enthusiasts fiddle with a technology to discover if it's real. If it is, they tell the visionaries. The visionaries then will pass the good word on to the pragmatists. When you're the market leader among the pragmatists, you're finally making the money you promised in your business plan. You also have enough volume and experience that your products are cheap enough and undemanding enough for the conservatives. The skeptics can remain in their cabins in the woods.
The problem dealt with in Crossing the Chasm is that the visionaries aren't in fact good references for the pragmatists. They provide tales of heroics - not stories of smooth, predictable adoption. Pragmatists want references from other pragmatists. (Think about it: if your goal in life, like mine, is to do as little lawn work as possible while avoiding the censure of your neighbors, who do you ask for advice? The person who's out there every weekend tending their gorgeous lawn, or the person you never see?) Pragmatists want a safe buy from the market leader - but there isn't one yet. Crossing the Chasm is about getting the first toehold in the pragmatist market.

Thanks Guillaume for such an interesting and stimulating reading!

See you on April 2nd!

Emanuele