Crossing the Chasm

Crossing the Chasm is hard work, and it can happen invisibly, or it may never happen. But even after the chasm, your work is really not done until you can confidently claim that you’re penetrating the Early Majority. Until then - you’re still a startup on the verge of death. That’s why you, as a founder or marketer, have to understand and internalize the adoption curve.

When I hear people stating that crypto has achieved mass adoption, I think they miss the point. Mainstream adoption is what = mass adoption. That is when you cross the chasm, onboard the Early Majority, and you’re cruising through the rest. That’s the mass adoption. You have to be past the middle part of the adoption curve. More than 50% of the potential addressable market is using your technology.

Web3 and crypto are very far from that now. But we have all the tech needed - now we only need people to stop building for the crypto crowd and build for normal people -> i.e. blending web2 and web3 in invisible and fun/easy-to-use ways, e.g. like Winny with Chipped is trying to do.

Don't Take The Numbers Literally

I know people often get hung up on numbers. The typical adoption curve numbers are below on the graph. They’re not exact numbers and they don’t have to be! Because it is ok to know roughly who are those experimenters and never-satisfied restless souls that go and try everything they can get their hands on. 

In the past, this 2.5% are the folks who were always running ahead of the hoard. They were the ones to go and try new things - like new fruits, catch and eat new animals, try to make fire with a lightning, etched. In the past, they would mostly die during these experiments, but it would keep the rest of the hoard safe. Occasionally, they would find something cool new to eat or would have luck with making a fire with stones. The rest of the hoard would benefit and we’d move to better future. 

The point I’m trying to make here is - that by nature there can’t be too many of these experimenters. They were nature’s way of preserving our species.

When looking at the numbers, don’t forget that the demographic and psychographic profiles of each adoption group were originally specified by agricultural researchers in 1956. There are many modifications since, but don’t take it too religiously in terms of numbers. The logic is sound, and numbers are directionally correct. That’s all. 

Innovators can be many

Among 7 billion people, innovators crowd can be as large as 200 million people. Assuming the chasm will be in the middle of the Early Adopters curve - it would mean there should be at least 650 million people using crypto before we get to the real chasm crossing. 

When I had regular coaching clients, I would run through the adoption curve discussion every month. It’s not about knowing how the curve looks, for entrepreneurs, product managers, marketing and GTM folks, it’s about internalising it. It needs to be one of the lenses you use to look at your numbers, your conversations and your team conclusions about what’s happening. If not, you maybe fooling yourself about mass adoption.

One last note; your project may not kill the person, but it will certainly consume some of their time, and we all know life is short, so be immensely appreciative of all early adopters. The louder they complain the better job they're doing 😉.

I hope you found something interesting in today's post. If you like it - bring your friends - they may love it as well! I

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