Discovery and Demos Across the Technology Adoption Curve
or
How to Avoid Crashing into the Chasm
(A Never Stop Learning! Article)
What’s in This Article for You?
- An example of crashing into and then escaping from the Chasm
- A Technology Adoption Curve refresh
- Symptoms and solutions to Chasm crashing
- Intriguing statistics and implications
- What about Laggards?
Plus, Three Take-aways:
- Why your current demos may no longer work.
- The level of proof required by prospects increases as you progress across the Curve.
- No Decision outcomes increase similarly.
Axioms
A “standard” demo will not fit all Curve categories.
Similarly, “standard” discovery does not apply to all Curve categories.
Very simply, for discovery and demos, one size does not fit all!
A Story
We had recently released our new flagship software which embodied the latest cutting-edge technologies. We had great success selling it to some of our existing customers and a few prospects, and then there was the terrible sound of nothing: no subsequent sales.
The balance of our prospects and existing customers didn’t resonate with our technology presentation. They didn’t understand our demo. Discovery, which had been previously seemed very effective, didn’t yield the expected results. We heard nothing but the sound of crickets in an empty room. Over 80% of our market was unresponsive.
What was happening?
My boss at that time was good friends with Geoffrey Moore, who was in the process of launching his “Crossing the Chasm” workshops, and Mr. Moore was invited to use us as a test case for his training.
It was highly successful. In the midst of the session, I exclaimed, “Holy cow – we’re in the Chasm…!”
What we learned and applied pulled us out of the chasm, resulting in a sales renaissance of our flagship, dominating the verticals that we addressed, and catapulting us towards the coveted $100 million annual revenue milestone.
You can find the balance of this article here – Enjoy!
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