Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers

by Geoffrey A. Moore

High-tech innovation and marketing expertise are two cornerstones of the U.S. strategy for global competitiveness. We will never have the lowest cost of labor or raw materials, so we must continue to exploit advantages further up the value chain. If we cannot at least learn to predictably and successfully bring high-tech products to market, our countermeasures against the onslaught of commoditizing globalization will falter, placing our entire standard of living in jeopardy.

#yikes

From a marketing point of view, we are all subject to the “Emperor’s New Clothes” syndrome, but particularly so in high tech, where every player in the market has a vested interest in boosting the overall perception of the industry. Skeptics don’t buy our act. We ought to take advantage of that fact.

you do not have to pick the optimal beachhead to be successful. What you must do is win the beachhead you have picked. If there is a genuine problem in the segment, you will have the target customer pulling for you. If it is a hard problem, and the segment is reasonably small, you probably will not have competition to distract you. This means you can focus all your attention on the whole product, which is where it needs to be. Nail that and you win.