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

by Geoffrey A. Moore

First there is a market . . . Made up of innovators and early adopters, it is an early market, flush with enthusiasm and vision and, often as not, funded by a potful of customer dollars earmarked for accomplishing some grand strategic goal. Then there is no market . . . This is the chasm period, during which the early market is still trying to digest its ambitious projects, and the mainstream market waits to see if anything good will come of them. Then there is. If all goes well, and the product and your company pass through the chasm period intact, then a mainstream market does emerge, made up of the early and the late majority. With them comes the real opportunity for wealth and growth. To reap the rewards of the mainstream market, your marketing strategy must successfully respond to all three of these stages.