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An early adopter or lighthouse customer is an early
The relationship is
customer
In sales, commerce, and economics, a customer (sometimes known as a client, buyer, or purchaser) is the recipient of a good, service, product or an idea - obtained from a seller, vendor, or supplier via a financial transaction or exchan ...
of a given company
A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of people, whether natural, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specific, declared ...
, product
Product may refer to:
Business
* Product (business), an item that serves as a solution to a specific consumer problem.
* Product (project management), a deliverable or set of deliverables that contribute to a business solution
Mathematics
* Produ ...
, or technology
Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, scien ...
. The term originates from Everett M. Rogers
Everett M. "Ev" Rogers (March 6, 1931 – October 21, 2004) was an American communication theorist and sociologist, who originated the ''diffusion of innovations'' theory and introduced the term ''early adopter''. He was distinguished professor em ...
' ''Diffusion of Innovations
Diffusion of innovations is a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread. Everett Rogers, a professor of communication studies, popularized the theory in his book ''Diffusion of Innovations''; the boo ...
'' (1962).
History
Typically, early adopters are customers who, in addition to using the vendor's product or technology, also provide considerable and candid feedback to help the vendor refine its future product releases, as well as the associated means of distribution, service, and support. Early adoption could also be referred to as a form of testing in the early stages of a project.
The relationship is synergistic
Synergy is an interaction or cooperation giving rise to a whole that is greater than the simple sum of its parts. The term ''synergy'' comes from the Attic Greek word συνεργία ' from ', , meaning "working together".
History
In Christia ...
. The customer receives early (and sometimes unique, or at least uniquely early) access to an advantageous new product or technology. In return, the customer may also serve as a kind of guinea pig
The guinea pig or domestic guinea pig (''Cavia porcellus''), also known as the cavy or domestic cavy (), is a species of rodent belonging to the genus '' Cavia'' in the family Caviidae. Breeders tend to use the word ''cavy'' to describe the ...
.
In exchange for being an early adopter, and thus being exposed to the problems, risks, and annoyances common to early-stage product testing and deployment, the "lighthouse customer" is sometimes given especially attentive vendor assistance and support, even to the point of having personnel at the customer's work site to assist with implementation. The customer is sometimes given preferential pricing, terms, and conditions, although new technology is often very expensive, so the early adopter still often pays quite a lot.
The vendor, on the other hand, benefits from receiving early revenues, and also from a lighthouse customer's endorsement and assistance in further developing the product and its go-to-market mechanisms. Acquiring lighthouse customers is a common step in new product development and implementation. The real-world focus that this type of relationship can bring to a vendor can be extremely valuable.
Early adoption does come with pitfalls: early versions of products may be buggy and/or prone to malfunction. Furthermore, more efficient, and sometimes less expensive, versions of the product usually appear a few months after the initial release ( Apple iPhone). The trend of new technology costing more at release is often referred to as the "early adopter tax".
See also
*Alpha consumer
An alpha consumer is someone that plays a key role in connecting with the concept behind a product, then adopting that product, and finally validating it for the rest of society. The term was coined by entertainment economist Michael Wolf in 1999 ...
* Beta test
A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...
* Coolhunting
Coolhunting is a neologism coined in the early 1990s referring to a new kind of marketing professionals who make observations and predictions in changes of new or existing "cool" cultural fads and trends. Coolhunting is also referred to as "tre ...
* '' Crossing the Chasm''
* Diffusion (business)
Diffusion is the process by which a new idea or new product is accepted by the market. The rate of diffusion is the speed with which the new idea spreads from one consumer to the next. Adoption (the reciprocal process as viewed from a consumer pe ...
* Diffusion of innovations
Diffusion of innovations is a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread. Everett Rogers, a professor of communication studies, popularized the theory in his book ''Diffusion of Innovations''; the boo ...
* Dominance (economics)
* Eating your own dog food
* Eric von Hippel
Eric von Hippel (born August 27, 1941) is an American economist and a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, specializing in the nature and economics of distributed and open innovation. He is best known for his work in developing the ...
* Experimental techniques
The design of experiments (DOE, DOX, or experimental design) is the design of any task that aims to describe and explain the variation of information under conditions that are hypothesized to reflect the variation. The term is generally associ ...
* Focus group
A focus group is a group interview involving a small number of demographically similar people or participants who have other common traits/experiences. Their reactions to specific researcher/evaluator-posed questions are studied. Focus groups are ...
* Hipsters
* Innovation
Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a new or changed enti ...
* Lead user
* Learning-by-doing (economics)
Learning-by-doing is a concept in economic theory by which productivity is achieved through practice, self-perfection and minor innovations. An example is a factory that increases output by learning how to use equipment better without adding wo ...
* Marketing
Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...
* Observational techniques In marketing and the social sciences, observational research (or field research) is a social research technique that involves the direct observation of phenomena in their natural setting. This differentiates it from experimental research in which a ...
* Participatory design
Participatory design (originally co-operative design, now often co-design) is an approach to design attempting to actively involve all stakeholders (e.g. employees, partners, customers, citizens, end users) in the design process to help ensure t ...
* Product lifecycle management
In industry, Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) is the process of managing the entire lifecycle of a product from its inception through the engineering, design and manufacture, as well as the service and disposal of manufactured products. PL ...
* Qualitative marketing research
* Quantitative marketing research
Quantitative marketing research is the application of quantitative research techniques to the field of marketing research. It has roots in both the positivist view of the world, and the modern marketing viewpoint that marketing is an interactive ...
* Technology adoption lifecycle
* Toolkits for user innovation
* User innovation
__NOTOC__
User innovation refers to innovation by intermediate users (e.g. user firms) or consumer users (individual end-users or user communities), rather than by suppliers (producers or manufacturers). This is a concept closely aligned to co-des ...
* Empathic design
Empathic design is a user-centered design approach that pays attention to the user's feelings toward a product. The empathic design process is sometimes mistakenly referred to as ''empathetic'' design.
Characteristics
The foundation of empat ...
* Whole Product In marketing, the whole product concept is an adaptation of the total product concept developed by Ted Levitt, a professor at Harvard Business School. In his book entitled “The Marketing Imagination” Levitt drew attention to the fact that consu ...
References
zh-yue:早期客 {{DEFAULTSORT:Early Adopter Diffusion Innovation economics Innovation Product development Memetics Science and technology studies Stage theories Sociology of culture Technological change