David talks about the need for “clinician-scientists [hoping] to advocate their research findings” to read and familiarize themselves with Moore’s theory of crossing the chasm.

I’ve been thinking about the process of how to best introduce significant ideas and I think many of the elements of Moore’s thesis apply.

Then I started to think that most of the elements of the theory apply to introducing… anything!

Whether you’re trying to introduce a high-tech product, a fruit (ala Seth Godin’s Purple Cow), or an idea to a market you should always single out your target market and build a suitable marketing strategy.

Are you fresh out of school? You’re introducing yourself to the world - approach the next steps of your life with strategies analagous to “crossing the chasm”. Same for starting a blog, starting a club or organization, starting a company, or advocating research findings.

What do you think? Am I way off base here? Can you think of an example when you’re introducing/launching something where it doesn’t make sense to follow the strategy?

[Bonus: I was fortunate enough to spend the weekend in San Diego with my Dad. Driving back up to LA last night I heard a great song on the radio: Dark Side of the Cop - Shaky Little Rules. You can listen to a stream of it on their web site. Click on “music” and then on the car picture (third one down) — the text in the photo should say “Summertime blues got in line with the others / Five guys in a car with imaginery lovers”). I wasn’t going to share this because of the nuisance of tracking down the stream, but the song is too good. Wouldn’t it be more beneficial for the group to let their music spread free and wild at this point?]


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Products, Ideas & The Chasm

Welcome to the conversation.

Hi, I'm Fraser and this is my personal site where I write about the things I'm interested in: start-up strategy, the web, music, and life.

My days are spent commercializing emerging technologies. Currently I'm helping to deliver the promise of semantic web to the consumer market at AdaptiveBlue. Previously I was at Trivaris, a Canadian seed stage investment firm.

I am a co-founder of Innovation Night, a community driven event supporting entrepreneurship in Canadian and US cities.

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