The amplitude of the curve, as shown in the accompanying graph, indicates strength of demand by each group. A famous corollary of the life cycle theory was laid out in Geoffrey A. Moore's book, Crossing the Chasm. That's because each market segment is separated from the previous segment by a marketing chasm. So marketers must create specific strategies for reaching each new segment-i.e., offer a value proposition compelling enough to energize the new segment. Here's our analysis of the five market segments.
Innovators have a core faith that credible new technologies are likely to make good things happen.
Like this columnist, they signed up for an account at Security First Network Bank as soon as it opened its virtual doors in the fall of 1995. Early adopters are just a few steps behind innovators. They, too, have an affinity for new technology. Not for its own sake, but because they are quick to believe that Web banking holds the promise of helping them solve some other problems in their business or private lives. We are now in the middle of the early-adopter phase, which will probably last through 1999.