Early Adopter Strategy

Early adopters are not representative of your eventual mainstream customers. They're more tolerant of bugs, more willing to engage with founders, more opinionated about features, and more likely to churn if the product doesn't move fast enough. Geoffrey Moore's 'Crossing the Chasm' is still the best framework for understanding this — early adopters and the early majority want fundamentally different things. For accessibility/healthcare apps, early adopters are often: progressive OT practitioners who are actively looking for better tools and are frustrated with paper-based workflows; tech-forward aged care providers experimenting with digital transformation; and individual carers who are highly motivated by a personal situation (a parent who fell, a sibling with a disability). These people will give you detailed, honest feedback — and they'll advocate loudly if you solve their problem. Identify your early adopters before launch through the channels where they self-identify as engaged and curious: OT Australia professional development events, NDIS provider online communities (Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups), and aged care industry conferences. Offer them beta access, personal founder attention, and genuine influence over the product roadmap.

The biggest mistake with early adopters is treating them like regular users. They deserve more access: direct communication channel (Slack community, WhatsApp group, private Discord), regular video calls with the founder, a visible product roadmap they can comment on, and genuine responsiveness when they report bugs or request features. Build a formal Customer Advisory Board (CAB) of 5–8 early adopters. Meet quarterly. Show them unreleased features. Ask hard questions: 'What would make you stop using this?' 'What would you tell a colleague who asked about it?' 'What feature would make you recommend this to every OT you know?' Their answers are more valuable than any user research report. The path from early adopter to reference customer is your most valuable sales asset. An early adopter who says 'I use BathCheck for every assessment I do and I'd never go back to paper forms' — on video, with their name and organisation — is worth 10 landing pages. Work deliberately to convert your best early adopters into public case studies.