Last Steps

Developing brand-new products is not the last step. Before we are finished, we have to market the new product to our customers. This is a special challenge for unprecedented products. Not only do we have to deal with the issues of choice and loyalty, but first we have to get the interest of the customer.

Marketing Brand-New Products

This may require a paradigm shiftand for any significant change in the customer's world, there will be resistance. To work through the resistance effectively, we must understand the layers of resistance (see the next section).

A classic software example was when Lotus Notes first entered the marketplace. The term groupware was not widely understood, and the package initially had only the basic capability to build applications. It is very difficult to demonstrate the value of groupware when no one in your group is using it yet.

Think of the layers of resistance as the customer's defense-in-depth against bad innovationsso they won't harm them. "No resistance" to innovation is not goodfor people or for organizations. Good new products will (eventually) make it through the resistance, but we can accelerate the process. The layers of resistance will need to be worked through, carefully, point by point.