Technology Evangelism

The goal of technology evangelism is the establishment of a new technology as a de facto standard within a given market. In markets dominated by network effects, the status quo tends to be locked in, making it impervious to alternative technologies that offer only minor advantages. However, these same network effects tend to favor new technologies that offer disruptive advantages, such as being simple, cheap, powerful, and unique.

The technology evangelist’s job is the creation of a critical mass of support for a new technology. Once critical mass is reached, the new technology becomes self-evangelizing, and the technology evangelist’s efforts can be invested in some other new technology.

In evangelism, speed is critical. The new technology must reach critical mass before the status quo’s backers can blunt its momentum – because change is always resisted. Once critical mass is reached, a new status quo will emerge, centered on the evangelist’s new technology.

The technology’s evangelist must:

• create materials that facilitate each potential adopter’s progress through the decision process,
• bring these materials to the attention of those potential adopters who have the most leverage (see below),
• organize a system of incentives to encourage early adopters to actively engage their leverage on behalf of the new technology, and
• drive a public relations campaign to publicize the early adopters’ support of the new technology, thereby
• maximizing the technology’s benefit from bandwagon effects and social proof.

Leverage is the ability to get other potential adopters to adopt whatever technology you adopt. The more people your technology adoption influences, and the more powerful your influence on each such person, the more leverage you have. Identification and exploitation of leverage is the key to efficient evangelism.

At each stage of the technology evangelism process, the technology evangelist's focus must always be on ensuring that the adopters of the new technology gain compelling benefits (a) directly, from adopting the new technology, and (b) indirectly, from getting others to adopt the new technology, too. "Ask not what your adopters can do for your technology; ask what your technology can do for your adopters." (Unless your technology is a whole lot better, don't even ask that.)