Be an Early Tech Adopter

Be an Early Tech Adopter

Not everyone is keen to be an early adopter for new technologies for various reasons, including fear of failure and high risk associated with the latest technology itself. Rather than be a first mover, some will choose to wait for others to take the first leap and be a follower instead. Adoption of new technology has no guarantee of success. However, there are many benefits to doing so. Among the benefits are the ability to use the latest technology to solve business challenges, opportunities to be featured as a success story and also the ability to avail new opportunities from utilising the new tech.

What is an Early Adopter?

Early adopters are the pioneer or first batch of customers to adopt a new product and/or technology before the majority of customers does. For most technology owners, early adopters are crucial in the development and to uncover the potential of an early-stage product or technology.

There are five stages of technology adoption:

• Innovators
• Early Adopters
• Early Majority
• Late Majority
• Laggards

1. Innovators

Innovators are the first adopters who are usually willing to take a risk and have higher risk tolerance.

2. Early Adopters

The early adopters are those who have the highest degree of opinion leadership.

3. Early Majority

Those in this stage seldom hold positions of opinion leadership.

4. Late Majority

This group are typically sceptical about innovation and have very little opinion leadership.

5. Laggards

Those in this category have an aversion to change-agents and tend to be focused on traditions and have little to no opinion leadership.

Similarly, for all other technology adoptions, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) may be viewed as an early tech adoption – especially with new developments and technologies such as ERP on the cloud and new functions & features such as predictive insights, artificial intelligence, business process automation and more.

Key Benefits As An Early Adopter

Pioneer User Group Privilege

If you are lucky enough to be a pioneer user of new technology, you will gain access to some of the best minds to fine-tune yours (and their) technology.

Your privilege as an early adopter also provide you with personalised service from professionals and experts in the area. You can get a better understanding of the functions and features of the ERP solution, and to get the assistance for the new technology that you are using.

Leverage on Free Publicity

Most of the time, technology owners are keen on promoting their new technologies with testimonials and highlights of customers who have adopted the technology at the early stage. You will have the opportunity to highlight your brand name and associate it with the use of new technology to improve your business offerings and services to your customer.

Most ERP vendors would appreciate those who discover the value of their new technology early and would usually reward these pioneer customers with free publicity for their brand on a myriad of PR activities. If you want to ride on free advertising from their campaigns, it is worth the while to take a leap of faith on the latest technologies.

During theMicrosoft Dynamics 365 global launch, Microsoft highlighted a few key customers who adopted the new platform early on which gave them invaluable PR worldwide. The value of publicity with a globally renowned brand like Microsoft is enormous and can’t be purchased with money. If you have been presented with opportunities to adopt a new technology or solution, hop onto the opportunity and get your brand far and wide!

Constant Innovation

Your competitors will be ahead of you in offering better products and services if you become a laggard in technology adoption. Continually innovating and being on the lookout for technology opportunities lets you stay ahead of the curve. Technology is a crucial enabler for business growth.

An ERP solution that packs new technologies such as AI (artificial intelligence), IoT and automation powers growth, enable the creation of new business models and improves the bottom line of any business. The value of these new technologies lies not on what they can achieve on its own but its combined power as a holistic solution.

In Conclusion

While organisations are aware of the excitement, benefits and dangers of adopting new technologies, it is understandable why they are cautious in spending on new technologies before inherent benefits can be determined. However, it is essential to remember that there is almost no chance of a reward without a little risk. At times, companies need to make the leap and be an early tech adopter if they want to leap ahead of competitors.

To stay ahead of the game and be an early adopter of the latest ERP technologies, contact us.