Techno‐Ready Marketing: How and Why Your Customers Adopt Technology

Technology dominates the marketplace today, whether it be its sale or its use. Business professionals can hardly have any conversation without using or referring to some form of technology. Techno‐Ready Marketing is a timely book providing a profile of the five categories of technology customers, based on a Technological Readiness Index, and how to market to them. The first half of the book covers the assumptions of the researchers, the instrument, and the results of the research. Chapters 6‐9 apply the results to marketing decisions, while the concluding chapter briefly discusses implications for nonprofit organizations. This book complements the current focus on customer‐driven marketing and offers solid advice, but the case for the uniqueness of this product category in a marketing effort isn’t strong. The data and application may be applied to any product category that has a degree of sophistication and some attending consumer risk. Also, the authors do not adequately explain how they come to their most significant findings.

Well written, clearly explained, and easy reading, Techno‐Ready Marketing begins with the authors’ underlying assumptions and the assertion of four core principles, arguing that the consumer adoption of technology is different than with any other product category. Consequently, it requires distinctive marketing strategies, it increases the importance of customer satisfaction and emphasizes the need to generate critical mass in markets. Using examples ranging from the acceptance of the early railroad to AOL’s triumph over CompuServe in the ISP market due to its ease of use, the authors suggest the technological adoption process is both historic and unique; “the influence of technology is ancient … archetypical”.

Parasuraman and Coby use chapter 2 and chapter 3 to explain technological readiness (TR) but sidetrack briefly on the corollary issue of e‐commerce. This “sidebar” is used to introduce their first research, the National Technology Readiness Survey (NTRS), conducted in 1999. An abbreviated example of the NTRS is included. The Technology Readiness Index (TRI) is then outlined in chapter 3. While the TRI is apparently a quantitative instrument – based on the continual reference to empirical data throughout the book – the authors assert that the TRI is more of a state of mind than a measure of technological competence. The instrument is built around four sets of terms, and correlates key forms of technology with consumer receptiveness to new technology. The terms are arranged in polar sets: optimism versus discomfort and innovativeness versus insecurity. The first set are “contributors” that increase the individual’s TR and the second are “inhibitors” having the opposite effect. The reason I keep using “seems to”, “apparently”, etc., is that the actual methodology and instrument are not revealed. Perhaps as a consulting firm the authors seek to keep the process proprietary, but this lack makes it difficult to access the validity and reliability of their findings. The research seemingly offers makers and marketers valuable information for increasing consumer purchases of technology‐based products, such as increasing consumer control over the product’s action, providing effective technical service support, etc. However, there is no way for the reader to validate the proposed customer profiles or the resulting applications of the data for himself/herself.

Chapters 4 and 5 must be read together as the latter provides the majority of the support for the introduction in the former. The five‐category typology of technology customers outlined in chapter 4 is reminiscent of the typical consumer behavior adoption process for any new product, ranging from the early adopter to the laggard. Each category also corresponds to the stages of the product life cycle, in that each is dominant at a specific time in a technology’s demand curve. In their introduction of the typology in chapter 4 Parasuraman and Coby offer skeletal descriptions of each and the practical implications. For example, the pivotal category, “Pioneers,” represents a large segment that has a positive attitude toward technology and willingness to innovate. To encourage their adoption of technology the authors suggest that the product must be shown to be safe to overcome their doubts and discomfort, and that capturing this segment accelerates the growth of the demand curve for any given technology product. Chapter 5 then lays out a more complete picture of each type. The data and descriptions are quite engaging but there is an important omission – any documentation as to the validity of the profiles. While each profile offers both qualitative and quantitative elements, the only linkage to any verifiable source are periodic references to their own study. I can understand the authors not wanting to bore the reader of a popular trade book with research detail, but they need to offer at least an appendix or notation more completely explaining their process. Currently, the reader has no idea of how these profiles were generated nor of their validity. This becomes problematic when seeming contradictions arise. In chapter 4, the “Pioneer” category is described with terms such as discomfort and insecurity. Then in chapter 5 they have “positive views and willingness to innovate”. The reader cannot reconcile the two sets of descriptors because of the lack of information on research methodology.

In chapter 6 the authors shift from the data to its application. Their application is consistent with the current marketing emphasis on customer relationship management (CRM). They suggest that the quality of service to the customer is the only viable sustainable competitive advantage. Parasuraman and Coby offer a pyramid of three types of marketing to make their point: internal, interactive, and external. External marketing is simply traditional marketing. Internal marketing is a mindset of considering employees as part of the customer base of a company. Interactive marketing is building customer loyalty through the linkage between employee and customer. They develop the role of technology in each of these marketing arenas. Parasuraman and Coby’s emphasis on the need to consider the employee as a “customer” and to rethink the employee‐customer relationship is valuable advice. But is that not true of any effective CRM process, not just technological products?

The substance of application is in the four strategies for acquiring technology customers; technology evangelism, future‐ready design, proving benefits, and market‐staging pricing, discussed in chapter 7. These strategies range from leveraging the influence of technology opinion leaders to issues of proper timing, proving benefits, and pricing appropriately. Returning to examples of successes and failures, Parasuraman and Coby show how future‐ready design – the timing issue – is vital to the successful introduction of a technology‐based product. This chapter is worth the price of the book. The practical examples, the specific strategies, offer some significant food for thought for marketers and manufacturers. The combination of the first two strategies, leverage and access, provide fodder for the grist mill as marketers contemplate how to best design and position their products to consumers with varying levels of technological sophistication and readiness. The second set of strategies, proving benefits, and market‐stage pricing, simply reapply managing customer perceived risk in a purchase decision and pricing based on product life cycle.

Satisfying the technology customer, the third key principle of Techno‐Ready Marketing, is the focus of chapter 8. Parasuraman and Coby make a strong and effective argument for customer‐focused marketing, offering excellent practical suggestions with ample examples of strong effective customer service and service support. They identify six criteria – intuitive, efficient, responsiveness, assuring, compatibility, and reliability – which should shape the customer‐service effort. Yet, once again, these seem to be the same criteria for any type of effective customer service. Obviously, the expense, sophistication, and consequential increased risk to the consumer of a technological purchase increased the importance of service by degree, but it does not seem to be all that unique to technology.

The techno‐ready marketing audit of chapter 9 is a powerful closing chapter. While chapter 10 offers some insights into the application of TRI to the non‐profit arena, its brevity minimizes its value. The audit is a powerful tool for assessing the technological adeptness of a firm in its interaction with the macro‐environment, its customers, its own internal organization, and its own product development and marketing processes. Manufacturers and marketers will find a great deal to think about in the series of questions provided.

Parasuraman and Coby’s strength is in the application of their research. Their examples and suggestions offer important insights into the practical consequences of dealing with demanding customers in the purchase of higher risk products and services. Perhaps my continual criticism, that the authors don’t make a sufficiently strong argument for the uniqueness of the technology product, is really the book’s strength in that Techno‐Ready Marketing is a valuable resource for the makers and marketers of any product that presents a high level of risk to its purchaser. Although substantive and practical, the lack of documentation and explanation of the research process leaves me just a bit nervous about the validity of their results.