What makes some people eagerly embrace new technologies while others resist change until the bitter end? The product adoption curve explains exactly that.

This article will teach you how it works and what it means for you as a product manager. You will also discover the characteristics of different adopter categories and the best adoption strategies for them. And how Product Fruits can help you implement them.

What’s the technology adoption curve?

The technology or innovation adoption curve is a model that illustrates how different user segments adopt new technologies at varying speeds.

In summary, it categorizes users into five groups: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. Each group comprises a part of the market and requires different engagement strategies.

Why the name?

Look at the graph. It follows a bell curve with the two biggest groups in its center.

Let’s learn more about each of the groups.

Innovators (2.5%)

Innovators are the first to jump on new tech—not because they need it, but because they love trying new things. 

They don’t mind bugs, half-finished features, or rough edges. They expect them. That makes them great beta testers who can provide valuable early feedback.

The problem? They rarely stick around. Innovators always chase the next big thing, so they’re not your most reliable long-term users. Their excitement fades fast.

Still, they’re useful for building buzz. By discussing it in niche communities, they can help attract the next wave of users—early adopters.

Engagement strategies for innovators

Innovators want to be first. Give them that privilege with an invite-only beta program.

Like the Notion AI one, it created a lot of hype about the new functionality and gave Notion tons of data to iterate on.

Innovators are your best source of early feedback, so make it easy for them to share thoughts. Run unmoderated prototype testing sessions, surveys, and interviews to understand what’s working and what’s not. 

Their input can shape your product before it hits the mainstream.

So, where do you find your innovators?

Go where they already are. Try Product Hunt, tech Reddit threads (e.g., r/startups), niche Slack groups (e.g., No-code Founders), and developer communities (e.g., GitHub).

Early Adopters (13.5%)

Early adopters are the trendsetters. Unlike innovators, they’re not just chasing novelty but looking for real solutions. 

They’re willing to take risks on new products only if the value proposition is clear. They don’t need perfection, but they do need a solid reason to switch.

Because they’re opinion leaders, early adopters are selective. Their reputation is at stake when they endorse a product, so they won’t recommend something unless they genuinely believe in it. That means flashy marketing won’t cut it—your product needs to be delivered.

But when they’re on board, they can be your best allies. They will champion your product and provide case studies that will help build your credibility.

Engagement strategies for early adopters

Personalize your onboarding for different personas to reduce time to value. Early adopters must experience value fast. If they can’t see how the product solves their problem, they will lose interest and move on.

Early adopters can be influential product advocates. If they love your product, they’ll spread the word among potential customers. Give them a reason to. Set up a referral program with exclusive perks.

But don’t build just for them. Their feedback is vital, but innovators or early adopters aren’t a representative sample. Filter their requests through market research. Otherwise, you risk creating a niche product that never scales.

Early Majority (34%)

The early majority phase is when things get serious.

Why?

They are the first group of mainstream users, accounting for up to 34% of the market—more than innovators and early adopters combined.

You must win them over.

Here’s the deal: they like innovation only if it’s safe. No half-baked MVPs, experimental features, or lengthy implementation. Before they commit, they want proof that your product works and the switch won’t disrupt.

And many companies fail to provide it.

The gap between early adopters and the early majority is called the chasm. If you can’t cross the chasm, your product can’t achieve mainstream success.

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But once they’re in? They stick around. The early majority are long-term users who bring stability and growth.

Engagement strategies for the early majority

Show proof, not promises. 

The early majority won’t take your word for it. They need to see results. Share customer success stories, reviews, and testimonials to give them confidence that your product is reliable and drives results.

Real users. Real wins. Real impact.

Make switching easy to minimize the risk of disruption. 

For example, by offering a migration service, providing quality educational resources, or ensuring fast and reliable support. Most businesses will not switch unless they’re confident it won’t derail operations.

Downtime, data loss, or a steep learning curve? They can all be deal-breakers for the early majority.

Late Majority (34%)

The late majority is a cautious lot. And slow to adopt new technologies.

They prefer sticking with what they know and only switch when it becomes unavoidable.

Instead of excitement, their adoption is often driven by necessity, like losing a competitive advantage to companies already adopting it.

Once they commit, they’re in for the long haul. They don’t like change, so they tend to stick with it after adopting a product.

Engagement strategies for the late majority

Best strategy? Show them they’re falling behind.

The late majority adopters won’t switch because they want to—they switch because they have to. Use hard data, for example, from industry benchmarks, to show them how their competitors are getting ahead thanks to the new technology.

Laggards (16%)

Laggards are the last to adopt new technology and don’t do it willingly. They prefer sticking with familiar tools, no matter how outdated they are. Change is a hassle they’ll avoid for as long as possible.

That’s why convincing them is tough. They’re often skeptical, resistant, and require more effort than any other group. Most only switch when they have no choice—either because their old system stops working or industry regulations force their hand.

But like the late majority, laggards rarely leave, especially in industries like banking, where stability matters more than cutting-edge solutions.

Engagement strategies for laggards

To win over laggards, you need to make change impossible to ignore.

Like Google, when they replaced General Analytics with GA4. Users had to switch to the new version or lose their data.

Highlighting regulatory changes can work, too. 

For example, the UK government is currently phasing in the Making Tax Digital program that will force the self-employed and landlords to use accounting software to record business transactions.

Don’t just throw them in at the deep end. Hold their hand every step of the way.

Self-service will not be enough for laggards, so be ready to offer white-glove onboarding and high-touch support to ensure smooth implementation.

How Product Fruits can help improve adoption process across the curve

Product Fruits is a product onboarding solution with many features to help you engage users throughout the adoption curve.

Help users discover new features with in-app announcements

Modals, banners, and newsfeed. Three main ways you can announce new features to your active users in-app. To improve their discovery. And keep your innovators and early adopters engaged.

Is the feature not ready to roll out yet?

Announce them to your power users and invite them to your beta tests.

Drive feature adoption with interactive walkthroughs

Telling users about a new feature isn’t enough. You need to show them how the feature works and make them use it.

How? With interactive walkthroughs.

Walkthroughs are sequences of in-app messages that guide users through the process step by step and prompt them to engage with a feature. Or provide a link to additional resources.

Leverage the AI assistant to create personalized onboarding

Building onboarding flows has never been difficult in Product Fruits.

It’s a no-code platform with a visual editor, so even non-technical users can create fully customized resources. And with the AI text assistant, you can craft crisp microcopy quickly.

Now, you don’t even have to do it manually.

We’ve recently launched an AI assistant to create the onboarding flow for you. Tell it about your users, main features, and what you want to achieve. Then, sit back and relax.

Offer self-service support

Product Fruits has the knowledge base functionality for self-service support. Add it to the Life Ring button, and your users can access it anywhere in the app.

Let’s face it: not all users will be happy to use this help. The later majority and laggards might not.

But your innovators, early adopters, and the early majority most likely will. because it helps them resolve their issues quicker and 24/7 without waiting for the support agent to answer their email.

The benefit? More time for your agents to support the less tech-savvy adopters.

Guide users to value with onboarding checklists

Product Fruits checklists are a quick and effective way to guide users to the Aha moment when they realize the product’s value. This realization is vital for product adoption.

More than one user persona? No problem. You can create a different checklist for each and use the segmentation feature to target specific users.

Coordinate all customer communications with the content map

With different user personas and users spread across different adoption curve stages, you need a lot of onboarding and support content. Which may be a nightmare to manage.

The Content Map solves the problem. It gives you an overview of what content you have scheduled, for when, and who’s responsible. This reduces the risk of under- and over-messaging.

Run surveys to collect customer feedback

The first way to collect feedback with Product Fruits is via in-app surveys. 

You can use them to:

• Collect feedback from beta testers.
• Gather NPS data – to find the right test participants and identify product advocates.
• Run PMF tests to decide how well your product satisfies the needs of the mainstream market.

The other is through the feedback widget, which you can attach to the Life Ring button. This is perfect for collecting on-demand feedback and user requests.

Conclusion

Users adopt new technologies at the same rate. Innovators and early adopters are happy to experiment with new products and need little support. But to succeed, you must cross the chasm and win over the majority. This takes more time, more evidence, and more support.

With this in mind, look at your current onboarding flows and engagement strategies. Are they helping users reach value fast? Are they reducing friction for hesitant adopters?

With Product Fruits, you can streamline the entire adoption process. From interactive walkthroughs and checklists to self-service support and in-app surveys, you have all the tools to engage users at every stage. Book the demo to start now.