The innovation adoption curve applies to rural water too.
We’ve all heard about it: the Innovation Adoption Curve. Okay, well I think we’ve all heard about it – sometimes the fields of entrepreneurship and technology can be a bit of an echo chamber. For statistics geeks such as myself, this theoretical model follows a normal distribution (usually referred to as a Bell Curve). See above – it’s fairly straightforward. You got this. I believe in you.
Essentially, this boils down to the fact that with any new product or innovation, there is a general pattern in how consumers…consume. Some people want the newest, shiniest stuff and are willing to shell out a pretty penny. These are your innovators (i.e. those folks who bought the iPhone 1 in 2007). Some people will take their sweet time, whether it’s because they’re happy where they are or because they can’t afford the newest stuff. These are your laggards (i.e. your friend who still owns an iPhone 1, but can probably only use it for calling and texting at this point).
If you didn’t know it already, Flowius Home is an innovation in the field of rural water supply. As such, we’ve gone through the stages of this curve as we built our first project in Wita and as we expanded our programs to new communities. Our goal is to push that curve along by quickly identifying the innovators, who can then influence the rest of the curve to adopt our solution by paying a fee for connecting their home to the water systems that we’re building. We’re collectivizing the costs for our systems, which means that we have to build the pipe mains, pumps, etc. for all users in an area, even if not everyone pays to connect their home to the system. Thus, we need to push everyone in an area to adopt Flowius Home by paying their connection fees.
The problem is that the rural people that we’re working with are, understandably, extremely risk averse. This is entirely reasonable since asking them to pay anything will constitute a huge part of their income and, if it doesn’t work, could be a matter of life or death. That’s…not what we want.
Our approach is to work with community leaders while also fostering a bit of constructive competition. First, we get 10-15 community leaders on board with our idea and get them to offer a formal pledge to pay to connect (the innovators). Then, we ask them to communicate with five friends each (no, this is not an MLM pyramid scheme) who we will have a small meeting with, where we work to get a pledge from them (the early adopters). Now that we have 50-75 people on board, we hold community meetings to get a majority of the rest of the community to pledge (the early and late majorities). Keep in mind that these are not payments, but instead a formal pledge where they fill out their information and sign a statement saying that they will pay when the time comes.
Since we can build isolated systems in the communities, we tell each area with their own isolated system that the first one to get 80% of the households to pay their connection fees will get their water system first. As community members see the first system constructed (the MVP – minimum viable product), trust builds, people pay, and the process quickens. And eventually, nearly everyone pays to connect (the laggards).
When you work to understand the social dynamics within social innovations like Flowius Home, you can not only build a better product, but speed up its adoption. What approaches have you seen that works? Join us in our journey!
-Chris