Your target audience should share your definition of the desire that your product solves, and be open to change.

The simple fact is you can’t please everyone, because different people want different things. Indeed, even when some people seem to have the same desire, they often define it in different ways. For instance, to some, adventure means thrill-seeking. To others, it means international travel.

Remember, the product you’re marketing embodies a certain definition of the desire it satisfies, and your target audience consists of the people who share that desire and definition. Everyone else is outside of your product’s scope, at least for now.

Next, you can narrow your target audience further by dividing it into two groups: adopters, who are receptive to change, and adapters, who are resistant to it.

Adopters embrace new things. They love the thrill of discovering something that’s more effective and innovative than what they’ve encountered before. Picture the technology fans who line up at the Apple Store, eager to adopt the new iPhone on its release day.

In contrast, adapters shy away from new things. They relish the sense of security that comes with familiarity. Picture the people who are still using flip phones.

Of course eventually, they’ll probably feel compelled to get a smartphone like everyone else. At that point, they’ll adapt.

The distinction between these two groups is crucial, because the product you’re marketing represents a new thing to everyone who hasn’t bought it yet. It offers them a novel way of fulfilling one of their desires, which they’re already fulfilling in other ways.

You’re much more likely to persuade adopters to try out your product than adapters. If you try to market it to the adapters, you’ll be asking them to do something that goes against their nature: giving up an old, proven way of fulfilling their desire, and replacing it with one that’s new and unproven, at least to them.

So forget about the adapters. Your product isn’t for them – not yet, anyway. Instead, make the adopters your initial target audience.

If there are enough of them, they’ll constitute the smallest viable market – the least number of people who can make your product profitable.