Quote:
Herko Coomans wrote:
Quote:
kenmcd wrote:
Herko, you mentioned above that having an outsider assess the situation with a fresh view may be helpful (paraphrasing). This is that view. Blunt comments and opinions and a healthy dose of reality is the market researcher's best friend. Some people may be offended by the criticism. I am used to asking customers questions and getting the sometimes difficult answers. Criticism and user comments are the lifeblood of a customer-focused marketer. Otherwise you are living in fantasy of your own making completely out of touch with the user/customer reality. Commercial companies die everyday because they are out of touch. What we think is not important. What the user/customer thinks is important.
Anything else and you will not be successful in expanding into other markets.
KM
I agree there, and always have. You will be hard-pressed to find a reply from me to a post with well put criticism that puts the poster down. I don't have a high tolerance for disrespect and bad language tho, and sometimes people confuse these motivations
(I know you weren't referring to any of my posts being unable to take criticism)
One of the things that do bother me more and more tho is that people in general tend to drop things in a collective lap and assign highest priority to it just because they think it should be done, and done as soon as possible. I myself and Mithrandir especially have given a huge amount of our free (and some of our not-free) time to XOOPS in one way or another, and it just never seems to be enough. I'm not complaining (much) about this, the point is that I think the communications team should also address the issue of 'The XOOPS Way', which is that we're all in this together. You want something done, you do it, or find someone who wants to do it for you. But make it worth their wile. There is no XOOPS staff, no one is paid by XOOPS.org, in fact, XOOPS.org is Powered by You, it is made up out of You, it is You.
Herko
The only "you" in the paragraph above which was specifically directed to you personally was in the first sentence.
After that, you = XOOPS project.
This was not an attack on you.
Sorry for the misunderstanding.
I am not demanding features now or anything else.
What I am talking about is a focus.
These conflicting priorities between the marketing, support, and development teams
are nothing new in commercial companies.
Some things are easy and require little effort.
Some things are more substantial and require much more time and effort.
The easy things which help users happen sooner in a user-focused environment.
Example: How long would it take to copy and post for download phppp's distribution?
15 minutes max? I'll do it. Give me the permissions and I'll do it today.
Example: When I first started investigating XOOPS, I found the XOOPS for Dummie's Guide.
I asked why this was not on the XOOPS web site, or at least a link.
I offered to do it. No response.
It took another 2-3
months until the XOOPS doc site appeared.
Non-user-focus: Post no link of Dummies while developing XOOPS doc site.
User-focus: Post a link today to the Dummies web site - five minutes.
Things which help users happen sooner in a user-focused environment.
Much of this is focus and priority, not a lot of work.
Marketing and CommunicationsI started this discussion of user-focus in the context of target markets.
The point being - to be successful in a target market (a particular kind of user),
there needs to be a focus on that particular user's needs.
That is the way marketing usually works.
Marketing is communicating to potential users (customers) how
the product meets their particular needs.
If the goal is to have more people using and contribution to XOOPS,
telling the world "XOOPS is great" will have little effect.
Telling a church director the specific benefits of using XOOPS to
manage their community web site will have a much greater response.
That is a specific target market which can be cultivated with marketing.
It is a market which the current XOOPS capabilities can meet their needs.
Then, that user must be able to install and configure XOOPS.
This is the weak link - this is where user-focus becomes important.
If this user is not a tech geek, they will not ever get this done.
All the marketing in the world will not fix this.
An easy-to-install pre-configured package designed for communities will.
The last step = end-user-focus.
This is the point.Marketing cannot sell a product that does not meet a user's needs.
Trying to do so is a waste of time and effort.
Plenty of commercial failures to demonstrate this.
You (yes, I actually do mean you now Herko) have told me you want to
expand XOOPS usage beyond the geek community.
This user-focus is what it will take.
We may want to pick a target user which will require the least
amount of development effort.
For example: religious communities may require only a packaged XOOPS.
This will definitely add users, but are they the users you want
the most?
I don't know if this target user fits with the goals of the XOOPS Foundation.
You tell me.
You want more corporate users?
This is going to require meeting the corporate users needs.
Using marketing communications to get a corporate user to look at XOOPS
only to dismiss it because it does not meet their needs is again
a waste of everyone's time.
Target MarketsI have asked for your input here.
My understanding is you and the board are going to discuss this and get back to me.
Techies? We can target more of them it you want.
Web designers is the only one I can think of - any more ideas?
Small group, mostly geeks.
(BTW - see "geek" as a compliment, it implies technical expertise to me.)
They are obviously the type of user who will embrace XOOPS as-is.
You have expressed an interest in getting more non-geek users. Who?
I tossed out some ideas in the previous post regarding the SWOT analysis.
I/we need the board input here, along with hopefully a commitment to
focus on meeting that particular non-geek-user's needs.
Once we have a couple target markets, we can get started with the SWOT
and gathering the appropriate authors and publications for a media list.
The media list is made up of the media which the target market reads.
Don't know the target market, cannot determine the media.
Regards,
KM