Marketing Message for Calligra

[Inge Wallin]

On Thursday, December 22, 2011 20:18:48 Cyrille Berger Skott wrote:
> On Thursday 22 December 2011, Inge Wallin wrote:
> > On Thursday, December 22, 2011 17:47:54 Cyrille Berger Skott wrote:
> > > You can make all the fun you want of LibreOffice attempt to port to
> > > Android, but if you go outside of the Calligra community, people
> > > perceive us as the people who have been trying for 14 years to deliver
> > > an office suite for the desktop. And now, we will start bragging to be
> > > leading on the free office suite market for mobile, and if you scratch
> > > under the surface, you will discover that we are positionned on a dead
> > > tiny fraction of that market.
> > 
> > I haven't exactly made fun of it. If you think so you have misunderstood.
> > My point, instead, is that LibreOffice has issued a press release saying
> > they will start porting to Android (note: 'will start'. Not 'have done').
> > They have in fact *nothing* to show here and if anybody runs the risk of
> > being known to not deliver on these platforms it's them.
> > 
> > But still it worked for them insofar as that journalists and bloggers
> > parrotted this press release. Some real buzz was created around
> > LibreOffice on Android. If we don't tell people that we have done more
> > already and will do more still then we can never push Calligra to the
> > front.
> 
> Yes, but you see, there is a huge difference between making a press release
> that say "Calligra is leading the way to free software office application
> to mobile devices with the Harmattan Office" and describing Calligra as
> the leader of free office on mobile device.

Please don't talk down to me.  I think I have marketed just as many products 
in my career as you have.

Yes, there is a difference.  And the difference is that the first way is 
cautious, and a bit cowardly as if you don't have as much to be proud of.  The 
second is bold and shows that you are going places.

> > > Merging an other email, since it is on the same topic:
> > > > I know it's sometimes laughable, but the reason people do it is
> > > > because it *works*.  All marketing textbooks say "you need to find a
> > > > niche where you are the leader and then tell everybody about it".
> > > 
> > > I am also hoping that every marketing textbook start by telling you to
> > > define who is your target. And to adjust your message for them.
> > > 
> > > Assuming our marketing target is geeky technical people, who know and
> > > follow open source project. Those people get suspicious with excessive
> > > "bragging", and while they know of the N9xx Maemo/Meego, they also know
> > > it is a very niche stillborn market. And will go and think, yeahyeah,
> > > they are the leader of nothing (and if they know from where Calligra
> > > comes from, they will think that people never change).
> > > 
> > > Worse, if our target is outside of that group, chance is that they
> > > don't know much about "free software", or meego and the N9. All they
> > > know is iphone and the cheap version of iphone (some of them know that
> > > it is called android). For them "the leading free office suite for
> > > mobile", free will translate to 0€, "mobile" translate to iOS or
> > > Android, and since it is available to neither, we are just liars.
> > 
> > I have two answers to this:
> > 
> > 1. I thought our target user group were students and academics.  At least
> > that's what I read from many of the maintainers and the Words manifesto.
> > So it makes sense that our marketing should target the same group. I am
> > pretty sure that this group knows the difference between iOS and
> > Android. But I don't think that the majority of the students are aware
> > of the history with KOffice. To them Calligra is something new and
> > hopefully exciting.
> > 
> > It is not unlikely that this group running LibreOffice or OOo already.
> 
> <off-topic>Honestly ? I think the accademic world is very far behind on
> that. Especially since, Microsoft is giving away MSO to students, and
> Universities provides MSO licenses to its staff. You rarely see anything
> else than windows/powerpoint or macbook/keynote in conferences/lectures.
> And the true geeks would use beamer. Which btw, means that if we provides
> a windows office suite that is as cool and easy as iwork, we will get a
> lot of users ;)</off- topic>

I think we are both affected here by cultural bias.  In Sweden it's pretty 
common to run OOo and LibreOffice if you run Linux.  If you run Windows, then 
of course MS Office is more common but I don't think these people will run 
Calligra anyway.  And even if I would love for you to be right, I think that 
making inroads on Windows is a very very tough job.


> More on topic, accademic people are even more suspicious to the use of
> strong word like "we are leader" and "we have the absolute answer to the
> essential question of the universe".

Real academics won't use Calligra anyway for some time since it doesn't handle 
references well.  How about students? I'm not sure they are as suspicious. 

But be that as it may, I will challenge any suspicious academic to find 
another free office suite that is better on tablets and phones.  And if they 
don't then Calligra is the leader.

> > And
> > frankly, getting them to switch to Calligra on their home computer or
> > laptop is going to be very difficult. But it's not unlikely that they
> > also have a tablet that they can use during lectures or in other places.
> > Telling them about Calligra and how it works well on tablets and
> > handheld devices is going to make a few of them try it out and hopefully
> > like it. It is more likely that they will test the leader of free office
> > apps than something they have never heard about so it makes sense to
> > take that position.
> 
> Not really, they would be more interested in the "easiest to use office
> suite on tablet". Or the one that offer "the most compatibile with
> .doc/.xls/.ppt". And they won't care if it is free software. If they are
> students, only that it comes with no charge ;)

Yeah.  But Calligra is not the easiest to use office suite on tablets for MS 
formats.  When we can save back files in MS formats we can hopefully say that, 
but definitely not yet.