Strategy Rule 7 - Make your Messaging Fun and Controversial
I haven’t written on open source marketing for some time. This is a continuation on something I wrote some time ago - Strategy Rule 6 - Say it in a Tag-Line - You’re the Open Source Alternative.
Messaging should complement and reinforce the differentiation and positioning (tag line) but also be more campaign oriented, fun and controversial. Messaging should intuitively feel like what the customer already thinks and believes - no salesman required to give a complex explanation. To re-enforce and support this it should be simply verifiable with a call to action. Transparency is key. Facts should be in the open in a similar way to code being open. You are up-against the deep wallets and a large sales-force whispering into the customer’s ear. If the message is not what the customer intuitively believes and can simply support the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) volume dial will be turned up by the enterprise sales force and become deafening.
Good open source campaigns typically revolve around undeniable facts focusing on:
- Dramatic Cost Savings
- Consumerization - Innovation through Simplicity for all Users
- Choice - No Tie-in to a Proprietary System
Some Dramatic Cost Saving examples are:
Do More with Less - Use Alfresco and save 89% to 96% compared to Documentum, OpenText, Vignette and SharePoint
For an analysis of publicly verifiable US Government GSA figures go to:
http://www.alfresco.com/products/whitepapers/
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Some Consumerization - Innovation through Simplicity for all Users examples are :
Does your ECM system feel like this?
Alfresco - As Simple as a Shared Drive and Facebook
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Some Choice - No Tie-in to a Proprietary System examples are:
Don’t get Tied in by Proprietary ECM Stacks
and be held to ransom with enterprise software price rises
Total Cost of Ownership just got Green - Reuse your existing software, hardware and skills to reduce costs in areas such as:
- Linux, Unix or Windows
- Oracle, DB2, MySQL or SQL Server
- J2EE – JBoss, BEA Web Logic (Oracle), Web Sphere (IBM)
- Existing High Availability (HA) and scale-out architectures
- PHP, Java, JavaScript, Ruby
- Dreamweaver
- Microsoft Office or Open Office
- AJAX. Adobe Flex, YUI
- Firefox, Safari or IE
Be Fun. Be Controversial and be Transparent
These three things when combined with open source are louder than enterprise sales FUD
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