My Prototype Four-pronged KDE Marketing Vision
So I've been thinking recently about KDE's overall marketing strategy, and I think that I've got a handle on my own vision of KDE Marketing, which is malleable and adjustable to accommodate varying strategies. I won't spam the whole planet with the details, since it might be lengthy, and only a few people will care enough to read the whole thing. This strategy is what I will be focusing on with my work within KDE over the next while, that is, if I don't get too distracted by the allure of coding :)

1. Traditional Marketing (advertising!)
   1. Adwords program:
   1. KDE is currently enrolling in the Google Adwords program. This should help to attach KDE's brand name to certain keywords, even if the links are not followed. In fact, we'd almost prefer people simply read the ads rather than click on them, since they cost us less that way.
   2. Targets
   1. Developers (ads land at Techbase):
   1. Open source developers (in general) - target them with the benefits of use KDE technologies
   2. Unix developers (similar to above)
   3. Cross platform developers
   4. Project managers who are researching development tools (pimp kdevelop, etc.)
   2. Users (ads land at KDE.org info page perhaps?)
   1. Target users of distros that don't ship KDE exclusively to install/use KDE - do not mention competing products directly (we don't want to piss the gnome/xfce/rox/etc. people off.
   2. Target users needing help with unix (keywords like howto, linux help, etc.) with links to KDE to show that these things can be accomplished with KDE.
   3. Target users of other platforms (even KDE on other platforms) with the KDE Workspace (plasma/kwin/etc.)
   3. 3rd party press/reporters/bloggers:
   1. Bring them to existing dot stories, the kde news sites, planetkde, etc. when looking for hot open source topics. Dot.kde.org should show up for unix news, linux news, etc.
   2. If we target writers, we'll have more stories about KDE, which in turn brings more users/developers.
   4. Other targets?
   2. Commercials - Franz and a few other people have been talking about creating audio and video commercials for KDE. While this is a good idea, I'm wondering where these will get seen other than at KDE/opensource/unix conferences.
   3. Other media? Any good (and inexpensive) ideas here?
2. Press
1. First Party Press
1. The dot: this is a high traffic, and high profile website within the KDE community, however many KDE users still do not know that it exists. Fortunately almost every story we post gets picked up by other news websites, such as lwn.net. The problem with the dot is that it really only posts official KDE news, and therefor gives off the impression of being somewhat of a propaganda website. (this is the reason google news refuses to index it, for example). We need to diversify the content on the dot, allowing for a wider range of topics (including permitting links to good blog entries more frequently). Additionally, we need to improve the response time between a submitted story and when that particular story is actually online.
2. PlanetKDE: this website is amazing! Clee estimates that we get about 80 thousand unique readers (based on IP) every week and 20 thousand unique IPs per day. We need to encourage KDE users to read this website for a less-official news source that can provide insight to the internal workings of KDE. It needs a more prominent place within the KDE community, but needs to maintain it's currently level of informality.
3. KDE user blogs: these are blogs that often talk about KDE, but are not linked from planetkde.org. We need a way to aggregate them into one place without displacing the developers from planetkde.org. For example, Jucato's or liquidat's websites often have good KDE content on it, but since it's not on planetkde, I often forget to read them. Perhaps a filter attached to google blogsearch that pulls up good KDE blogs and aggregates them would be useful.
2. Third party press
1. It is important to have writers outside of KDE so that we sound more impartial. We need to encourage those that have writing skills to write, and we can even try to hook them up with third party publishers.
2. It is also important to ensure that we can still direct the tone of KDE press in some fashion, so this means keeping on contact with the third party writers to stress the things that we'd like them to. For example, stress that KDE 4.0 is only the first building block so try not to rip it apart when the reviews come out, but make sure to have the users understand that it isn't the second coming of Christ either.
3. We should also help press outfits that are new to covering open source topics get acquainted with ourselves. We need to play up our numbers (users, site traffic, etc.) so that they realize that they will get readers by covering KDE. Having a ready audience means money to publishers, and knowing how big our userbase actually is can help them jump on the KDE bandwagon.
4. We need to make sure that they are not intimidated by KDE, and are willing to ask questions. When someone in the press interviews you, blog about it so that people realize that you are accessible. This will lead to more interviews and therefor more press in the future.
3. The KDE Community
1. This is more about retention than anything else. If they hear about all sorts of neat things that are happening on the 'other side', and KDE is quiet, we will lose users that go to try the latest and greatest.
2. We need to keep blogging, creating the digest, and improve the amount of stories on dot.kde.org in order to keep our users coming back. Users crave regular features such as the digest, which make them feel like they are getting a good scoop.
3. We need to ensure that the users know the KDE brand. Many users just install a unix distro without even knowing what KDE is. The Plasma welcome dialog can help, as long as it isn't immediately dismissed, like ktips usually is. Getting users familiar with KDE is the first step in turning them into contributors.
4. Conferences/presentations, etc: users need to know about local conferences that feature KDE and that they can attend these conferences. Last summer in Glasgow, we bumped into KDE users in the pub - they could have been at the Akademy talks if they had known about it earlier. We should be playing up our next Akademy location (Belgium) already, just to ensure that everyone in the local area feels invited. The same goes for our release party in mountainview.
5. Always do things in public whereever possible. Private mailing lists (and discussions on private lists) should be avoided whereever possible, unless the material is sensitive for some reason. Most of the stuff that happens on the KDE e.V. mailing lists (except membership issues) can happen just as easily on a public list -- if a topic can be public, please make it public so people know what is going on.
6. The whiners!: you know the ones I'm talking about - the ones that complain every time we change something in KDE, especially if it's artwork. They should not be shut out (in fact, feel happy that they are event paying attention to your work). They can demotivate a lot of people, but sometimes they raise valid points even while making a total ass out of themselves. Posting rebuttles (publicly) will help keep them quiet as well as show that you are confident in your own work. (Keep up the good work, Oxygen team!)
4. Community Relations
1. Distros: communications with the distros will only help increase KDE's visibility. We need to approach them (rather than waiting for them to come to us) to ensure that we know their needs, as well as to make sure that their work ends up upstream. If we keep the distros happy, new or rising distros will be more likely to choose KDE as their default so we won't have the same thing happen to us that happened with ubuntu (being a second class citizen).
2. Upstream: KDE has an upstream too! we depend on a large number of libs, so we need to keep these library developers informed about KDE's needs, any improvements we make to the libs, and so forth. If we keep them happy by sending them improvements and so forth, they will be more accommodating to KDE in the future.