Unique Selling Point

I was just thinking after reading the many forum contributions about CP v2 and core plugins.
One thing I noticed is we can have a “selling point” in that feature.
Let me explain… WP is for everybody. It has a core and a modular structure, but it’s not granular.
One thing v2 of CP will start doing… Is giving a granular level of control on many features. Allowing people to disable what they do not need and to enahnce what they need instead. Also it allows for plugins on top of that.
What a business needs is control. Control over the content is not enough. A company needs to be able to take precise actions resulting in foreseeable metrics. Very often a part of the company’s core is its site.
What CP is doing, it’s giving this control to business users. It starts with v2, it will evolve and take CP on its unique role.
I think one other valuable USP is we are focused on security first.
I don’t know if these ideas are worth something but hope they can be of some use.

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Marketing and coding ultimately need the same vision from complementary, nuanced perspectives :bouquet:

Thanks for pointing me to this discussion, I wrote before reading it.
In fact it speaks about levels of control and security.
And v2 of CP is going that way.
Now we just need a way to convey these concept in a way to attract people to CP for this unique value.
(I agree with @LinasSimonis about private sites by default, it’s one of the best way to be in control).

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I don’t mean that that discussion ought to replace this one in any way. :bouquet:
There is indeed a difference between the coding philosophy and building a sales funnel and a +1 for a separate marketing discussion.
The two should just touch base now and again so they do not lose sight of one another.

I have recommended to @BlueSkyPhoenix before to create consumer profiles (perhaps based around casual/blog user; business user; and dev) and to map user experience journeys for these consumer profiles.
I recommend making close note of all the “points of contact”, i.e. where the consumer interacts with CP.

I think it would be a really fun exercise to do as a project, if you’re interested in trying your hand at that sort of thing @ElisabettaCarrara ?

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Being a free thinker (part code newby part user,part website builder, part translator) I am sensible to things coming into contact.
I am not saying the two posts are interchangeable but my post and the quoted ones just decline the same two meanings as you noted.
What I think is we need to set CP as something more than just WP without GB. Also we need to trust we will shape CP on its own path.
And the words “business focused” for me now translate in granular control and safety first. What if we start to tell people those concepts? How is a dev going to react?
As a user, self-taught ClassicPresser/wordPresser and manager of my own site I built and maintain all by myself I know these concept would definitely buy me over.
I don’t know however if a dev may be attracted to them.
What is it like for a dev, coding safety first and allowing granular control over features? If we need to map touching points we need to define this: what our values mean to different targets.

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Of course, I hadn’t thought about it this way but this makes a ton of sense!

As dev lead here is the shortest way I can think of to share my vision.

For v1: long term support and a stable base for people who don’t want to switch to Gutenberg.

For v2: offer the ability to turn off features most people don’t need or want, and start growing our own plugin and theme ecosystem.

We won’t be able to break out everything at once for v2, and we need to be especially careful with changing defaults in ways that might break existing sites (or even user expectations for new sites), but there is still a lot that we will be able to accomplish.

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So, creating consumer profiles basically means creating a name (even a pic) and a bio / back story that is sort of an amalgamation of different users with broadly similar characteristics. @ElisabettaCarrara

So, basically, if you’re doing this for a dev (you’d have separate ones for a business user and for a casual/blogger user), you’d ask @james and as many other devs as possible stuff like this:
(Try to keep the questions open and relatively short.)

  • How long have you been developing?
  • Do you primarily develop for core or plugins?
  • Why do you program in PHP instead of another programming language?
  • WHY are you so vehemently anti-Gutenberg that you felt SO passionate about it that you decided to break away from WP? (And please don’t just say “security” :rofl: - I still don’t understand WHY GB is so much more vulnerable. Please enlighten me.)
  • Optional: Which continent are you from?

To start mapping a user experience journey:

  • Where did you hear about CP?
  • Which of these have you used, and which one did you use first? Forums, PMs, e-mail, Slack, petitions, other?
  • In one or two sentences, please express the way you felt while you made your first contact with CP? Please make note of any emotion like anger, irritation, excitement, exasperation, etc.

Once you have enough data, it is possible to start drafting the consumer profiles and mapping the journeys.
The user journey map is then used to define sales funnel stages.

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@anon71742606 these are called “marketing personas”, made a ton in the past.
I have an issue however… Since I am no one in the web (no big name I mean) my polling is not going to gain the traction it needs to collect enough data.
But… Maybe if I set the polling up on my blog and we all try to spread the world we can reach a critical mass we can use…
@james thanks for the insights, one question I would like to add to the ones mentioned above is: how difficult it is to change perspective as a dev? I mean, imagine you coded for WP core for 10 years applying their standards in terms of safety and control, do you feel any difference in applying new standards?
(Or better, is a dev going to “notice” there is a difference?)

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@anon71742606 thanks for your insight on consumer profiles and for tagging me in this conversation. I am completely open to working on this; our biggest blockers right now are time and manpower. Anywhere you’d like to jump in, roll up your sleeves, and get started is absolutely welcome.

We got v1 out incredibly quickly and I’m so proud of the teamwork that went into that – but moving that quickly meant we had to get super focused on what was most needful at the time: launch.

Our focus since v1 has been on making sure we have a solid foundation to build upon – getting the organizational structure in place, adding directors, and setting the course for v2 and beyond was part of that. I’m not surprised that the marketing discussion is ramping up again and I welcome anyone who wants to participate in meaningful ways to produce and execute a successful strategy.

I know you’re also getting involved in the documentation piece as well, so thank you for that!

I’ll also tag @raygulick here, as he is our marketing co-lead. He and I have been working on the new CP website design; I expect that once that’s done we’ll be able to focus more fully on other areas of marketing strategy.

Thanks again!

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@BlueSkyPhoenix

We’re not critical of the way that the marketing is done, especially with the constraints. :bouquet:
I’m mainly concerned that CP is moving into a new phase of its life cycle and how that changes the market / user needs.

Devs / “innovators” mainly joined because of a common enemy in GB.
But that won’t sustain them forever.
And “without GB” won’t appeal to “early adopters”, especially in business.
v2 IS about a lot more than just that and we’d like to see that come out in the messaging.
Elisabetta summarized it well in her original post.

We’d also like to help maintain a united community vision, with nuanced perspectives.
At this point in an organizational life cycle, it is so easy for functions to lose sight of one another.

Personally, I would like this to work because I want to use CP v2 :rofl:

I’d be happy to help where I can, but I know there are also others who are very capable and willing. @ElisabettaCarrara could draft the personas for everyone’s input?

I can work on the other document in the meantime with K.

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I am currently working on drafting the polling part.
And also writing some lines to evaluate differences among various stages of adoption.
IMHO the cycle of adoption goes hand in hand with marketing personas.
I think I’m going to have the polling ready for tomorrow.

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Just to let everybody know I drafted a first version of the polling aimed at devs as contributors, I would like the commuity feedback before going further.
Should I add/remove something?
I am going to prepare the other polls as soon as this one is nailed down, then I will make them live on my blog via the google poll link.
Also I will make the link available to everyone wanting to share it on their channels.
Here is the link to the first draft:

https://forms.gle/qURTazeyyz9msmTt6

@anon71742606, @BlueSkyPhoenix, @raygulick feedback needed.

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I.t.o. questionnaire design:

I don’t think the person should be forced to be specific with where they are from.
I think it should include “Please answer N/A if you prefer not to say.”

There is no option to specify where if you choose that you heard about CP from “other” (or to optionally include a link to the blog, etc.)
There are also one or two other questions with “other” options which do not leave space for an optional explanation.

Oh. And I forgot. Under “core vs plugins” as primary area of interest, you should also have “themes”. Sorry! :blush:

I think it is short and sweet.
Really nice work.

P.S. In terms of your concern that it will not have enough exposure once released, maybe the Committee can help with that by asking the active devs to answer (including it on Slack, for example). @james @anon71687268 @azurecurve @joyously
You kept it really short and simple, so it should not take a lot of time away from busy devs.

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Thanks for the feedback.
Going to amend it and I think this afternoon I will release this first one on my blog!

Oh. And you should ask @norske to complete it too. :bouquet:

What is cool about the dev personality is that there are already quite a few ready candidates to answer it, so getting data is less difficult than for the other personalities.

I actually suspect that there will be three personas within the dev personality, which will correspond roughly with their primary area of interest.
I think you will find that core devs will be more keen on collaborative coding, while the plugin devs and theme authors will tend to prefer more solo work, with some overlap.

I also suspect that you will find that there significant differences between plugin authors and theme authors.
Mainly i.t.o. the languages they feel more comfortable with.
May also be cool to ask them to rate their expertise as they perceive it on PHP, JavaScript, jQuery, AJAX and CSS. As well as ask if they use any other languages (like Agile).
(Edited: Suggest using a simple 1 - 10 scale.)

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Making this a new post so it doesn’t go missing in the convo:

If it can be incorporated without making it too long, I’d also be very interested in seeing (again, simple scale like 1 to 10) how opposed the respondents are to:

  • GB;
  • Gravatar;
  • XML-RPC;
  • Admin-AJAX;
  • REST API;
  • RSS;
  • Post via e-mail;
  • Emojis;
  • “Phoning home”.
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Thanks for the feedback @anon71742606.
Amended to reflect your suggestions.
I am trying to write a coherent post on my blog to include it, afterwards I am going to share it also on slack.

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1-10 is too many options, 1-5 is more than enough. Don’t irritate readers, keep it simple!

Also, I think that “how opposing” should be reformulated to “how opposing to installed and activated by default”, at least to some questions.

From marketing view these questions are wonderful. Good job.

$0.02

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I’m offended by the age and gender required questions. And why is it required if you can choose “Prefer not to say”? What’s the point?

Very valid points, @LinasSimonis

If a 1 - 5 scale is used though, I think it needs to include a description, where 1 is x and 5 is y.
From a questionnaire design standpoint.

There are a few nuanced questions related to those features and I am not sure which is best to ask since asking all of them may make things a bit too long.
Anyone, please feel free to chime in.

The way I initially phrased it was more to assess a “gut” dislike.
I wanted to know “How unlikely are you to write a core feature / plugin / theme that relies on one of the following?”
Basically, some devs would NEVER use a particular feature if they can conceivably avoid it.

I don’t think any of the devs answering would oppose a core plugin for these features, so I’m not sure you’ll get any information from the question that you did not already know.

I think it is possible to incorporate this into the rating system though.
So perhaps 5 if you would NEVER write a utility that relies on it, 4 if you would write something that relies on it with caution, 3 if you want it in a core plugin, 2 if you want it disabled by default in the core and 1 if you want it enabled by default within the core.

It would also be nice to have it in a “rank in terms of the perceived security risk”, but that type of question has its own challenges in terms of questionnaire design.

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