It doesn't matter what you do -- writing, design, code, philosophy, advocacy, lemonade -- if you want it to get out there, if you want people to use it, you have to market. It doesn't matter whether you're "selling" in the sense of exchanging money or not.
Marketing is critical. And marketing isn't just telling people about it, or advertising. Marketing is making a site that is attractive (to the audience), giving your project a name that is easy to understand and remember, and easy to google for, and making it easy to use, to install, work with it, share it, troubleshoot it, making it easy to find help, easy to find other people who use it in a community. Marketing means making it clear as hell what the user gets out of your "product," and keeping the focus on the user at all times.
These are all relative, depending on your audience. (Ex: Lots of developer types actively enjoy the simplest possible visual design, and enjoy the thrill of conquering something that's a little bit technically hard. But not all. And none of them enjoy searching & searching and being unable to find the thing.)
If you don't to make money off your work, great. But if you want people to use it, you have to market it, that's just the way it works. It's not good enough to simply make something you want to make and stick it out there. Just being "free" and "open" isn't enough.
If more open source developers would take the time to learn how to effectively promote their own work, the world would be a better place. But sadly, because most OSS developers belong to a group that considers marketing "evil," and has a chip-on-the-shoulder reaction to the idea that marketing is required for even free-as-in-beer projects, it won't happen.
I completely understand. Unfortunately, I'm too busy building cool shit to market it like crazy. I look for clever ways to market, like getting my company to promote it or including it in presentations.
I know it's human nature to like prettier things, I'm just surprised when localtunnel was posted on Hacker News originally, it did not get as much attention as showoff.io and it does the EXACT same thing. I guess I'm disappointed in the community for that?
Comments
It doesn't matter what you do -- writing, design, code, philosophy, advocacy, lemonade -- if you want it to get out there, if you want people to use it, you have to market. It doesn't matter whether you're "selling" in the sense of exchanging money or not.
Marketing is critical. And marketing isn't just telling people about it, or advertising. Marketing is making a site that is attractive (to the audience), giving your project a name that is easy to understand and remember, and easy to google for, and making it easy to use, to install, work with it, share it, troubleshoot it, making it easy to find help, easy to find other people who use it in a community. Marketing means making it clear as hell what the user gets out of your "product," and keeping the focus on the user at all times.
These are all relative, depending on your audience. (Ex: Lots of developer types actively enjoy the simplest possible visual design, and enjoy the thrill of conquering something that's a little bit technically hard. But not all. And none of them enjoy searching & searching and being unable to find the thing.)
If you don't to make money off your work, great. But if you want people to use it, you have to market it, that's just the way it works. It's not good enough to simply make something you want to make and stick it out there. Just being "free" and "open" isn't enough.
If more open source developers would take the time to learn how to effectively promote their own work, the world would be a better place. But sadly, because most OSS developers belong to a group that considers marketing "evil," and has a chip-on-the-shoulder reaction to the idea that marketing is required for even free-as-in-beer projects, it won't happen.
I completely understand. Unfortunately, I'm too busy building cool shit to market it like crazy. I look for clever ways to market, like getting my company to promote it or including it in presentations.
I know it's human nature to like prettier things, I'm just surprised when localtunnel was posted on Hacker News originally, it did not get as much attention as showoff.io and it does the EXACT same thing. I guess I'm disappointed in the community for that?