Promotion and Marketing

• Update version number and release date in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOFA_Statistics
• Update latest release date at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_statistical_packages
• Add blog entry to sofa site
• Tweet on it.
• If important enough, add blog entry to pssst site

• identica/twitter
• Website add to home, downloads, and sofastats_connect
• Add item to SOFA and pssst blogs
• Launchpad add announcement
• Freecode add announcement
• Facebook add status update
• Google+ add status update
• Linked In announcement
• Mass email using bcc to selected people
• Google group new topic
• NZPUG mailing list

• Ask Eden Perich if SOFA might be useful for clients
• Blog tour - ask for participants and advertise list on site, people installing for first time or using for different projects
• When:
  • new releases
  • major new releases
  • winning an award or getting any other media attention
• User-contributed tutorials
• SOFA testimonials on website
• Blog article - Why Math Teachers Hate Statistics - think keywords and search
• Blog article on teaching statistics using SOFA

http://www.mailchimp.com/

Like what Dokuwiki sends me. Contains images, nice headings etc.

Most normal people will look for their software using Google. Must appear in the correct aggregator pages. Order matters in Google searches so try “free statistical packages” and “statistical packages free”.

• MacStats - when a Mac package is available

If you have any feedback on the program, please feel free to contact me. There is also a community discussion group at https://sourceforge.net/projects/sofastatistics/.

And if you like SOFA, I would encourage you to vote for it at

https://sourceforge.net/projects/sofastatistics/

or

http://freshmeat.net/projects/sofa-statistics

I don't have an advertising budget so I need to encourage alternatives like user voting

http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html

• Try to get a set of stories published at the same time
• Give some numbers (they love facts and numbers)

Get onto the CD or DVD. Tie in with a support contract discount if citing PC World.

Make your database your Gold Mine - show how SOFA Statistics can be used for exactly that.

• Not explaining what SOFA can do but what users of SOFA can do
• Articulate vision of Statistics Open For All.
• Promote what it _feels_ like (comfort etc)

• Write on interesting topics related to data manipulation, statistical teaching, open govt data, research reporting errors etc
• Write about how a new release can help a user, not just a raw list of new features and bug fixes
• Don't forget to tweet it

From http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100301/lets-take-this-offline.html. To really work, Sierra observed, 
an entrepreneur's blog has to be about something bigger than his or her company and his or her product. 
This sounds simple, but it isn't. It takes real discipline to not talk about yourself and your company. 
Blogging as a medium seems so personal, and often it is. But when you're using a blog to promote a business, 
that blog can't be about you, Sierra said. It has to be about your readers, who will, it's hoped, become 
your customers. It has to be about making them awesome.

So, for example, if you're selling a clever attachment to a camera that diffuses harsh flash light, 
don't talk about the technical features or about your holiday sale (10 percent off!). Make a list of 
10 tips for being a better photographer.

If you're opening a restaurant, don't blog about your menu. Blog about great food. You'll attract foodies 
who don't care about your restaurant yet.

If you make superior, single-source chocolate, don't write about that great trip you took to the Dominican 
Republic to source cocoa beans. That's all about you. Instead, write the definitive article about making 
chocolate-covered strawberries. For the next 10 years, whenever a gourmand or a baker searches Google for a 
recipe on how to make chocolate-covered strawberries, he or she will find your post. Helping your users 
make awesome chocolate-based confections is likely to attract readers who might buy fancy chocolate, and 
that's the point of a successful blog. Writing about trips to the Dominican Republic is going to attract 
only people who might want to travel to the Dominican Republic. Unless you're selling that, you shouldn't 
be blogging about it.

• Success not measured in how interesting I am or how many followers I have per se. Purpose is to:
  • raise awareness of SOFA Statistics
  • drive downloads and adoption
  • encourage contributors to come forwards
• Quality not quantity (once a week is fine)
• Around general areas of data manipulation, statistical teaching, open govt data, research reporting errors etc
• If people like what I write, they will follow it and they may even re-tweet it to all their followers.
• Keep any general tweeting on another account.
• If you individually follow someone they get an invitation to follow you
• You can follow lists (although it may pay to individually follow some individuals)
• Mr Tweet will suggest people to follow (do this once you have a slight profile and some followers so it has something to work on)
• Re-tweet any mentions of SOFA Statistics
• Link to my blog items
• Use bitly
• If using bitly, who else has used that bitly link. Might be someone worth following.
• Example of manually re-tweeting something not in English RT @GlauciusJunior SofaStatistics, um produto interessante para fazer seus dados serem úteis [two forward slashes here]interesting product to present data usefully

• Jono Bacon's “The Art of Community”