MODx Kudos and Crits in new CMS Survey Report

In my daily Google Alerts for MODx I got a link to this article: http://www.pr-inside.com/the-battle-for-the-open-source-r724246.htm about the 2008 Open Source CMS Report (here: http://www.waterandstone.com/downloads/2008OpenSourceCMSMarketSurvey.pdf)

In it there are some interesting stats and some things that we incorporate into our marketing strategy.

Lemme hear your feedback.

Cheers,

Jay

MODx
This system showed more mixed metrics than any other in the survey. MODx picked up the
"Most Promising CMS" nod at the Packt Awards in 2007; yet oddly, outside MySpace, MODx
has been unable to build much show of support. Moreover, while the system has solid search
engine rankings, it was the big loser in the Alexa rankings in our survey. Perhaps even more
disturbing is that MODx was the only system in survey whose user ratings declined during the
test period. It looks to us like MODx is managing to attract attention but failing to convert the
attention into users. Does MODx risk slipping into irreversible decline or will they manage to
capitalize on the many advantages they have in placement? If they are to make a go of it, they
will need to repair their user ratings and improve their performance in goodwill indicators.

Interesting assessment. In looking at the Alexa graph, MODx has some extreme dips so depending on the test period the results will very. Other than the dips (or peaks depending on the pov) it has been pretty constant. And I am surprised of the perceived user ratings, I wonder how they came to that conclusion?

Very good document, thanks for pointing it out. I think that the authors will be in for a surprise with the new effort underway to strengthen MODx’s brand.

I plan on taking some cues from the doc once I do a complete analysis of it. I’ve been working on a Brand Awareness Campaign and so this may point at some key areas of attack. As far as Alexa is concerned, I don’t care about it but inlinks, articles, books and general chatter are all areas that I want to focus my attention.

Once the new modxcms.com is up and the documentation harmonization and cleanup is done we’ll have a stronger foundation on which to build.

In addition I want to get more folks involved in spreading the word about MODx.

Very nice catch Jay, despite the comments we are still in the article as a rising star which is no small feat, yet it’s true we have lot of ground before our marketing is on par with Joomla’s and Drupal’s. Hopefully with Jay on board (and the re-branding in motion) we can boost the MODx Brand and expand our effort to "convert the attention into users". Something which will also mean getting better on documentation...

But we sure need to recruit firepower to boost the effort but also specialized skills to hit the target (for instance, specifically target and attract devs to the mix and make it sexy to join MODx dev).

Anyway, curious about the Brand Awareness Campaign
I am away for today but as soon as I am back we shall chat about that !

But let’s not forget that there has been also (quite fast) incline in MODx user base, at least when looking at the "Most Online Today" thread.. Won’t be too long that 1000 users barrier is hit. The trend is good, we just have to keep it going. Hopefully with the Revolution and all the marketing effort, we will get more and more experienced developers on board too and with that, help to the core team as well, so we can keep bringing those awesome features to the product in a timely fashion and stay in the top. Articles, like in Shaun’s blog, are excellent way to bring attraction to Revolution to developers too. I don’t know where the guys (Shaun and Jason specifically) finds the time to do all this.. Amazing guys.

Quote from: davidm at Jul 28, 2008, 01:04 AM

But we sure need to recruit firepower to boost the effort but also specialized skills to hit the target (for instance, specifically target and attract devs to the mix and make it sexy to join MODx dev).

I shall add something like "When I joined MODx, hot girls started to chase me every where I go" to my signature..

I’m not concerned about external perceptions of uptake honestly. There are projects that have been launched by Fortune 50 technology companies and $27-billion engineering firms. MODx is not going anywhere. Now if I can convince those aforementioned two to actually publicly acknowledge their use of MODx, we’ll be onto something!

Speaking of which, does anyone know of a good format to start writing some case studies?

Ryan, it is not exernal percecptions of uptake that concern me at all. What the report does highlight is that, while MODx is a well used platform, general awareness is much lower than even lesser used CMSs.

So lots of people have downloaded MODx (who really cares) and no-one can ethically track who is using MODx on websites (at least I think of stats tracking as a violation of privacy w/in a GPL or other type of OS project and one that has opened doors for Wordpress to be more easily hacked).

What my thought is: to get more people to speak, write, think and share about MODx in the general world of CMS use and integration.

I know it is more than possible to move awareness through the tech-knowledge chain to where business will start requesting that at least MODx be considered as part of a planning exercise. The more people who become aware of MODx the more people will use it and the more reason for Devs to tinker with it to see how long it takes them to do what they want. Wordpress and Joomla have spawned industry around them and while making fewer leaps in development with far larger communities because they are for the most part stuck with a rigid system requiring complex overrides. We need people in the tech media to understand MODx’s clear (vs our current nebulous and vague based on what we are not and the tongue in cheek web2.0 stuff on the homepage) position in the marketplace.

Case studies are important and I think that we need to be running one a month. I think the format used by Freshbooks is a very concise one and one that is First person vs us writing the case studies.

I’ve mentioned it before and I’ll mention it again that as part of the awareness building we need to make it easy for our users and the media to get the word out about MODx. I see a spread.modxcms.com as an ideal forum (not bb forum but location) for this. Logos, case studies, links, one-sheets and tools to help users do much of the work of spreading MODx and the MODx brand. Currently if someone wants to write a blog post about MODx they have to steal the logo from the index (which is sliced with bacground) and links are inconsistent. Suggestions of link text, keywords and more to make referring to MODx simple.

Once the new site has been completed, I’d like to see an entire page of badges with layered PSD and PNG’s for users to dl and integrate with their sites (if they want). While corporate clients won’t want this devs and designers will.

I’ve heard the perceptions that if we get a whole bunch of designers and non-techs to MODx that the forums will collapse under the weight of newb questions and people will give up but the fact is that those who get to the point where they realize there is nothing they can’t do with MODx with a bit of PHP knowledge will continue to use and those that are looking for "click to done" will move on.

My continued goal is to get MODx to the position of a w/in the top 5 and really into the top 3 CMS systems/frameworks and awareness is critical. There are many unknown geniuses in the world and it is the job of the marketer to make that genius known. MODx is truly revolutionary and like no other CMS today. Let us make it known to the world.

I agree completely Jay. I think the new website will help vastly, as well.

Quote from: smashingred at Jul 28, 2008, 10:32 AM

What my thought is: to get more people to speak, write, think and share about MODx in the general world of CMS use and integration.

...

Case studies are important and I think that we need to be running one a month. I think the format used by Freshbooks is a very concise one and one that is First person vs us writing the case studies.

I’ve mentioned it before and I’ll mention it again that as part of the awareness building we need to make it easy for our users and the media to get the word out about MODx. I see a spread.modxcms.com as an ideal forum (not bb forum but location) for this. Logos, case studies, links, one-sheets and tools to help users do much of the work of spreading MODx and the MODx brand. Currently if someone wants to write a blog post about MODx they have to steal the logo from the index (which is sliced with bacground) and links are inconsistent. Suggestions of link text, keywords and more to make referring to MODx simple.

Total agreement here as well. I think the case studies of some of the more high-profile users will go a long way towards building credibility for the MODx platform with developers. At least I hope it does for the 1-2 weeks it’s likely to take them to unlearn bad habits.

I’ve heard the perceptions that if we get a whole bunch of designers and non-techs to MODx that the forums will collapse under the weight of newb questions and people will give up but the fact is that those who get to the point where they realize there is nothing they can’t do with MODx with a bit of PHP knowledge will continue to use and those that are looking for "click to done" will move on.

That’s fine as well. I’m seeing more and more folks step up and offering help in the forums too. That’s a great sign!

My continued goal is to get MODx to the position of a w/in the top 5 and really into the top 3 CMS systems/frameworks and awareness is critical. There are many unknown geniuses in the world and it is the job of the marketer to make that genius known. MODx is truly revolutionary and like no other CMS today. Let us make it known to the world.

:D

One of the things about the case studies is that I think that while we should invite some high-profile folks to the party, I’d love (and in many cases prefer) to go after developer/designers and firms that use MODx as part of their business.

I know that the end users are important such as the UltraEdit site as well as a number of others but in the beginning, real, in-the-trenches users are going to have the most impact. Peppering that with high-profile end users will be added fodder for publicity but to aid in our goals of expanding the developer community working professionals will have most impact. The high profile end user cases will be good for MODx users as strength in selling MODx implementation.

The Case Study should be comprised of common questions depending on the market; devs, designers, end users/enrepreneurs and be open ended to get unique cases while highlighting one or two wins withing the implementation.

I’ll have more on this later this week.

I’d like to have open submissions on the spread.modxcms.com as well in context to the bi-monthly newsletter to be launched after the site is launched.