[TYPO3-marketing] TYPO3 Brand Name

[Sander Vogels]

Hi Nicolas,

Thanks for your input. I also studied marketing and advertising and 
specialised in the psychologic processes behind it. There is absolutely 
no proof whatsoever that there should be a relation between a brand name 
and what the product does in terms of problem solving. People's minds 
tend to go from arousal, recognition off a problem towards awareness off 
possible solutions. In that stage they start looking out for porducts 
that help them solve the problem so it is key that your brand is in 
their awareness-set. That's why it's important to establish your brand 
plus the link to it's strong problem-solving abillity. In becoming a 
strong brand there are only a few things that are important, like that 
it's easy remembered. TYPO3 does that, maybe just because it's a strange 
name like Yahoo. Ofcourse it should not have a strong negative 
connotation, so it's not SatanCMS (which would do good ofcourse in the 
hardrock market) or something. But making a typo is something very 
common. Everybody has this each day on our keyboards but do we find this 
so negative? No it's just work in progress, just like TYPO3. I'm sure 
this has not any negative implication on world wide marketshare. In fact 
we do to a certain extend very well know why TYPO3 is not doing in other 
regions what it does in the EU and this will improve with new versions 
of our CMS, the matureness of over-see markets and the ongoing vendor 
shake-out. My opinion is that you should not waste your energy on this.

But...If you have energy and time for setting up surveys and the 
knowledge about putting the questions right you could help me out with 
another project. I wanted to do a research under TYPO3 companies, their 
clients but also the prospects they didn't get to see what the motives 
are choosing TYPO3 or not, what the main competition is, what they do 
better etc. Some people promised to help me out but did nothing in the 
end. You might be exactly the person to realise this with me. Imho we 
need more market-research before we can do the marketing. We might even 
ask if they find TYPO3 a negative name ;-).
Whaddaya think?

Ciao,
Sander

Nicolas Schudel wrote:
> Hello Marketing list,
> 
> Allow me to briefly introduce myself. My name is Nicolas and I am a  
> TYPO3 user from Switzerland. I recently completed my studies in  
> Australia where I researched "Designing Brand Identity in Free/Open  
> Source Software Projects". While researching, I also took a closer  
> look at the TYPO3 rebranding and interviewed Rasmus Skjoldan on the  
> topic. During the analysis of the TYPO3 brand I found a problem,  
> which is the reason I am writing to this list.
> 
> I think the brand name has a serious flaw. The word 'typo' in english  
> means 'spelling error'. While most of the TYPO3 community is in  
> europe, this problem may seem irrelevant. In german, for instance,  
> the word hints another meaning: 'typo' is short for 'typography'.  
> However, the name may be a hinderance for a newcomer to the project  
> from any english speaking country. SPELLING-ERROR3 may give the wrong  
> first impression. I have no proof that this is the case for newcomers  
> and would have to back my claim with the results of a survey. At the  
> moment it is a 'gut feeling' and may explain why TYPO3 is soaring in  
> Europe but not anywhere else.
> 
> I would therefore suggest that the project considers a change to the  
> brand name - one that works in the english language. Now would be the  
> correct time, version 5 is being recreated almost from scratch. Maybe  
> the brand name should be updated with it.
> 
> Regards, Nicolas
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> 
> 
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