Re: [flexcoders] Flex Marketing

[Tariq Ahmed]

I agree Paul. But... It definitely helps sell the case of Flex when customers feel confident in the technology you're promoting. Keep in mind that the majority of Flex apps are internal in nature, for the Enterprise is where Flex excels. So you're not going to see the many holy s**t apps that already exist. E.g Jon Hirschi and Tom Ortega built an *AMAZING* application over at eBay... .easily could win the MAX best app award, but you'll never hear about it. I think what Clint and I are asking for is to notch it up a bit, vs "moving forward quietly..." Quiet makes it difficult to sell to a customer that their next Gen Application is rooted in a technology they never heard of. Meanwhile the AJAX bandwagon beats very loud, and many developers who want to take things to the next level will have AJAX on the forefront of their minds as it's 'brand' recognition is so dominant. Technologists gravitate towards what they think is the 'industry standard'. And it's not just about the mindshare of Developers that need to be focused on. It's more important to capture the minds of those who control the budget and cash flow. The Directors and VPs. All they keep hearing about is AJAX, so from a strategic point of view you want to go with what is perceived as mass adoption (so that the support system is there, and that there's a large talent pool to draw/recruit from). I personally want people to start believing that Flex is the industrial strength solution, vs some "niche" boutique technology. Paul Andrews wrote: Is it just me that thinks Adobe is doing fine just as they are? I think the real Flex breakthroughs will come as developers start releasing clever apps and people start saying "holy s**t".   I happen to think that the developer support by Adobe (and Macromedia before them) is phenomenal.  Flex will move forward quietly until it hits it's tipping point, then adoption will surge ahead.   Don't worry too much about promoting Flex - let your applications do that for you.   Paul   ----- Original Message ----- From: Tariq Ahmed To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]ups.com Sent: Wednesday, October 04, 2006 9:58 PM Subject: Re: [flexcoders] Flex Marketing I'd agree to that. The marketing effort seems to heavily rely on the development community doing that job for them. Things like labs and DevNet are KEY to maximizing technology adoption - but people need to know about it in the first place. To Restate Adobe's Goal: 1 000 000 Flex Developers by 2010. Some HEAVY DUTY marketing is needed. It definitely made sense to capture those who are most amiable to Flex (CF and Flash developers) first and grow from there. I think someone blogged about this before; in that of course Adobe related blogs are going to be heavy proponents for Adobe technologies. But now it's time to penetrate into the rest of the world. In polling my heavy duty tech friends in other industries, they BARELY know what Flex is. Many haven't heard of it. And some have heard of it, just because they heard me mention it. Awareness of the brand and technology needs to be more prevalent. Gimme a cool Flex decal and I'll put it on my car! :) Clint Modien wrote: I mentioned this @ the Silicon Valley Flex User Group meeting the other day but I wanted to reiterate it here and see if I could invoke a response from Adobe. Mr. Mendels? Where is the marketing for Flex? Why keep the most beautiful framework in the world for creating applications a secret? Where are the Visual Studio style banner adds everywhere. Where is the buzz for it on Slashdot. Why arn't other developers in the world standing up and saying is creating applications really this easy!?! I've seen the lights go on in a developers eyes when they get it. When they see what 5 lines of code can acomplish with Flex. They get excited. Excitement sells licenses. (Gets off his soapbox and points to it...) ... Thoughts? __._,_.___ -- Flexcoders Mailing List FAQ: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/flexcoders/files/flexcodersFAQ.txt Search Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/flexcoders%40yahoogroups.com SPONSORED LINKS Software development tool Software development Software development services Home design software Software development company Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe __,_._,___