RE: [libreoffice-website] Work on the "Why?" pages

Hi all,

> From: commerce@traduction.biz

> I just posted an expanded version of the "Why for Home?" page.
>
> There's quite a bit more text in there. With someone's comment of
> "text, text, text..." still ringing in my ears, i feel I'd better
> explain my thinking a bit.

:) Ok that "someone" was me, and I wrote all why pages originally.

Well, I am surprised that no Graphic Designer is attached to the website project.

I tried to bring in an excellent Graphic designer, but it seems external graphic designers are not 
welcome until SC or some other team gives him a thorough cavity search. So I dropped the idea.

At present, the website looks exactly like a wiki (and thence the remark "text text text..."). 
Apart from the LibO logo (which is a mixed up thing, as logos go), there are no graphics at all.
All pages look exactly the same (Home page, L1, L2...), with no visual differential (with color, 
layout, fonts, breaks...)
The screen space is not divided according to graphic design principles.
The site has no tagline, search or site map (three basic things).

It is assumed that the visitor would be interested enough to stay and soak up all that text (and 
text and text and...)
He will look through all pages till he finds what he wants (no map, no search).

We do have a wiki for LibO. So the website should be devoted to main points, and for details, the 
visitor should be taken to the Wiki.

Compare the site with http://www.openoffice.org/ and http://why.openoffice.org/
I am not saying that OOo site is ideal, but at least it has many visual elements to hold the 
interest of the visitor.

Websites are designed by Graphic Designers, not Engineers.
The text is written by copywriters, not manual-writers (the different is in slant: marketing vs 
engineering).

Therefore we need graphic designers to redesign the pages.
And copywriters to brush up (and snip away) what we have written.

****
@Role of SEO in success of LibO:

Since LibO is a OpenOffice fork, we actually do not need much help from SEO.
I have already added the metatags to most pages, which should be sufficient to start with

There is a separate page for Libo at Wikipedia, which also should be a big start.
Wikipedia also has Libo in the first place in Open Source apps list 
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_applications).

A major remaining step is registration with Google ASAP.
Then hits will ramp up within 2-3 months, with careful tuning of metadata.
******
Now that SEO (machine reading/spidering) is out of the way, we must concentrate on HUMAN readers.

How can we hold THEIR interest??

We need to emphasize how LibO is different from the other versions.
That should explained prominently at the website, in terms of (a) philosophy and (b) features.

For example, Novell version of OpenOffice boasts of compatibility with MSO.
Oracle version of OOpenOffice boasts of low download costs because of patch-based updates.

We also should position the product in this cluster of "apparently same" products.

-Narayan
                                          
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